USC’s fairytale overshadows Michigan State’s true stories when the teams meet in Hollywood
PHOTO: Eight months after Michigan State coach Duffy Daugherty’s Spartans beat UCLA in the 1956 Rose Bowl, he was on the cover of Time Magazine, October 8, 1956. Daugherty’s impact on college football integration spanned his career, 1954 to 1972.
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History writes people out of the story. It’s our job to write them back in.”
— David Maraniss, Pulitzer Prize-winner and biographer.
By TOM SHANAHAN
Michigan State and USC share more than Big Ten affiliation when they meet Saturday night at the Coliseum. College football lore credits the schools with integration leadership, but one has been unjustly given credence to over the other.
USC’s claim is a fairytale, yet the 1970 USC-Alabama game is embedded in college football lore.
Michigan State’s story is factual, but it is lost to history due to negligent sports journalism that avoided race and documenting 1960s milestones.
How could the media get so much so wrong? Why can’t the media admit it was duped by a false narrative?
First, digging up the myth.
USC’s revisionist history of Alabama coach Bear Bryant orchestrating events was bolstered by the allure of Bryant’s legend. Journalists who should know better fail to challenge it to this day.
The myth’s denouement was the performance of USC fullback Sam Cunningham, an African American. He ran for 135 yards and two touchdowns in the 42-21 victory, but the only facts about the game played on September 12 at Legion Field in Birmingham are found in the box score.
The tale claims Bryant scheduled the game as one to lose to launch integration. Bryant wanted Cunningham’s dominant performance against his all-White roster to shock his bigoted fans into allowing him to recruit Black athletes. The excuse made for Bryant was his hands were tied by racist Alabama Gov. George Wallace and Jim Crow.
The tale, aggrandizing USC’s role, was crafted among USC boosters two decades after the game was played. When they looked back upon college football landscape and saw a void due to 1960s sports media failures, they ignored their own poor track record on diversity. They conveniently backed up Cunningham’s performance to fill the hole.
The fairytale, though, failed to acknowledge what the 1990s media missed: Steady if tumultuous progress throughout the 1960s.
By the 1970 season, 33 of 37 major southern programs included Black players. The USC myth poses Bryant as a crusader leading the way, but when Wilbur Jackson was Alabama’s first Black player in 1970, Bryant was bringing up the rear. He was the seventh of 10 SEC coaches to recruit his first Black player.
Auburn, Alabama’s in-state and Southeastern Conference rival, was a year ahead of Alabama when James Owens was Auburn’s first Black player in 1969. No one fired Auburn coach Shug Jordan.
One by one, southern schools recruited their first Black football players. They were keeping talent home that was otherwise boarding Michigan State coach Duffy Daugherty’s Underground Railroad or bound northward for other schools.
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The 1960s pioneers included Maryland’s Darryl Hill, 1963; Wake Forest’s Bob Grant and Butch Henry, 1964; Houston’s Warren McVea, 1964; Southern Methodist’s Jerry LeVias, 1965; Kentucky’s Nate Northington and Greg Page, 1966; Kentucky’s Wilbur Hackett and Houston Hogg, 1967; and Tennessee’s Lester McClain, 1967. Another pioneer was Gary Steele at Army West Point, 1966. They stood up to Jim Crow and the KKK.
LISTEN TO THE END GAME podcast episodes on Michigan State, Wake Forest, Kentucky, Houston, Auburn, Southern Methodist, Tennessee, Army West Point and more.
The End Game: Race and Sports – Tom Shanahan Report
MORE ON MICHIGAN STATE AND DUFFY’S INFLUENCE ON THE SOUTH: Three Black Teenagers Changed the Face of College Football and Got Written Out of History – Tom Shanahan Report
MY BOOKS SOLD IN THE BELLY OF THE BEAST ON THE USC CAMPUS
The truth sets you free in USC’s Belly of the Beast – Tom Shanahan Report
MY BOOKS AND DOCUMENTARY DEVELOPMENT TOLD IN DETAIL ON SOUTH FLORIDA TRIBUNE PODCAST
Author Tom Shanahan: Raye of Light with Forward by Tony Dungy
There was nothing shocking for southern fans to see Black athletes playing in stadiums below the Mason Dixon Line by 1970.
Maryland’s integrated 1963 team played games throughout the Atlantic Coast Conference schedule. Houston’s integrated rosters played at multiple southern stadiums from 1965 to 1969 and beyond.
Among other moments was Houston at Tennessee, 1965; UCLA playing Tennessee in Memphis, 1965; Army West Point facing Tennessee in Memphis, 1966; and Wake Forest at Auburn, 1966.
Wake Forest’s Freddie Summers was the South’s first Black quarterback in 1967 while playing for the North Carolina school in Winston-Salem. Southern Methodist, in addition to playing at Southwest Conference stadiums throughout LeVias’ All-American career, took the field at Auburn and won, 1968. LeVias caught a touchdown pass and a two-point conversion.
College football integration was a fait accompli by 1970.
On the same day of the 1970 season openers when USC played at Alabama, Stanford upset No. 4 ranked Arkansas at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock. Stanford was led by an all-minority backfield. Fullback Hillary Shockley, an African American from Los Angeles High, scored three touchdowns with 149 total yards. This was ABC-TV’s national game of the week in the days there was only one national game of the week. USC-Alabama was limited to local radio networks.
Also on that day, September 12, Georgia Tech’s Eddie McAshan was the Deep South’s first Black quarterback to start a game. He led the unranked Yellow Jackets to an upset of No. 17 South Carolina’s integrated roster at Grant Field in Atlanta.
The myth’s many weeds that grew and obscured history’s integration trail was born in the late 1980s in Los Angeles circles among USC boosters, according to an account from USC alumnus Steven Travers in his 2007 book, “TWO TEAMS, ONE NIGHT.”
The myth spread in the early 1990s upon Loel Scrader of the Long Beach Press-Telegram picking up on the word-of-mouth tale and publishing it. The national media, susceptible to Bryant tales, failed to vet the myth. It has been regurgitated since then, jumping from newspapers to magazines, to the Internet and films.
Travers received plenty of backlash among USC backers for telling true stories, albeit overall he believes portions of the myth USC influenced Alabama.
When the 1960s moments are researched and dusted off, Daugherty’s unappreciated leadership is evident. Daugherty wasn’t a self-promoter and that lack of public awareness contributed to Bryant/Cunningham/USC myth shoving him into the shadows.
In 1962, The Associated Press reported Michigan State’s 17 Black players represented the most in major college football history. The Spartans’ 1964 team was the first fully integrated roster to play in the South in a game against North Carolina at Kenan Stadium in segregated Chapel Hill.
Daugherty was the first to abandon an unwritten quota limiting Black athletes. USC was among those programs remaining in single digits. This point, compared to Michigan State’s rosters, is an aspect of the myth Travers only recently began to understand.
Despite USC’s campus located in populous and diverse Los Angeles, the Trojans’ 1962 national title team numbered only five Black players and the 1967 national championship roster only seven. One of the seven was San Francisco City College import O.J. Simpson.
USC coach John McKay admitted in his 1974 book, “McKAY: A COACH’S STORY,” he heard complaints from the Black community about his lack of Black players. He told them USC was no different than any other program. This was a disingenuous comment. USC played Daugherty’s fully integrated rosters in 1963 at the Coliseum and at Spartan Stadium in 1964.
USC’s 1967 roster traveled to Michigan State a year after the Spartans’ two-year run of 1965 and 1966 shared national titles with Black athletes that numbered in the 20s.
In the 1966 Game of the Century when unbeatens Notre Dame at Michigan State played to a 10-10 tie to share the national title in their quasi-national championship, Notre Dame’s roster numbered one Black player, Alan Page.
Michigan State lined up 20 Black players, 11 Black starters, two Black team captains, College Football Hall of Famers George Webster and Clinton Jones, and the South’s first Black quarterback to win a national title, Jimmy Raye, who rode Daugherty’s Underground Railroad from segregated Fayetteville, N.C.
Although it’s true USC’s 1970 roster numbered 18 Black athletes against Alabama, the Trojans started only four Black players — three seniors and a junior — as a product of shedding the quota limitation years. Of the 18 players, 15 arrived in 1969 or 1970. Nine were through junior college route and two as four-year school transfers.
Daugherty’s influence also extends his coaching tree. Four assistants on his first staff in 1954 followed his blueprint of ignoring quota limitations upon becoming a head coach.
They were Dan Devine (Arizona State, Missouri, Notre Dame), Bob Devaney (Wyoming, Nebraska), Bill Yeoman (desegregated Houston) and Grandelius. Three other Duffy Daugherty Disciples were Earle Edwards (desegregated NC State), Frank Kush (followed Devine at ASU) and Chuck Fairbanks (Oklahoma).
Daugherty also opened doors to Black coaches through influences of former Michigan State players and assistants Sherman Lewis (Louisville, Kentucky), Jimmy Raye (Fayetteville, N.C.) and Tyrone Willingham (Jacksonville, N.C). All three arrived at Michigan State as Underground Railroad passengers before embarking upon their coaching careers.
Raye and Lewis, after their time as Spartans assistants, moved on as long-time NFL assistants. Willingham was a head coach at Stanford, Notre Dame and Washington.
Raye was the NFL’s second Black coordinator as offensive coordinator of the Rams, in 1983. The Pro Football Hall of Fame honored Raye with its inaugural NFL Awards of Excellence in 2022.
Lewis was the first Black offensive coordinator to win a Super Bowl ring with 1996 Green Bay Packers. Lewis was honored in 2023 in the second NFL Awards of Excellence class.
Willingham, recruited by Raye and accepted by Daugherty as a walk-on, was the first Black coach to take a team to the Rose Bowl (Stanford) and the first Black head coach in any sport at Notre Dame.
Meanwhile, the role of UCLA, USC’s cross-town rival, also has been overlooked. In 1961, UCLA’s eight Black players, led by Kermit Alexander, threatened to boycott the Rose Bowl if Alabama’s all-White team was invited over the traditional Big Ten representative.
Bryant worked behind the scenes due to a lapse in the Rose Bowl contract between the Big Ten and the Athletic Association of Western Universities (the Pac-8 forerunner). AAWU commissioner Tom Hamilton, Bryant’s World War II U.S. Navy buddy, was in position to pick the AAWU champion’s opponent.
But when Los Angeles Times columnist Jim Murray exposed the feelings of UCLA’s players and confronted Bryant – who offered a no comment — the Rose Bowl backed down. Minnesota, with single-digit Black players, was invited.
In a similar 1961 college football integration moment ignored by the media, Colorado, coached by Duffy Daugherty Disciple Sonny Grandelius, threatened to boycott the Orange Bowl in segregated Miami unless the Buffaloes’ five Black players were granted the same hotel and restaurant accommodations. The threat was delivered by Joe Romig, a White offensive lineman who is in the College Football Hall of Fame. The Orange Bowl and Miami backed down.
The 1962 Rose Bowl and Orange Bowl sagas remain ignored by the media in favor of falsely posing Bryant and USC as crusaders.
The USC fairytale’s popularity promoting Bryant and USC over Daugherty and the true pioneers in the South and UCLA is like taking a history bag, shaking it and having Alabama Gov. George Wallace tumble out as a Civil Rights hero and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. lost to history.
One way to explain the false narrative’s successful spread is explained with a quote from historian Ken Burns. The award-winning documentarian said this in a 2020 National Sports Media Association Zoom call about researching stories:
“We tend to resort to conventional, superficial understandings, tying things up to nice bows.”
The claim the 1970 USC-Alabama led the way is a snappy parable. It’s easily repeated.
The facts Daugherty led the way with milestones spanning his 19 years from 1954 to 1972 require a lengthy explanation. It’s a tome difficult to briefly sum up and repeat.
Bryant/Cunningham is nice bow.
Daugherty is unwinding a thick industrial spool of wire.
The 1970 USC-Alabama myths continue with no apparent midnight pumpkin.
Not until a prominent national media figure espousing the myth admits to the sloppy journalism.
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All of the above research is found In my books, “RAYE OF LIGHT” and “THE RIGHT THING TO DO.” I will debate the fairytale vs. facts with anybody, anytime, anywhere.
ADDENDUM
USC backers often embellish their history as inclusive by pointing to USC’s C.R. Roberts, a Black halfback, in the 1950s.
Roberts ran for 251 yards and three touchdowns to lead USC to a season-opening win at segregated Texas. That’s true. But in the next nine games, Roberts only gained 519 yards, 57.7 per game, with only two more touchdowns to finish with 775 and five.
Jon Arnett led USC with six touchdowns while he rushed for 625 yards. Ernie Zampese ran for 500 yards. Arnett was the Pacific Coast Conference Player of the Year in 1955 and 1956.
Roberts didn’t move the needle as USC continued to limit its Black athletes.
FOR MORE OF MY STORIES ON 1970 USC-ALABAMA/BEAR BRYANT FICTION
My lengthy catalogue of 1970 USC-Alabama myths and Bear Bryant fairytales – Tom Shanahan Report
USC backers also point to Willie Wood as the Trojans’ quarterback, in 1959. Black quarterbacks were rare in the 1950s but not unprecedented.
Michigan State’s Willie Thrower was the first Black quarterback in the NFL as a rookie in 1953 with the Chicago Bears. Sidney Williams, an African American, was Wisconsin’s quarterback, 1956 to 1958. Wilburn Hollis was at Black QB at Iowa, 1959 to 1961. Minnesota’s Sandy Stephens was the first Black quarterback to win a national title in 1960 and the first Black quarterback to win a Rose Bowl game in the 1962 contest (1961 season).
Wood didn’t move the needle at USC.
It shouldn’t be so hard to straighten out history, but I heard a typical media response from Bryant Gumble when I pitched him at HBO Real Sports. He said his “younger audience wouldn’t understand the story.”
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Tom Shanahan is an award-winning sportswriter with two books on college football integration, “RAYE OF LIGHT, Jimmy Raye, Duffy Daugherty, the Integration of College Football and the 1965-66 Michigan State Spartans,” and “THE RIGHT THING TO DO, The True Pioneers of College Football Integration in the 1960s,” and a children’s book, “DUFFY’S COLLEGE FOOTBALL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD.” Shanahan’s 2022 story on the 1962 Rose Bowl, Alabama and segregation was awarded first place for Enterprise from the Football Writers Association of America.
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I invite you to follow me on Twitter @shanny4055
I’ll put my facts on the true pioneers of college football integration versus Bear Bryant fairytales against anybody, anytime, anywhere. Watch here.
Click here for my story on the 1962 Rose Bowl and Segregation and Alabama.
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Click here to purchase The Right Thing To Do
THE RIGHT THING TO DO
The True Pioneers of College Football Integration in the 1960s
Foreword by Ruffin McNeill
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Click here to purchase Raye of Light.
RAYE OF LIGHT
Jimmy Raye, Duffy Daugherty, the 1ntegration of College Football and the 1965-66 Michigan State Spartans
Foreword by Tony Dungy
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DUFFY CHILDREN’S BOOK purchase links: Order from Barnes and Noble here and Amazon here.
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DUFFY HAWAII CHILDREN’S BOOK coming soon at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.
