In the coming weeks, tens of thousands of people will attend the Final Four of the men’s and women’s NCAA Tournaments. They will congregate in raucous arenas and argue with strangers about the merits of college basketball stars. Hours later, they will either celebrate victory or mourn defeat with the same strangers. Young athletes from eight teams who rank among the best in their respective sports will be at the center of the commotion and excitement. However, the best basketball players from historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) will be among another group of athletes in San Antonio during the men’s Final Four. The 48 players—24 men and 24 women—will not attend the Final Four in Texas. Instead, they will take part in the 2025 HBCU All-Star Game & Experience, a six-day competition that will end with two championship matches on April 6. This year marks the fourth men’s HBCU All-Star Game and the first time organizers have added a game for women, something they said is “long overdue.” It’s also the first in San Antonio, a city that is “buzzing about this event,” says founder Travis L Williams, who coached for a combined 17 years at Tennessee State University and Fort Valley State University. Williams and the event’s organizers host a college and scholarship fair, a panel on social justice and civil rights, a pro day combine, and a fan fest over six days. The event will also include BAM testing, a performance evaluation service used by the NBA as part of the draft. To ensure that HBCU athletes are evaluated in the same manner as potential NBA and WNBA draft picks, the organizers hired the service. Williams asserts, “We want no excuses.” “We want to level the playing field and provide these amazing opportunities for both our men and women in this space, and there is not a better audience than the biggest weekend in college basketball.” That goal is admirable and ambitious, but is it enough? HBCU hoopers have long been ignored in America. The NBA has drafted 351 men from HBCUs into the league; the first was West Virginia State’s Earl Lloyd in 1950, and the most recent was Kyle O’Quinn in 2010. In contrast, the WNBA has chosen only seven women from historically black colleges and universities, and none of them are currently on team rosters. According to WNBA and NBA analyst Diamond Forrest, those numbers and statistics can start to feel like there isn’t enough representation, which could discourage other talented HBCU athletes from seriously considering a career in collegiate basketball. Forrest, who spent two seasons playing for HBCU Jackson State, pointed to the case of last year’s third-round pick Angel Jackson as an example.
Since teams have limited roster space, later draft picks are most likely to be dropped, it is common knowledge that most third-round WNBA picks do not play in their rookie season, if at all. However, Forrest was disappointed when the Las Vegas Aces cut Jackson. Before her dismissal, the Aces posted photos of Jackson in a jersey (a common practice after players are drafted), something Forrest found frustrating because she says it felt like a bait-and-switch.
Teams like the Aces could do more than draft a player from an HBCU for a photo opportunity, she believes. “You could keep them on the roster and develop them,” Forrest says. “There’s no reason why Angel Jackson isn’t now on the Aces’ roster. She could learn from A’ja Wilson – they play the same position.”
In reality, it might not be so simple. It is not as though HBCU programs and events like the HBCU All-Star Game are unknown to NBA and WNBA teams and scouts. As Williams notes, the 2024 HBCU combine was attended by 15 of the NBA’s 30 teams – but no one was picked up. And that’s partly due to structural reasons that mean HBCU programs find it tougher to attract the best high school players.
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When attempting to comprehend some of the difficulties that HBCUs are facing, Jim Crow America serves as an important point of origin. Brown v. the Board of Education, which was decided in 1954, ended racial segregation in the classroom. But the athletic departments at southern universities and colleges remained segregated by law, and those at their northern counterparts practiced “de facto segregation,” says Eric Moyen, assistant vice president for student success at Mississippi State University.
The situation began to change significantly after Kentucky’s all-white Kentucky team lost to Texas Western’s all-Black starting five in the championship game of the 1966 NCAA Tournament. White colleges started to recruit Black players, and HBCUs – already underfunded – soon found they couldn’t compete with powerhouse programs like Alabama and Duke when it came to signing the best young talent. Moyen asserts that HBCUs are unable to offer Black athletes perks like television exposure and a degree of celebrity that those big programs could (and still can) provide. “Does an 18-year-old want to fly on a chartered jet to his next game or take a 10-hour bus ride?”
HBCUs won’t be able to take advantage of televised game revenue or NCAA Tournament payouts if they are unable to attract top talent due to this systematic lack of funding, which affects everything from state support to athlete lifestyle. They become less appealing to the best high school players as a result of their lack of revenue, and the cycle continues. Additionally, even if a player with fewer recruits suddenly emerges as a genuine talent at an HBCU, they are likely to be enticed by a larger program. “There will be dozens of players this year in the NCAA Tournament who were overlooked in high school recruiting but became excellent players at “mid-majors,” “according to Moyen.” “Those players have moved on to big schools, where they can get paid now, be seen, and compete against players who will help them prepare for the NBA. The HBCU All-Star Game may be able to carve out a niche and strengthen HBCU schools and conferences because only a small number of universities will be able to follow this model. Williams took 10 men’s players from the 2024 HBCU All-Star Game to Paris last summer to participate in Quai 54, the world’s biggest streetball tournament, against some of the top talent around the world. Williams wanted to “provide more opportunities on a global scale” and expand the athletes’ horizons. Approximately 50% of the athletes who have participated in past HBCU All-Star Games are now playing professionally overseas. Providing opportunities to play professional basketball outside the US, with showcases such as Quai 54, could even be the kind of incentive that can help something like the HBCU All-Star Game continue to grow, and could encourage higher caliber athletes to attend HBCUs – even over powerhouse teams – in the first place.
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Each year’s HBCU All-Star Game has been built on the success of the previous year’s edition. Williams claims that the first three games, in 2022, 2023, and 2024, drew a total of 1.6 million viewers on CBS, that the city of San Antonio has embraced an event that Houston and New Orleans enjoyed before and that this year’s group of athletes will undoubtedly perform to the fullest. However, there is still a long way to go. “To put it in perspective, there are 450 NBA players, 30 NBA teams, 156 WNBA players, and 13 WNBA teams,” Williams says. “[HBCUs] have zero representation in both. We are just not provided the same exposure and access.”
However, Williams believes that this year’s HBCU All-Stars are among the best he has ever seen. He continues, “And so events like this, platforms like this are important to showcase the best in Black college basketball.” “People still don’t understand the magnitude of it because I feel like we haven’t scratched the surface,” “The game is continuing to grow, grow, and grow.” For Williams and his team, this year’s HBCU All-Star event is about more than what happens on the court; it’s about bringing his athletes to college basketball’s biggest weekend and giving them the largest stage possible. After that, he loses control of everything and the authorities take control.
