The HBCU baseball season has dwindled down to just a few schools still in action, those being Bethune-Cookman University and Texas Southern University. As winners of the MEAC and SWAC tournaments respectively, both face yet unnamed opponents in regional play that begins June 2-5 and preceded by the May 29th NCAA Division I Post Season Selection Show. All other HBCUs have either just recently been eliminated or finished their seasons weeks ago.
This is a time when Black College Nines names is mythical HBCU national baseball champions in its large and small school divisions and its BCN Elite Teams in both divisions. In 2017, Black College College Nines added a service award to HBCU sports information directors and others for their promotion of HBCU baseball and support to our reporting.
This brings us to four gentlemen who have assisted Michael Coker and myself this season in bringing our readers in depth stories, game reports, interviews, both coach and player features, tournament coverage and score gathering… and doing all of this for nothing more than their love of college baseball. And because of this, we award our heartfelt thanks to:
Bob Broughton, for his commentary and reporting on HBCU NAIA baseball and Chuck Curti, for his coach and player feature stories.
John Winters, for his research and feature stories on black coaching integrators in college baseball.
Harold Michael Harvey, for his reporting of SWAC and SIAC baseball. Harold represented Black College Nines and reported live from both conference tournaments. As well, Michael presented an in depth story on Darien Brown of Tuskegee University who never let a debilitating congenital birth defect interfere with his love of baseball and is now a pitcher for the Golden Tigers of Tuskegee University. His story is one of great determination and a worthwhile read! The link can be found here.
As the founder of Black College Nines, I also want to thank our lead contributing reporter, Michael Coker for his comprehensive coverage of HBCU baseball and for spearheading our popular BCN Polls and Elite Team selections.
These gentlemen, as well as the 33 members of our polling committee deserve our praise for their interest and time dedicated to preserving the great tradition of HBCU baseball!