Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin has partnered with North Carolina Central men’s basketball head coach LeVelle Moton to help young minority men’s and women’s basketball coaches. Myron Medcalf of ESPN reported the news.
Moton and Tomlin hatched the plan over a decade ago at Steelers training camp, per Medcalf, who wrote that Moton, a lifelong friend of Tomlin, attends training camp every year.
“It’s not only a moral obligation, but a social responsibility to leave the game and our vocation better than we found it,” Tomlin said in a statement to ESPN.
The two will hold “The Next Up” conference that will look to identify Black and minority head coaches who are rising up the ranks and help them get in front of key decision-makers across the college sports landscape. Moton has been the head coach at NC Central since 2009 and has led the team to four NCAA tournament appearances during his time there. Prior to taking over as the head coach, Moton served as an assistant at NC Central and also played at the school from 1992-1996. He’s the all-time winningest head coach in NC Central history.
Tomlin is also on the board of directors for the National Coalition of Minority Football Coaches, founded by Maryland head football coach Mike Locksley. Tomlin will now look to also help advance the careers of Black and minority coaches across the college basketball landscape.
As of two years ago, 82% of all head coaches in men’s and women’s basketball were white, Medcalf noted. Those figures are according to The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida’s annual report.
With the NCAA tournament continuing tonight with the Sweet Sixteen before the Elite Eight starts on Saturday, all eyes are on the sport, which explains the timing of the announcement. There are three minority coaches in the remaining teams. They are Marquette, coached by Shaka Smart, along with NC State, coached by Kevin Keatts, and Houston’s Kelvin Sampson. NC State and Marquette play each other at 7:09 ET tonight.
One of the reasons for the initiative is due to the rise of search firms for finding coaches, and Moton told Medcalf it’s changing the landscape and not allowing minority coaches to get the same opportunities. The hope is that the initiative and the conference will get minority coaches in front of people making decisions and help them advance in their careers.
