Two other Black head coaches have teams ranked in the top 25: Charlie Strong at the University of Louisville (No.13) and James Franklin, in his third season, at Vanderbilt (No. 23).
No Black head coach in the modern era of college football has won the national championship primarily due to the lack of opportunities for the job that is often the most lucrative on campus. The 2012 season began with 15 African-Americans leading teams out of the 120 that make up the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). That group made up just 12.5 percent of all head coaches in a sport where approximately 60 percent of the players are African-American. That percentage of Black players is higher when you look at the top half of those teams that make up the “Power 5” conferences (ACC, Big 10, Big 12, SEC, Pac-12).
