Coaches of Color Are Hard to Find in College Football

Big-time college football lags far behind other college and professional sports in its record of hiring minority coaches, according to a new study by the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida.

All but two of the 22 head coaches hired last year to lead the nation’s biggest football programs were white, bringing to eight the total number of nonwhite head football coaches in Division I-A football in the 2008 season, the report notes.

But in recent weeks, even that small number has dwindled, the report says. Late last month, the University of Washington fired Tyrone Willingham as its head coach, and Kansas State University announced this week that its head coach, Ron Prince, would leave at the end of the season. Both men are African American.

Since 1996, 12 African-American head coaches have been hired out of 199 vacancies, said Richard E. Lapchick, author of the report and director of the institute. And although 54 percent of football players in Division I-A are African American, Asian, or Latino, only 7 percent of head coaches and 33 percent of assistant coaches are, the report states. —Libby Sander