There are too few Black head coaches in college football. In a sport that is roughly 50% Black at the player level, only 15 of 131 FBS jobs are held by Black men. According to an NCAA race and gender demographics database, 61% of football players in the SEC are Black, and yet there are no Black coaches in one of the richest and certainly the most recently successful conferences in the sport. Qualified Black coaches are out there, but the responsibility rests with athletic directors to follow through and hire them.
In an effort to surface more of them as well as prepare them for interview scenarios and provide athletic directors with data on candidates that fit their criteria, Under Armour has ramped up its five-year commitment to the National Coalition for Minority Football Coaches with a $1.5 million investment, much of which will go to expanding the Coalition’s academy program that pairs up-and-coming Black coaches with sitting athletic directors.
Representation will always matter to those who are in the underrepresented class. For former five-star recruit Rakim Jarrett, the fact that his head coach Mike Locksley, the coalition’s founder and president, was hired by Maryland from Alabama (where Locksley recruited Jarrett as an assistant) helped the Terps beat out SEC stalwarts for his commitment.
