Play Ball: Baseball returns to Xavier University
15th March 2021 · 0 Comments
By Amber Parks
Contributing Writer
On February 23, after a six-decade hiatus, Xavier University of Louisiana played its first collegiate baseball game since 1960.
The relaunch of the baseball program at a historically Black university during Black History Month paid tribute to the sport’s role in the civil rights struggles of the nation.
“Relaunching baseball in a predominately African-American community is monumental,” said Adrian Holloway, the head coach of Xavier’s baseball team, called the Xavier Gold Rush. “It not only gives families and fans a chance to come together and watch baseball, but it also gives an opportunity for minorities to keep playing in a predominately white sport,” Holloway said.
Baseball is still a vital part of many HBCU collegiate athletic programs. Roughly 48 HBCUs still have baseball teams. In Louisiana, Xavier will rejoin Grambling State University and Southern University in Baton Rouge as HBCUs with current baseball teams. It will be the only HBCU in New Orleans with a current baseball team and will compete in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference along with regional HBCUs Tougaloo College in Jackson, Miss., Talladega College in Ala., and Edward Waters College in Jacksonville, Fla.
Reviving the program was not only important to recognizing baseball as a viable sport for African Americans, but it has also granted more opportunities for young Black men to pursue a college education at a Black institution, university officials said.
“Baseball has added to the fabric of Xavier’s campus,” said Jason Horne, Xavier’s athletic director. “The almost 50 recruited players have added to the culture of campus,” Horne said.
The team’s first game since the civil rights era is important not only because it is the first game in 61 years, but also because of the historical significance that ties both the sport and Black institutions to something greater: Black excellence. Without Hall of Famer Jackie Robinson to desegregate the sport, the chance to play baseball in an integrated league had not been possible. Because of Robinson’s persistence and tenacity, he was able to expand the fight for desegregation in all areas of the Civil Rights Movement.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. credited Robinson with making his dream feasible.
“Jackie Robinson made my success possible,” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said in 1968 just before his death. “Without him, I would never have been able to do what I did,” King said at the time.
It has also helped the community to connect again during the isolation of the pandemic, university officials said.
“Bringing this sport back in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and Black History Month has brought the community closer,” Horne added. “People came to watch in the stands and outside the fence, and ultimately had fun and relaxed,” he said.
While only 9.9 percent of college baseball players are drafted to play professionally, according to data from the National Collegiate Athletic Association, increasing the number of college athletes through this sport means more young Black men can use sports to afford a college education and then pursue careers beyond athletics.
“Growing up, I was one of very few kids on any of my baseball teams,” said Kwame Jackson, a Xavier alumnus who said he was honored to be able to attend the game and proud to see the Xavier logo return to a baseball field. “Baseball at HBCUs is going to impact many young aspiring ball players,” Jackson said.
The team said they fed off the energy of supporters in the community excited that college baseball had returned to New Orleans at an HBCU. Trae Hall, a sophomore from Hueytown, Ala., who plays outfield said the crowd support encouraged his teammates to deliver their first win of the season and in decades. Hall went on to score the first run in 61 years at the team’s first game of the season. He said that seeing his teammates and the fans react to his run, gave him a sense of gratitude to be able to play baseball for an HBCU.
“It was a different type of enjoyment because they felt the same thing I felt,” Hall said.
This article originally published in the March 1, 2021 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.