TUSCALOOSA, Alabama (AP) – Alabama coach Nick Saban has led dozens of his football players and athletes to protest against social injustice and recent incidents of police brutality against black men and women.
The organization traveled a short distance from Monday on the campus of the Evil M.Moore Athletic Facility school at Foster Auditorium, where segregationist governor George Wallace stood at the gate in 1963 to block the entry of two black students.
Crimson Tide athletes, coaches and workers have joined a number of occasions between football players and other school athletes from across the country following the shooting of Jacob Blake and others through the Wisconsin police.
Such rallies or marches have taken place in Oklahoma, Kansas, Duke, Baylor, Mississippi and the state of Mississippi, along with others planned.
“For some, we can’t let this impulse die,” said runner Najee Harris.”This will have to be a continuous movement until the replacement occurs.
“We want to do more as a team and as Americans in this movement.”
Harris walked near Saban dressed in a T-shirt with the words “Defender Black Lives.”Other players showed symptoms with messages like “Black Lives Matter” and “Defend anything or fall in love with anything.”Another sign read “Even black lives matter “on the front and” All lives don’t count “on the back.
“That’s what helped me grow in my leadership role, pay attention to players, be informed from players and give them opportunities to do things that may just have an effect on social replace today,” Saban said.”Today I am like a proud parent.
“I’m proud of our messengers and I’m very proud of the message.”
Players Chris Owens and Jarez Parks spoke, along with athletic director Greg Byrne, president of Stuart R University.Bell and chief of police at John Hooks University.
“Equality is all we want,” Owens, central Alabama.
___
More advanced school football: https://apnews.com/Collegefootball and http://www.twitter.com/AP_Top25