Historic black colleges ready to do battle in LV

Steve Guiremand

Friday, Sept. 20, 2002 | 10:22 a.m.

It's called the Silver Dollar Classic. But Saturday night's game between Grambling State and Tennessee State at Sam Boyd Stadium could just as easily be called the Black History Bowl.

The two storied football programs have produced some of the National Football League's biggest stars, including Grambling State head coach Doug Williams, who was Super Bowl XXII MVP as quarterback of the Washington Redskins.

Tennessee State (1-2), based in Nashville, has won 11 Black College National Championships and has also produced NFL stars such as Richard Dent, Ed "Too Tall" Jones, Claude Humphrey and the late Joe Gilliam, Jr., a quarterback with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Eighteen Tigers have gone on to play in the Super Bowl including defensive end Anthony Pleasant with the New England Patriots last season.

Meanwhile, Grambling State (2-1), which hails from Grambling, La., has won back-to-back Black College national titles under Williams. The school was made famous by former coach Eddie Robinson who compiled a remarkable 408-165-15 record and won eight Black College national titles before retiring after the 1997 season.

Grambling State has produced over 200 NFL players including Williams, quarterback James Harris, former Green Bay Packers great Willie Davis, defensive back Willie Brown and wide receivers Charlie Joiner, Sammie White and Jake Reed.

The two schools were among the few in the south that would allow black football players to compete until the early 1970s when former Alabama coaching legend Bear Bryant finally broke the color barrier in the SEC. That occurred after USC went into Birmingham in 1970 and handed the Crimson Tide a rare 42-21 pounding.

That contest is featured prominently in a section entitled "History-Shaping Games" in this year's USC football media guide.

"It's a rare feat when a football game helps to change social attitudes (but) the 1970 USC win over Alabama may have done just that," the guide states. "Thanks to dominating performances for USC by a trio of African-Americans (Sam Cunningham, Clarence Davis and Jimmy Jones), Bryant was convinced he needed to recruit black players to his program. The rest of the Southeastern Conference soon followed suit and opportunities for black athletes in the South began to improve tremendously."

Bryant was so impressed by the play of Cunningham, older brother of former UNLV star Randall Cunningham, that he invited him into Alabama's all-white locker room afterward and introduced him to each player.

"This is what a football player looks like," Bryant said.

As more and more black athletes moved into conferences like the SEC, perennially all-black schools such as Grambling State and Tennessee State saw their programs drop to Division 1-AA status.

"There's no question that a lot of players that used to go to schools like Grambling now go everywhere else," UNLV coach John Robinson said. "But I still think those schools are thriving and those teams are thriving."

Organizers decided to hold the game this year in Las Vegas to expose African-American youth in the West to the history of Black College Football. The Silver Dollar Classic is part of a series of games that also combines cultural experiences under what are being billed as Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Football Classics.

A crowd of about 20,000 is expected for the game which kicks off at 7:30 p.m. Tickets, priced from $20 to $100, can be obtained at unlvtickets.com or by calling 739-FANS.

Further information on the Silver Dollar Classic and the events associated with it can be found on the Internet at www.silverdollarclassic.com.