When Virginia coach Tony Elliott walked into ACC media day last month, his shoes commanded immediate attention.
On one side of his personalized Nikes, Elliott has the names of his wife, Tamika, and their children, A.J. and Ace. On the other side, he has a Clemson jersey, where he played from 1999 to 2003. His left shoe has the date he was hired as head coach of the Cavaliers, Dec. 10, 2021, written inside the Nike swoosh — a day he had been waiting for since starting his coaching career in 2006.
Next to the swoosh, there is a phrase written in orange capital letters, save for the final word, written in blue: “A man will be defined by the condition of his heart.”
The shoes, and particularly that phrase, encapsulate Elliott’s path to Charlottesville: That of a biracial man who grew up in a Black household, graduating college with an engineering degree, switching paths to coaching, becoming the highest paid offensive coordinator in the country and now one of 14 Black FBS head coaches.
The shoes are a vehicle for expression, allowing him to show who he is and what he represents. He calls them an “important part of Black culture,” while simultaneously wanting to be viewed as more than what some see first.
“I know that I am a minority,” Elliott said. “I just don’t want it to be solely about that.”
It is easy to say that Elliott is the right coach at the right time for Virginia — a Black coach hired by Carla Williams, a Black woman and athletic director, at a university that has taken steps to address its own history with race in recent years. But what he represents takes on a deeper meaning than football coach.
That is especially true for players such as linebacker Nick Jackson, part of the “Groundskeepers,” a group the Virginia football team formed in 2020 to work toward goals in their collective fight for racial and social change.
“It just shows how far we’ve come, honestly,” Jackson said. “We know the history of UVa, with slavery and all the stuff that came to make UVa…
Source : espn
