Earl Banks

If you want to gauge the true measure of Earl Banks' contributions during his 69 years on Earth, you have to look beyond his induction into the College Football Hall of Fame last December, beyond the 40 players he coached who went on to play in the National Football League, beyond his three consecutive undefeated seasons at Morgan State and his 95-30-2 record, beyond his own All-American status while a student-athlete at the University of Iowa.You have to look at Earl Banks' work in molding college-age men at Morgan State into mature and responsible adults.

James Phillips had the feeling it was going to be a rough day. Normally a restful sleeper, he had tossed and turned in bed before waking up with a splitting headache around 3 a.m. yesterday.Two hours later, Phillips was reawakened by the phone call that made his headache seem insignificant.Earl Banks, known simply and affectionately as "Coach" to his co-workers and former Morgan State football players, had died.Yesterday, Phillips fought back tears while recalling Banks' effect on his life.

Earl Banks was much bigger than the game of college football.He was an institution, a motivator, a philosopher, a giant man with a heart to match his size.Banks also was a great football coach. He won't be mentioned in the same breath with Stagg, Rockne or Bryant, but his former players held him in the highest esteem."He was one of the best college football coaches in the country," said former University of Maryland and Dunbar coach Bob Wade, a defensive back at Morgan under Banks. "His coaching style would have made him competitive in any arena, even against the best, because Coach Banks, along with coaches like Eddie Robinson and Jake Gaithers, were the elite."

NEW YORK -- All the plaudits and tributes have been officially extended and football stories from games past recounted, if not documented. Now that Earl Banks is in the College Football Hall of Fame, he says it's his desire to start playing "pay back."In typical Banks whimsy, he put the honors heaped upon him at banquets in Baltimore and New York in smiling perspective."When I pass on, I won't have to try to rise in the casket to find out what they're saying about me," he quipped. "I've heard it all, and it sure sounded good."

All the crybaby protests and threatened strike by the football players of Morgan State University achieved, aside from bringing embarrassment to themselves, was to solidify the position of the coach they were complaining about. Good.Ricky Diggs didn't deserve to be boiled in hot grease or thrown into the discard. The school administration, much to its credit, decided to stand behind the coach. It wouldn't cave in to the unfortunate demands of the malcontents.Diggs is what Morgan needs -- a return to discipline and, with this, a chance to regain glory.

No, it's not just another presentation. This is going to be different, significant and emotional. Tomorrow afternoon, Earl Banks will be called to the center of the field at halftime of the Morgan State-Delaware State football game. The crowd will be on its feet.Earl Banks is to receive a framed certificate that will, in turn, be displayed in the school's trophy case. It will be symbolic of his election to the College Football Hall of Fame. Then in December, he'll do it all over again in New York at a Waldorf-Astoria ceremony for what will be a more formal enshrinement.

Earl Banks, Morgan State's "Papa Bear," who put the school's football team in the national spotlight and put 40 players into the professional ranks, was selected yesterday for induction into the College Football Hall of Fame."

The hiring of a head football coach is a watershed moment for any university, a time of great anticipation and great expectations. Yet there was Morgan State athletic director Leonard Braxton yesterday, expounding on the meaning of "skepticism" as he introduced Ricky Diggs.Now that's a novel approach -- lecturing critics before the curtain rises. Braxton, however, knows Morgan's latest football hiring won't be taken seriously, at least not at first. The school that gave us Leroy Kelly and Willie Lanier also has given us eight coaches in the past 18 years.