Ricky Byrdsong: I followed his career all the way to the end … and in the years that followed. I thought about him, again, the other day. That’s why I decided to write this piece.
He played college basketball at my alma mater, Iowa State. Ricky went on to become head basketball coach at a school near my home, the University of Detroit. And, later, he held the same position at Northwestern University, a school my team (Michigan State) plays regularly.
Two stories about Ricky stand out. The first story is about sports. It’s about coaching pressure and how the coaching game can eat you alive. The second story is about hate. It’s about a man gunned down because he was black.
Story One: It’s a tradition in the Fear household: on winter Saturdays we watch Big Ten basketball. The Saturday in this story is February 5 1994. The game: Byrdsong’s Wildcats vs. the Minnesota Golden Gophers.
It had been an up-and-down season for NU—Byrdsong’s first—strong at the outset (undefeated entering Big Ten play) before the losing started. The losing string began with a last-second loss to Purdue and it reached seven games by the time NU hit the road to play in Minneapolis.
Always a NU fan (except when NU plays MSU) I rooted for the ‘Cats that day, but a win wasn’t in the cards. But I noticed something odd as the second half wore on: Ricky seemed abnormally agitated. He walked onto the court twice. He got a “T.” He continued walking around, a lot more than coaches normally do. Then Ricky left the playing floor entirely, venturing into the stands. He bantered with fans, high-fived a few of them, and engaged the Gopher mascot, too.
Yikes! NU’s head coach is sitting in the stands, I thought. This is absolutely surreal! What the heck is going on?
Was it a motivational ploy? A stunt? A breakdown? We’ll never know. Byrdsong called it his “walk on the wild side.” But soon thereafter Ricky’s wife, Sharialyn, asked NU for a leave of absence on her husband’s behalf. It was granted.
Courtesy bradycampaign.org
Byrdsong recognized the seriousness of the matter and felt remorse, too, especially for the negative publicity NU received. But he also poked fun at himself, quipping: “They (the professionals) want to make sure whether (what happened in Minnesota) was genius or insanity. I’m leaning toward genius. Some are leaning toward insanity.” (Chicago Tribune, 2/18/94)
Ironically, even with the disruption, that ’93-94 campaign would be Ricky’s best in Evanston: the Wildcats wound up 15-14. The highlight was beating Michigan—with the ‘Fab Five’—in the Big Ten finale. That win propelled the ‘Cats into The NIT where they won a first-round game against Chicagoland rival, DePaul.
It was all downhill after that: Ricky’s NU teams never won more than 7 games in a season and went 9-56 (overall) in conference games. The end came in early ’97 when he was fired with seven games to go.
Most of us will never know what it’s like to experience the pressures of big-time college coaching. There was even more pressure for Ricky, who was NU’s first African-American basketball coach. Different people handle the pressure differently, of course. We’ve seen examples of player abuse, drug abuse, and other destructive behaviors. None of that is Ricky’s story: he was a stand-up, personable, and engaging guy—a family man—who always took time for people, all kinds of people, especially kids. He was a players’ coach, too.
Sometimes “stuff” happens in life … and, then, we have to live with the consequences.
Story Two: I read The New York Times every day. I remember Sunday July 4 1999. The headline read: “Former college coach shot to death near Chicago.” The story was about what happened Friday night, at the beginning of a holiday weekend. I read in disbelief:
“A white gunman cruised the streets of Chicago and its northern suburbs on Friday evening, shooting from a car at a dozen people, all of them black, Jewish or Asian. An African-American man, a former basketball coach at Northwestern University, was killed, and six Orthodox Jews walking home from Sabbath prayers were injured. The former coach, Ricky Byrdsong, was fatally shot as he walked with his two children near their home. He was hit once in the lower back and died early today after surgery at Evanston Hospital.” (NYT, 7/4/99)
This happened? It happened in Chicago? It happened to Ricky? I needed details. Here’s what I read:
“Benjamin Nathaniel Smith, 21, a white supremacist, got behind the wheel of a 1994 Ford Taurus, a couple of handguns by his side…. He allegedly shot Ricky Byrdsong in the back.Only three blocks from his home, Byrdsong fell to the ground in front of his kids. He died four hours later, on an operating table.” (Mike Downey, LA Times, 7/7/99)
Courtesy: hereandnow.wbur.org
I had lost track of Ricky. He left coaching and settled in a new career, insurance. Life was good. But on that fateful July day he was out in the neighborhood—a nice neighborhood—on a daytime walk with two of his three kids. He didn’t know Benjamin Nathaniel Smith and Smith didn’t know Ricky. Both died: Ricky at Smith’s hand and Smith, by suicide (a few days later), after a high-speed police chase in southern Illinois (Jet Magazine, 7/26/99).
Who was this man, Benjamin Nathaniel Smith? An “an angry young man” is the Chicago Tribune’s description, a member of the supremacist group, World Church of the Creator (see: “Smith’s legacy of fear and hate,” 1/3/00). Smith reportedly wrote “Sic temper Tyrannis” (“Thus always to tyrants”) in his high school yearbook—the words John Wilkes Booth presumably shouted as he assassinated President Lincoln (from Murderpedia).
And what about this man named Ricky Byrdsong? He lives. “From tragedy to victory” is how Sharialyn puts it. I watched her say it—and you can, too—in an exceptionally well-done videography produced by students in NU’s Medill School of Journalism. “Fly Like The Byrd” (2009) is on Vimeo at http://vimeo.com/5204860).
People remember Ricky. Each year, on or around Father’s Day, the Evanston-North Shore YWCA sponsors a fundraiser, “Ricky Byrdsong Memorial Race Against Hate.” Over 5000 runners-walkers participated this year. Proceeds support “Y” programs in racial justice and violence prevention. See http://www.ywca.org/site/c.ewK0LoO8LmK6F/b.7966989/k.ED0/Ricky_Byrdsong_Memorial_Race_Against_Hate.htm
Courtesy: chicagoistheworld.com
Sadly, the very thing that snuffed out Ricky’s life is still around: hate. Nearly 6000 hate crimes were reported to the U.S. police in 2012 (FBI statistics). That’s 6000 too many.
Stand up to it if you see it, experience it. It shouldn’t exist in our world.
Think about that the next time you take a walk with loved ones. You expect it to be uneventful. I’m sure Ricky did, too.
It wasn’t.
“Black” should never be a cause of death.
Endnote: Read more about the Ricky Byrdsong story in No Random Act by Dave Johnson and Neta Jackson (Castle Rock Creative, 2012).
I’ll never understand what it’s like to be black in America, but one of my colleagues does. I thought about her—Jennifer Patterson—as I wrote this essay.
