Rod Broadway is following career opportunities created at Grambling by Eddie Robinson

Rod Broadway might just be the natural outgrowth of everything Eddie Robinson once worked for at Grambling State.

The third-year coach, just the third to follow Robinson, is among those being considered for the open position at East Carolina — an upper-classification nod still shockingly rare for African-American coaches.

The way was cleared, ex-GSU players and coaches say, over six decades of leadership by Robinson, who passed away in 2007 after establishing a still-standing Division I record for career wins.

“‘Rob’ always said opportunity would come if you worked hard,” said Douglas Porter, a former offensive coordinator under Robinson who left for a subsequent College Hall of Fame career as a head coach. “Broadway has done that. His success has been amazing.”

Broadway’s possible departure to East Carolina — or to Duke, a job for which Broadway interviewed in 2007 — would thrust Grambling into its fourth coaching search since 2003. Still, these potential move fit well into Robinson’s groundbreaking legacy.

It could also help reinvent a GSU program once known as a hotbed for football talent into a launching pad for emerging football minds. That would be a startling evolution. After all, Robinson led Grambling for a remarkable 57 seasons. But it’s in keeping with the influential position that this tiny Southwestern Athletic Conference school once held.

“The problem with Grambling is, we’re off the beaten path these days,” said Tampa Bay Buccaneers coordinator of pro scouting Doug Williams, the former GSU quarterback who succeeded Robinson as coach in 1998. “We’ve got to sell Grambling now, and this helps do that.”

Grambling storied football legend was constructed in large part by former Robinson players — more than 200 of them — who have been drafted into the pros. GSU produced one of the first African-Americans to sign a pro contract, the first to start a season at quarterback, the first passer to win a Super Bowl and MVP — and four Pro Football Hall of Famers.

That draft total, however, is skewed by pre-1980 numbers. Only 31 draft selections have come since — with just three after Robinson retired.

His hopes and dreams have continued to play out, however, on the sidelines.

More recently, two Robinson successors — first Williams at the University Kentucky in 2002, then the University of South Florida more recently; and now Broadway — have received that rarest of opportunities: A shot at a Football Bowl Subdivision job.

In fact, African-Americans filled just 11 of 176 head coach vacancies in FBS football over the previous decade, according to the Black Coaches Association.

“It says a lot of about our coach,” said former Grambling quarterback Brandon Landers, who led Grambling to a Bayou Classic win in 2004 and the SWAC West title in 2007. “He’s intelligent and, in his time here, he’s done a great job. I hope we can keep him. He’s a damn good coach.”

Broadway hasn’t made any public comment on other open positions, and when asked typically reiterates a passion to coach at GSU. “I have a job and I’m honored to have this job,” he has said in the past.

Broadway, of course, boasts roots outside of black college football.

He spent 20 seasons as an assistant, with stops at both East Carolina and Duke, as well as Florida and North Carolina — where he played collegiately — before taking over the historically black Division II North Carolina Central program in 2003. There, he claimed two CIAA Conference championships, establishing a 33-11 record over four years.

But no one can argue with the spotlight that winning at Grambling has provided.

Since 2007, Broadway has gone 27-9, set a new school record for consecutive home wins at Robinson Stadium, won two divisional titles, two Bayou Classics and the 2008 SWAC Championship Game — for which he took home the aptly named Eddie Robinson Trophy.

That’s recognition, of course, for Robinson’s records, but also for accomplishing so much during a time when blacks were institutionally excluded.

Chief among them was Robinson himself, who might have followed a career trajectory similar to successors Williams and Broadway … had he arrived in another moment.

“People get caught up with the fact that Coach spent so many years at Grambling,” Williams said. “At the same time, if Coach had worked in these times and was as successful as he was back then, who knows if he would have stayed at Grambling? He came along at a time when these opportunities weren’t out there.”

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