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SALT LAKE CITY — More than 1,400 miles from Grambling, Louisiana, longtime rivals Grambling State and Southern gave basketball fans at the NBA's All-Star weekend a taste of HBCU basketball.
And what a taste it was.
Shawndarius Cowart had 18 points and four assists, and Jordan Smith added 14 points and nine rebounds as Grambling State held off rival Southern 69-64 in overtime at the HBCU Classic.
Brion Whitney scored 13 points with four rebounds to lead Southern, and Bryson Etienne added 10 points and eight rebounds in front of a crowd that included Rev. Jesse Jackson, Chicago Bulls legend and Southern alum Bob Love, NBA star Donovan Mitchell, and Utah Jazz owners Ryan and Ashley Smith and Dwayne Wade with his wife Gabrielle Union.
"That's our Southern-Grambling rivalry every single time," Grambling head coach Donte' Jackson said. "We played in a rivalry of substance and brought it up to Utah. Whether we play Southern at Grambling or Baton Rouge, all bets are off. I don't care what the record is, it's going to be a competitive battle; and it's been like that for the last six years I've been here."
When Whitney hit a 3-pointer as part of a 22-5 run and help Southern retake a 57-56 lead with 4:11 left, the roof on the pro-Jaguars side of the arena blew off its screws. By the time Cameron Christon had helped Grambling force overtime, the atmosphere was as electric as any in the Huntsman Center.
Neither team was willing to give an inch. Neither team was willing to turn over.
"This is what HBCU is all about," Southern coach Sean Woods said. "Southern, we battled because we wanted to win this game bad. And they wanted to win it, too. Now we split."
Plenty of Grambling fans showed up, flanking the school's "World Famed" Tigers marching band. Huge swaths of Southern fans sat opposite, in front of the acclaimed Human Jukebox marching band.
For one afternoon, Grambling and Southern brought a little bit of HBCU hoops to the Wasatch Front, making Salt Lake City an extension of the Bayou Classic that dates back to 1932 in football. The exposure was nice.
But in an age where racial and social justice initiatives are spread through hashtags and viral Tik Tok videos, the next steps are the hardest. Southern University doesn't face racial tension like much of America, said Southern's Woods, a former Kentucky player under coach Rick Pitino. The biggest challenges facing Historically Black Colleges and Universities have been fiscal.
The SWAC, just like other HBCU conferences like the MEAC, CIAA and SIAC, often face a crisis of funding, as well as media opportunities. But even that is getting better, both through the NBA's All-Star efforts and other events like the recently announced Pac-12/Southwest Athletic Conference Legacy Series that ended 4-4 this year.
"This is something that is long overdue; not just in the NBA, or putting an emphasis in the media on HBCU basketball and SWAC basketball," Woods said. "Normally in November and December, we're chasing money. So you get treated as such, and always get that school's referees, at home, at the beginning of the season.
"We've got great basketball," he added. "That was an awesome basketball game today. Unfortunately, we came out on the short end of the stick, but that was a big-time basketball game today. That was two of the better teams in the league, and you got your money's worth."
Saturday's game was more than a conference game, of course. The NBA and its lead sponsor AT&T will donate $100,000 to each school to fund academic, athletic and wellness resources as part of a multi-year effort to support HBCUs.
The second HBCU Classic is part of the NBA's renewed commitment to the Black community, a moment that began during the league's COVID-19 bubble in Florida when NBA games were played on a court with the phrase "Black Lives Matter" written across it, former NBA star and current ESPN analyst Jalen Rose told KSL.com on Friday afternoon.
"The more that you create a level of awareness on a large platform like the NBA or a major brand like Starry, you get more information out and more people who get a chance to digest that information. That's more people that are eager to learn and listen," Rose said. "The NBA took a giant leap during the bubble, putting Black Lives Matters on the floor and allowing players to put 29 messages on their uniforms.
"That's substantial for their audience who now doesn't only get a chance to watch their players perform, but also they get to learn about them as people."
Rose was in town to help present a $50,000 donation on behalf of Starry, Pepsi's recently launched lemon-lime soft drink, to the University of Utah's Black Cultural Center.
The donation will go toward scholarships and funding four fellowships in the center's Operation S.U.C.C.E.S.S, a program that focuses on leadership development as students look to address issues in the Black community and gain invaluable work experience.
The Utah-specific donation is part of PepsiCo's Racial Equality Journey, an investment of more than $570 million over five years that seeks to address inequity, provide opportunity, and bring meaningful change to Black communities.
"I think education is key," said Kent Montgomery, senior vice president for industry relations and multicultural development at PepsiCo. "When you think about the history of PepsiCo, we like to invest in educational opportunities and we think education is the key. It helps us all in the community, helps students today, and also helps student growth tomorrow."
Saturday's game was also about education.
Several fans called the game the best part of NBA All-Star week as they made their way to the concourse exits. And the fact that two all-Black schools played a thriller in front of a largely homogeneous state like Utah — with all its basketball fans — was not lost on the players, either.
"I think it's good to show what Black people have to offer," Southern guard Brion Whitley said. "HBCUs are historically Black colleges, and this shows our passion, it shows our pride, it show show hard we play, and how much love that we have for each other. It's great that it's in Salt Lake.
"This whole thing is to put a spotlight on HBCUs; Deion Sanders did that at Jackson State, and there are a lot of great HBCUs out there that get kind of looked over sometimes. We're one of them. So we're happy to get Southern out in the media so people can give back to us and find others who want to come be a Jaguar."
Added teammate Terrell Williams Jr.: "We don't take anything for granted. We're just showing who we're about."
