Marching to the beat of its own drummer: the Heritage Bowl showcases black-college football - Column

There are 20 NCAA-sanctioned bowl games this postseason, and the average college fan could rattle off the names of many of those events in less time than it takes to explain the bowl coalition.

The 20th? You probably couldn't guess in a hundred years, which is how long historically black colleges have been fielding football teams, and about the length of time it took before they had an officially sanctioned postseason football game. (Note: Historically black colleges have been fielding football teams since Biddle -- now Johnson C. Smith -- University and Livingstone played on a snowy December 27, 1892.)

The Heritage Bowl III, scheduled for 4:30 p.m. ET Saturday in Atlanta's Georgia Dome, is the first NCAA-sanctioned black-college bowl game, and the only one that does not involve Division I-A schools. This bowl matches Division I-AA (Southwestern Athletic Conference and Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference) teams; this year's game is between South Carolina State (8-3) and Southern University (10-1).

There are eight other games on the already-glutted New Year's Day bowl agenda, and the Heritage Bowl, without a national broadcast, likely will get lost in the madness. That won't be a first.

The game's forerunners were the Yam, Vulcan, Pecan and Prairie View bowls. (Yes, Prairie View! Under Coach Billy Nicks, Prairie View A&M was a black-college power known as "the black Notre Dame" during the 50s and early '60s.) For years, the Orange Blossom Classic -- with Jake Gaither's powerful Florida A&M Rattlers the host -- served as the unofficial national championship game for black colleges.

On January 1, 1947, there were six black-college "bowl" games played.

Few outside the African American community seemed to notice. Black-college football, in essence, does not exist to mainstream fans or media. Never has. Outside the African American community, black-college football has more of a cult following, and, that, in great measure, is more for its entertaining halftimes.

(Ever notice the ESPN football promos? There is the Grambling band in all its high-steppin' glory -- not the football team, which boasts the winningest coach in NCAA history, Eddie Robinson.)

What's odd here is the impact black-college programs have had on the National Football League, including:

* The most prolific runner in NFL history, Jackson State's Walter Payton.

* Twelve NFL Hall of Famers, including Mel Blount from Southern; Lem Barney from Jackson State, Deacon Jones from South Carolina State and Mississippi Vocational; Willie Lanier from Morgan State; and Larry Little from Bethune-Cookman. Little and Payton are honorary co-chairmen for the Heritage Bowl. Says Little: "The Heritage Bowl is special because it showcases black-college football talent and the efforts and achievements of its players and coaches. I can speak as a player and a coach when I say that black-college teams need and deserve this recognition."

* The NFL's first modern-day African American head coach, Maryland State's Art Shell (Los Angeles Raiders).

* The coach with the best winning percentage in NCAA history among those with more than 200 victories, Gaither (.844; 203-36-4).

* An all-time offense that could include quarterback Doug Williams (Grambling); running backs Payton and Tank Younger Grambling); and wide receivers Jerry Rice (Mississippi Valley), Charlie Joiner (Grambling) and John Stallworth (Alabama A&M). How about a defense that included Willie Davis (Grambling), Ed (Too Tall) Jones Tennessee State), L.C. Greenwood (Arkansas AM&N), Robert Brazile (Jackson State) and Willie Brown (Grambling)?

There was once a grand era for black-college football, yet it is an era we will not see again. Pre-'60s, pre-integration, black colleges spawned some of the game's most incredible players from star-studded squads that engaged in some spirited games.

"The SWAC games were tough," says Ken Houston, who played at Prairie View before beginning a Hall of Fame career as a defensive back with the Oilers and then the Redskins. "The referees would be cheating. You'd have to score 100 points to beat somebody, 7-6."

Yet, the same integration that opened so many doors for African Americans also closed doors on some black-college programs. Black-college football is not slipping into obscurity, though it certainly has flirted with the possibility because of the impact of integration.

"They used to say I had a farm system, and I told them they were right," Gaither said in the 1960s, at a time when white colleges -- especially in the South -- began heavily recruiting African American players. "My boys did come off the farm. Right here under their noses was the greatest talent in the world and they didn't want it."

Enrollment at historically black colleges is on the upswing. The feeling of an anti-African American social climate on some larger campuses, plus athletic scholarship limitations, has made black colleges an attractive alternative. The lure of television and big bucks, however, have put to rest any serious competition between black colleges and major universities for blue-chip athletes.

Still, black-college football thrives in its niche, its golden era gone. But the Heritage lives.

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