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Stephen A. Smith Discusses HBCUs and Their Impact
EBONY
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10/14/2024
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00:00
My name is Stephen A. Smith, not only of ESPN, but also of my own operation,
00:06
Stephen A. Smith Show, over the digital airwaves of YouTube and iHeartRadio,
00:09
and of course, a graduate of Winston-Salem State University.
00:13
And I'm here with Ebony.
00:14
Clarence Big House Gaines was introduced to me.
00:17
He was the head basketball coach.
00:18
He was a legendary basketball coach for the university,
00:21
had a lot to do with integrating the sport of basketball,
00:24
along with the late, great John McClendon, who was a mentor of his.
00:29
And I was introduced to Clarence Big House Gaines by a former player of his,
00:32
who was a family friend, by the name of Harold Funny Kitt.
00:36
And he took me down to Winston-Salem for a tryout with Winston-Salem State,
00:44
Clarence Big House Gaines.
00:46
And he put me on a basketball court with them, and he said,
00:49
you're on your own now.
00:50
Coach is right here.
00:51
There's a legend.
00:52
He wants to see you play, et cetera, et cetera.
00:54
So the coach put me on the basketball court,
00:56
and I went around, around the court, and I was passing the ball.
01:00
And the coach blew the whistle and told me to come over there.
01:04
And I came over to him.
01:05
He said, didn't they say they brought you down here because you could shoot?
01:10
And I said, yes, sir.
01:11
He said, well, then God damn it, shoot the basketball.
01:14
And then I promptly went out, and I hit 17 straight three-pointers.
01:19
And he signed me to a basketball scholarship on the spot.
01:22
For me, being a part of an HBCU, you just
01:26
learn the value of true support.
01:32
Of course, we get that from family and loved ones.
01:35
But when you go to an HBCU, you see the people that you're surrounded by.
01:41
They share your hue, your background, where you're livelihood,
01:48
where you come from, things of that nature, your culture.
01:51
And because of that, you recognize that you're not standing alone,
01:55
that you find yourself in a predicament and a situation
02:00
similar to everybody around you.
02:02
And it uplifts you because you're there to help one another.
02:07
Very, very few people, if anyone, is rooting against you.
02:10
Certainly, folks root for themselves, but it's a family kind of atmosphere.
02:14
You feel a level, an innate level of accountability and responsibility
02:20
to go about the business of doing the best that you can,
02:23
because you know that your achievements ain't just for you.
02:27
It's for the institution, and it's for the culture.
02:29
HBCU Week, led by Ashley Christopher, who's done a phenomenal job.
02:34
She does all the work.
02:35
I'm the face of it from the standpoint of giving it the notoriety and publicity
02:39
it deserves.
02:39
But the real, real work is done by her.
02:42
When we talk about over 8,000 to 10,000 scholarships and excess of $87 million
02:47
being given out to students to attend HBCUs, 90-plus percent of that work
02:53
is done by her.
02:54
And so she deserves all the credit in the world.
02:57
But I'm also going to give a lot of love and appreciation to Disney.
03:02
So Disney on the Yard came about later in terms
03:05
of working in concert with HBCU Week.
03:08
And we've had various shows where Magic Johnson blessed us
03:12
with his presence, Troy Vincent, the executive VP for the National Football
03:16
League, who plays an instrumental role in making sure HBCU athletes get
03:21
notoriety and get looked at by the National Football League.
03:25
They showed up to the first HBCU Week show we did for ESPN on first take.
03:32
Magic Johnson flew into town on his own dime, in his own time,
03:36
to attend that show.
03:38
You know, you got to be thankful for people like him.
03:40
We've been to Howard.
03:41
We're going to Tennessee State in the month of October.
03:44
We're going to Atlanta-Clarke and Spelman, Morehouse, and all of that,
03:48
and Atlanta in November.
03:50
And we're making various trips.
03:51
And we plan on continuing to do this.
03:52
I get texts and calls all the time with people saying, come to my school,
03:56
come to my school, come to my school.
03:58
And I'm going to do all of that.
03:59
I'm going to try to get to every HBCU I can just
04:03
to make sure we bring the attention that HBCUs deserve
04:06
so students out here can understand that is a viable option for them.
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3:34
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