Hiring Coaches a "Black and White" Issue for Willingham: Pt. 2

Every offseason the ever-present discussion of minority coaching candidates (or lack thereof) exists under the recruitment chatter. I personally believe that the color of the skin of a coach should never enter the mind of any hiring official. Yet the media continues to point out the number of minority candidates each year, and by doing this, marginalizes the real issue.

The issue at hand is that all coaches, minority or otherwise, should be looked at equally, but the media continues to categorize them. Keeping count of minority coaches puts undue pressure on administrations to hire them, even though they may not be ready, and it puts pressure on the minority candidates to either succeed or be perceived as another example of a minority coach failing. 

If all the most-qualified candidates are non-minority, then so be it, all the coaches should be non-minority. If all the most qualified candidates are members of minorities, then all the coaches should be members of minorities. The hiring of coaches should be based on the merits and experience that one gains over the course of a career, not about the NCAA's worry about their quota. I think that this argument is in the best interest of not only the NCAA product, but for coaches at large.

Unfortunately, in the world we live in, some people want to look at the skin color of a coach. Some set equality back by using race as an excuse for failure and blame everyone else but themselves, calling racism. Tyrone Willingham is one of those individuals. As a minority coach, he saw himself as a trailblazer, the first black head coach in Notre Dame and Washington's history.

It's a feat to be commended, for sure. But he took these positions and felt the need to use them as a forum to further a cause rather than do his job. As he stated in an article in the Chicago Tribune:

"For me, the experience was a stepping-stone; hopefully not a stepping-stone personally, but a stepping-stone for African-Americans.”

Again, nothing wrong with breaking a barrier for minorities, but he neglected to do his job on the field and in the office. It's one thing to get the job; it's another to take it, make a statement, and lose sight of what you were hired to do as the media reacts. He neglected the job he had taken, that "not of an activist, but as a molder of young men," as he himself stated.

He took a Notre dame team that was accustomed to 10-win seasons and reduced it to mediocrity with five- and six-win seasons.

The Tribune article goes on to state that Sylvester Croom and Ron Prince were fired after Willingham, leaving only three FBS Division minority coaches. Never mind that the coaches fired had a combined winning percentage of .395 at their respective schools (38 wins in 96 games).

Willingham was fired at Notre Dame under speculation that it was racially motivated, due to the fact that he was a black coach at the traditionally white school.

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