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Texas Tech has suspended basketball coach Mark Adams on Sunday over “an inappropriate, unacceptable, and racially insensitive comment” he made to a Black player.
Athletic director Kirby Hocutt said he was made aware of the incident Friday and issued a written reprimand before deciding to suspend Adams to investigate further.
According to ABC News, the incident occurred in a meeting between Adams and a player, who wasn’t identified, the school said in a news release.
To date, only the school has released any information regarding the incident and consequential suspension.
Adams says he never apologized as school tries to cover for him
Adams stated, “I said that in the Bible that Jesus talks about how we all have bosses, and we all are servants. I was quoting the Bible about that.”
Adams spoke with Jeff Goodman of Stadium and related that he believes his comments were not racist. Adams claims he was quoting a Bible verse when he told one of his players that there is “always a master and a servant.”
According to Yahoo! Sports, Adams, 66, addressed the team the following day, but said it was to explain the situation, not offer an apology.
“One of my coaches said it bothered the player,” Adams said. “I explained to them. I didn’t apologize.”
Yet, according to an ESPN source, Adams apologized to the team after he found out the player was upset about the use of the Bible verse.
The school’s statement also contradicts Adams recollection of events, saying, “Adams was encouraging the student-athlete to be more receptive to coaching and referenced Bible verses about workers, teachers, parents, and slaves serving their masters,” the statement read. “Adams immediately addressed this with the team and apologized.”
The school didn’t immediately say who would fill in for Adams as coach for the upcoming Big 12 Tournament, and the alleged apology has not been publicly confirmed by any player to date.
White coaches have a long history of taking the hoods off
Three years ago, Pat Chambers resigned at Penn State after one of his former players revealed the coach said he wanted to “loosen the noose that’s around your neck” when talking to the player about helping him reduce stress.
During the 2020-21 season, Creighton coach Greg McDermott apologized for telling his team after a loss to “stay on the plantation” as a way to reminding them to stick together. McDermott was suspended for one game.
GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville, who spent decades as a college coach, both at the University of Mississippi and Auburn, once said, “They want reparations,” he said, screaming, “because they think the people that do the crime are owed that! Bullsh–! They are not owed that.”
UT-Chattanooga fired an assistant coach for an insulting and racist tweet about Stacey Abrams after her run for governor of Georgia.
Former TCU football coach Gary Patterson used the N-word with his players. He’s now an assistant coach at the University of Texas.
Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy has had numerous issues with race. University of Iowa football players sued the school for racial discrimination. There was the resignation of Cale Gundy.
There was also the embarrassingly racist tone-deaf use of a Trayvon Martin photo by Ohio State to enforce the team’s rule prohibiting use of hooded sweatshirts.
More influential than ever, student-athletes must demand change with NIL sponsors
Now that college hoopers are able to earn money from their labor through name, image, likeness (NIL) contracts, student-athletes not only have a platform, but corporate sponsorships which can apply pressure to men like Adams and schools like Texas Tech.
Ever since 2020, many companies have boasted about their DEI programs and social impact, however, with student-athletes now wielding unprecedented influence, those very NIL companies must support players, who to no fault of their own, are thrust into a scandal beyond their making.
Gone are the days where a company can stand in the background like Jerry Jones, hoping things work themselves out, and profiting either way if it doesn’t.
If a business is going to enrich themselves from their talents, players must also demand they stand with them during unforeseen and unprovoked racial controversies, which as aforementioned, is a recurring theme in college athletics.
Coaches who espouse racism of Biblical proportion should be nowhere near a locker room full of still malleable minds, who could’ve absorbed the hateful analogy as the very truth many of their ancestors were once force-fed.
White coaches are constantly given the benefit of a doubt for their racist comments, and a ‘suspension’ will not teach nor tame someone who inherently believes Black people are inferior.