The stories of Black athletes integrating professional sports are legendary. Names like Jackie Robinson, Althea Gibson and Lee Elder are known throughout the cosmos as pioneers for justice and equality.
Little, however, was known about the integration of college basketball until ESPN’s groundbreaking documentary, “Black Magic,” chronicled the lives of former players and coaches that worked to desegregate the collegiate athletic conferences.
Televised commercial free, March 16 and 17, “Black Magic,” drew a 1.3 household rating, watched by an average of 1.2 million households, making it the ESPN’s most-watched documentary ever. The film documents the injustices faced by Black college athletes during the civil rights movement as told through the lives of basketball players and coaches from that period.
Perry Wallace, the first Black basketball player to play in the Southeastern Conference, remembered vividly his days in Tennessee as a Vanderbilt Commodore. Some days, says Wallace, were pleasant. Others, he admits, were frightening.
“When you played in the stadiums of the Mississippi and Alabama schools, you encountered a hostile crowd of thousands screaming racial epithets: nigger, coon, all the old-fashioned stuff. I received hate letters. My life was threatened,” says Wallace, who played from 1967-1970.
The Southeastern Conference was established in 1932, when the 13 members of the Southern Conference left to form their own conference. Ten teams make up the SEC including: the University of Alabama, Auburn University, the University of Mississippi, Mississippi State University and University of Tennessee.
