Bill Russell became the NBA’s first black head coach in 1966, 23 years before Art Shell became the NFL’s first head coach in the modern era.
This season, there are 14 black NBA coaches – nearly half the league. Including Miami’s Erik Spoelstra and Charlotte’s James Borrego, more than half of the NBA’s coaches are minorities, and now, there is just one Black coach and two minority head coaches in the NFL.
That doesn’t mean the NBA hasn’t had its issues with minority hires for the top coaching position. At the start of the 2020-21 season, there were just seven Black head coaches, down from a league-record 14 in the 2012-13 season.