Sam Cunningham, 1950-2021

Jerry Claiborne was a football coach. From 1954 to 1957, he was an assistant to Paul "Bear" Bryant at Texas A&M University. From 1958 to 1960, he was an assistant to Bryant at the University of Alabama. From 1961 to 1970, he was the head coach at Virginia Tech, leading them to the 1963 Southern Conference Championship. From 1972 to 1981, he was the head coach at the University of Maryland, winning 3 straight Atlantic Coast Conference Championships from 1973 to 1975. From 1982 to 1989, he was the head coach at the University of Kentucky. He won 179 games as a head coach, including 3 bowl games. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame.

But he is mainly remembered for something he said about a player he never coached: "Sam Cunningham did more to integrate Alabama in 60 minutes than Martin Luther King Jr. did in 20 years."

Was it an exaggeration? Yes -- unless you consider the State of Alabama's addiction to football.

Samuel Lewis Cunningham Jr. was born on August 15, 1950 in Santa Barbara, California. He was a 1968 graduate of Santa Barbara High School. Other notable graduates include his brother, Randall Cunningham, an All-Pro quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles; Baseball Hall-of-Famer Eddie Mathews; NBA star Jamaal Wilkes; Olympic Gold Medalists Karch Kiraly (volleyball, 1984 and 1988), Kami Craig (water polo, 2012), actors Timothy Bottoms, Brad Hall, Josh Brolin; film directors Taylor Hackford and Ron Shelton (both in the Class of 1963); dancer Martha Graham; and stockbroker Charles Schwab.

Up until 1972, the NCAA did not allow freshmen to play varsity football except under special circumstances, such as during the manpower drain of World War II, or as emergency measures, such as the 1970 plane crashes that killed most of the players as Wichita State and Marshall Universities. So when Sam Cunningham got his scholarship to the University of Southern California, a.k.a. USC, he did not play as a freshman in their 1969 season.

His debut for the Trojans came in the opening game of his sophomore year, on September 12, 1970. The Trojans, then ranked Number 3 in the nation, took the field at Legion Field in Birmingham, the secondary home field of the University of Alabama, then ranked Number 16.

USC did so with the 1st all-black backfield in college football history, outside of historically black schools: Quarterback Jimmy Jones and running backs Clarence Davis and Sam Cunningham.

'Bama had been forced to racially integrate by President John F. Kennedy in 1963, but still hadn't fielded a single black football player. Of the schools then in the Southeastern Conference, Alabama's arch-rival Auburn, Florida, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Tennessee and Vanderbilt had; Georgia, Louisiana State (a.k.a. LSU) and Mississippi (a.k.a. Ole Miss) also had not. To be fair, Bryant had tried hard to recruit Frank Dowsing to be Alabama's 1st black player in 1969, but, a Mississippi native, he chose Mississippi State instead, becoming their 1st. So the Crimson Tide put an all-white team out against the USC Trojans. Sam Cunningham ran for 135 yards and 2 touchdowns. USC beat 'Bama 42-21. Sam was modest about his achievement, if not about what it meant for his race: "What they saw was the future. Their team was eventually going to be integrated."

The Bear's boys had been humiliated on their own soil by black players. He knew he couldn't send an all-white team out anymore. He also knew that, if he did something, nearly everybody in the State -- those who weren't Auburn fans, anyway -- would go along with it. It was said that he was then the only man who could run for Governor against George Wallace and beat him. But he never ran for public office.

Ironically, in the next off-season, Bryant played golf with USC coach John McKay, who mentioned he had a commitment from a junior college transfer from Alabama, defensive end John Mitchell. Bryant got him to switch. He even became one of the Bear's assistant coaches, and has been on the Pittsburgh Steelers' staff since 1994.

In another irony, Davis, not Cunningham, would lead USC in rushing yards in 1970. They finished 6-4-1, the tie coming at home, at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, to then-Number 9 Nebraska. They also lost away to Number 12 Stanford, away to Oregon, home to the University of California, and against arch-rival UCLA. (Both teams then used the Coliseum for home games, and UCLA was the designated home team this time.)

But they also won away to Iowa, and defeated then-Number 4 Notre Dame. That would be their last game of the season, as they were not invited to a bowl game.

Again in 1971, this time ranked Number 5, they opened the season against an Alabama team ranked Number 16, this time at the Coliseum. Not only did 'Bama have its 1st black player, but this was the 1st time Bryant used the offensive formation that he would use to make his team better than ever: The wishbone, which had done so well for Texas and Oklahoma. The Tide beat the Trojans 17-10.

Again, USC went 6-4-1. They won away to Rice, Cal, Number 19 Washington and Number 6 Notre Dame; but lost away to Number 8 Oklahoma, home to Number 15 Stanford, and home to Oregon. The tie came "at home" to UCLA. Again, there was to be no bowl.

The 1972 season was another story. With sophomore quarterback Mike Rae handing off to Cunningham and throwing to Lynn Swann, the Trojans opened the season by beating Number 4 Arkansas in Little Rock, then followed it with wins at home to Oregon State, away to Illinois, at home to Michigan State, away to Number 15 Stanford, home to Cal, home to Number 18 Washington, away to Oregon, against Washington State in Seattle, "away" to Number 14 UCLA, and home to Number 10 Notre Dame.

They won the title in the league then known as the Pacific-8, and went to the Rose Bowl, where they beat Number 3 Ohio State in front of a record crowd of 106,869 to take the National Championship. In that game, "Sam Bam" ran for 4 touchdowns, earning Most Valuable Player honors in the Trojans' 42-17 win.

Sam was drafted by the New England Patriots, and played for them from 1973 to 1982, rushing for 5,453 yards and making the 1978 Pro Bowl. In spite of their success the last 20 years, he is still the Pats' all-time leading rusher. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame, and the Patriots elected him to their team Hall of Fame.

But if not for that game in Birmingham in 1970, he would now be known as Randall's older brother. Randall went to the University of Nevada at Las Vegas (UNLV) before starring for the Eagles and the Minnesota Vikings.

But that game goes down in history alongside such other milestones of integration:

* April 15, 1947: Jackie Robinson makes his debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. The beat the Boston Braves 5-3.

* March 23, 1963: Loyola University of Chicago beats the University of Cincinnati in the NCAA Final, 60-58 in overtime, at Freedom Hall in Louisville, a Southern city. This was the 1st NCAA Final to have a majority of the players be black.

* March 19, 1966: Texas Western University (they became the University of Texas at El Paso, or UTEP, the next year), with an all-black starting five, beats the all-white University of Kentucky, 72-65, at Cole Field House on the University of Maryland campus, in College Park outside Washington, in the NCAA Final.

* September 1, 1971: The Pittsburgh Pirates field Major League Baseball's 1st all-minority starting lineup, and it didn't occur to any of the players, or even manager Danny Murtaugh, until they looked around at the start of the game. They beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 10-7 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.

* April 8, 1975: Frank Robinson (no relation to Jackie), still an active player with the Cleveland Indians, is the 1st black man to manage in an MLB game. He hits a home run off Catfish Hunter, and the Indians beat the Yankees at Cleveland Municipal Stadium -- interestingly, by the same score as in Jackie Robinson's 1st game, 5-3.

The other members of that 1970 USC backfield? Jones played in the Canadian Football League, and helped the Montreal Alouettes win their championship, the Grey Cup, in 1974. Although less regarded in college than Cunningham, Davis had a better pro career, helping the Oakland Raiders win Super Bowl XI in 1977.

After his playing career, Sam Cunningham worked as a landscape contractor in California. He was married to Cine, and had a daughter, Samahndi. He died this past Tuesday, September 7, 2021, at age 71, outside Los Angeles, in Inglewood, California.