Black History Month has been celebrated in some form since 1924. For sports fans, it is a chance to reacquaint themselves with those who broke down barriers in all areas of competition and all segments of society. Many are now household names and American icons: Joe Louis, Jesse Owens, Jackie Robinson, Wilma Rudolph, Muhammad Ali, up to Tiger Woods, Tony Dungy and Venus and Serena Williams today.
Every day throughout February, FanHouse will shed light on the other figures in the history of sports whose breakthroughs were as significant as those mentioned above, but who aren't as instantly recognizable as pioneers. During Black History Month 2010, FanHouse aims to give them their due.
Jerry LeVias
Became the first African American scholarship athlete in the old Southwest Conference in 1965.
Jerry LeVias never set out to be a pioneer when he enrolled in Southern Methodist University and became the first black scholarship athlete in the Southwest Conference. He said he was just adhering to the desires of his grandmother, SMU coach Hayden Fry and, even bigger, God when in 1965 he accepted a scholarship from the Mustangs instead of the more than 100 other college suitors.
Lane Kiffin is the Paris Hilton of college football. He's famous for nothing, essentially, except being famous. While at Tennessee, fresh off a firing from the Oakland Raiders, Kiffin claimed all the negative media publicity that surrounded his 13-month tenure in Knoxville was a deft manipulation of the media. Right. In reality, Kiffin was out of his league when it came to understanding how a major SEC team was covered. Kiffin claimed that the spate of attention, 95 percent of which was negative, was needed to revive a program he characterized as moribund.
A moribund program that was, you know, less than a year removed from playing in the SEC championship game when Kiffin was hired. But, no matter, college football's Paris Hilton had to make a scene. And he did, turning the Tennessee job into an extended version of the The Simple Life. When he bolted for USC, Kiffin claimed he no longer needed to capture media attention because the status of the program was so much better. Then, barely one month into the job, Lane Kiffin went all Paris Hilton on us once more: He offered and accepted the commitment of a 13-year-old quarterback David Sills.
Due to my overlapping bowling date Wednesday with Seantrel Henderson, whose hand overlapped mine when he shook it, I was unable to listen in on University of Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly's Signing Day press conference. Thanks to the miracle of the webernet, though, I was able to peruse his comments on Thursday.
Kelly was funny and forthright, and he also used the term "University of Notre Dame" (as opposed to simply saying, "Notre Dame") 13 times. Granted, that's the school's name, or most of it: if you really wanted to be pretentious, you would say, "The University of Notre Dame du Lac."
Referring to the school by its full, more majestic moniker was no accident. In much the same way that ESPN analyst Ron Jaworski says, "National Football League" instead of "NFL," Kelly was attaching a certain prestige to his program. And that's fine.
Notre -- excuse me, the University of Notre Dame -- Dame signed 23 players to its incoming 2010 freshman class. Five of those players are already on campus, mid-year enrollees. Another 18 faxed their letters of intent on Wednesday, beginning at 7:05 a.m. with defensive end Bruce Heggie, a player who will finish in the Top 10 of his high school class academically and who is the first player in recent memory who comes to South Bend having received no other scholarship offers.
"There's always going to be some questions about recruits that don't have the pedigree," Kelly said of Heggie, "but I kind of like that. I certainly don't have the pedigree, either."
David Sills, all of 13 years old, has verbally committed to USC. Sills is a quarterback out of Bear, Del., who has drawn raves for his talent at such a young age.
"His skill set is off the chart," his personal coach Steve Clarkson told ESPN. "I've never seen anyone at his age do what he's been able to do." Clarkson has mentored other top quarterbacks in the past, including current USC starter Matt Barkley.
According to the ESPN, new USC coach Lane Kiffin received a verbal commitment from Sills on Thursday evening. "He's already six feet as a 13-year-old," Clarkson said. "And he's breaking down NFL footage."
If Sills has indeed verbally committed to USC, it would be an unprecedented moment for college football, and raises all sorts of questions about recruitment. Forget 2012, we're talking about the class of 2015 here.
That's the way it's going to be at Florida State for the time being under first-year head coach Jimbo Fisher. While that is a departure from the regime of former head coach Bobby Bowden, Fisher's approach and presence has rejuvenated the Seminoles' fan base.
Renewal of booster membership is up 90 percent from this point in 2009 according to the boster association, while the ticket office is reporting an 80 percent increase in new sales over the total from this time last year. And let's not forget Fisher's first recruiting class Wednesday, one that secured a top-10 national recruiting ranking.
Make no mistake: this was Jimbo's class. He's head coach, player personnel director and rush chairman. Though each of his assistant coaches played a role, Fisher signed off on all 24 players.
That's an 180-degree turn from Bowden, who let his assistant coaches handle the evaluations of all players aside from quarterback. And in recent years, Bowden eventually turned that responsibility over to Fisher as well.
"It never felt unnatural. No part of it never felt unnatural," Fisher said of the recruiting process under his command for the first time as a head coach.
Black History Month has been celebrated in some form since 1924. For sports fans, it is a chance to reacquaint themselves with those who broke down barriers in all areas of competition and all segments of society. Many are now household names and American icons: Joe Louis, Jesse Owens, Jackie Robinson, Wilma Rudolph, Muhammad Ali, up to Tiger Woods, Tony Dungy and Venus and Serena Williams today.
Lane Kiffin
Due to my overlapping bowling date Wednesday with Seantrel Henderson, whose hand overlapped mine when he shook it, I was unable to listen in on University of 
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- One voice, one message.
