Racial Profiling: Majority of HBCU Victories Come in NCAA's Preliminary Round

After Richmond shocked Jim Boeheim-coached Syracuse in 1991 and Santa Clara kayoed Lute Olson's Arizona squad in 1993, the next three #15 seed victories over #2 seeds came at the hands of historically-black colleges and universities - Coppin State over South Carolina in 1997, Hampton over Iowa State in 2001 and Norfolk State over Missouri in 2012.

However, no HBCU institution has reached the Sweet 16 and the last 13 representatives in non-preliminary round contests have a losing margin of 26.4 points since Norfolk State's success. Perceived in most quarters as picking-on-patsies fodder, the truth about black crime in basketball is that it's a big sin many fans don't know or can't recall the high degree of success historically-black colleges and universities enjoyed at the small-college level. For instance, Norfolk State appeared in the NCAA Division II Tournament 10 times in a 12-year span from 1984 until finishing third in the 1995 tourney. But most of these HBCU institutions currently are imprisoned at the NCAA Division I level, where they are little more than indentured servants doing the bidding of their major-university masters almost always getting whipped on the road during non-conference competition.

What many observers should know is seven different historically black colleges and universities advancing to the NCAA DI level captured a total of nine NAIA and NCAA College Division Tournament championships in a 21-year span from 1957 through 1977 (Tennessee State from 1957 through 1959, Grambling '61, Prairie View A&M '62, Winston-Salem State '67, Morgan State '74, Coppin State '76 and Texas Southern '77). Coppin State is the lone school in this group to go on and post a triumph in the NCAA Division I playoffs.

Winson-Salem State saw what life looked like on the DI side of the fence and abandoned ship after only one season. All but two of the 25 HBCUs endured at least one season with 20 defeats in a six-year span from 2003-04 through 2008-09. The pair that emerged unscathed during that stretch were Hampton (worst record was 13-17 in 2003-04) and Norfolk State (11-19 in 2006-07).

Despite both leagues prevailing in the same year for the first time in 2021, conference members from the Mid-Eastern Athletic and Southwestern Athletic have won only 10% of their NCAA Division I Tournament games after Howard University and Texas Southern each succumbed by more than 20 points this year. Alcorn State registered the first three of the following modest total of 14 HBCU wins in the DI tourney versus non-HBCU competition (eight in preliminary-round competition; SWAC's Texas Southern matched up against MEAC's North Carolina Central in First Four in 2018) since the SWAC and MEAC moved up to the Division I level in 1979-80 and 1980-81, respectively:

1980 Midwest First Round: #8 Alcorn State 70 (Baker/Smith team-high 18 points), #9 South Alabama 62 (Rains 22)
1983 Midwest Preliminary Round: Alcorn State 81 (Phelps 18), Xavier 75 (Fleming 16)
1984 Midwest Preliminary Round: Alcorn State 79 (Phelps 21), Houston Baptist 60 (Lavodrama 14)
1993 West First Round: #13 Southern (LA) 93 (Scales 27), #4 Georgia Tech 78 (Mackey 27)
1997 East First Round: #15 Coppin State 78 (Singletary 22), #2 South Carolina 65 (McKie 16)
2001 West First Round: #15 Hampton 58 (Williams 16), #2 Iowa State 57 (Rancik/Shirley 10)
2004 Preliminary Round: Florida A&M 72 (Woods 21), Lehigh 57 (Tempest 13)
2010 Preliminary Round: Arkansas-Pine Bluff 61 (Smith 14), Winthrop 44 (Corbin 13)
2012 West First Round: #15 Norfolk State 86 (O'Quinn 26), #2 Missouri (Dixon 22)
2013 Preliminary Round: North Carolina A&T 73 (Underwood 19), Liberty 72 (Marshall 22)
2015 Preliminary Round: Hampton 74 (Chievous/Johnson 15), Manhattan 64 (Richards 17)
2021 Preliminary Round: Texas Southern 60 (Walker III 19), Mount St. Mary's 52 (Chong Qui 14)
2021 Preliminary Round: Norfolk State 54 (Hawkins 24), Appalachian State 53 (Forrest 18)
2022 Preliminary Round: Texas Southern 76 (Etienne 21), Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (67 (Tennyson 18)