Maryland’s Mike Locksley Named 2nd Most Influential Black Figure in College Football By Sports Illustrated

University of Maryland football coach Mike Locksley has been named the second most influential black figure in college football in a list written by Richard Johnson for Sports Illustrated, coming behind former NFL/MLB star and current Colorado Buffaloes head coach Deion Sanders.

Locksley returned to Maryland in December 2018 as head coach, following the firing of D. J. Durkin. After serving as an assistant coach for several college football squads, he became the head coach of the University of New Mexico in 2009, coming back to Maryland as an offensive coordinator after his dismissal from UNM in 2011. In 2015, Locksley was named the interim head coach at Maryland after Randy Edsall was relieved of his duties. Locksley did not return to Maryland after that season, joining the University of Alabama as an offensive analyst. Locksley was promoted to offensive coordinator for the 2018 season, and that year received the  Broyles Award, given to the nation’s top assistant coach.

In June 2020, Locksley founded the National Coalition of Minority Football Coaches (NCMFC). It’s foundations are dedicated to preparing, promoting, and producing minority coaches at all levels of football (professional, collegiate, scholastic, and recreational). The full blurb on coach Locksley from the Sports Illustrated article can be seen below.

Few coaches have put their money where their mouth is like Locksley has as far as advancing coaching diversity. The organization he founded after brainstorming during the COVID-19 lockdown—the National Coalition for Minority Football Coaches—seeks to help level the playing field for minority coaches, who, despite being over 50% of the playing population in FBS football, are nowhere near that parity from a head coaching standpoint.

“We’re not here to tell people who to hire,” Locksley told Sports Illustrated in March 2022. “But what we are here to say is we do have minority coaches, and you keep hearing ‘We don’t have a pipeline,’ and that’s so not true. There’s so many coaches that are prepared with the tools necessary to lead programs but we just want you to put ‘em on the dance floor and give them a real opportunity.”

Besides its robust membership (over 1,500 coaches), the coalition’s stated goals are to prepare, promote and produce minority football coaches and administrators. One of the key ways they do so is through their academy program, which pairs a young minority coach with an established athletic director.

Featured photo courtesy of the University of Maryland