The University of Kentucky will honor its first black football players with statues outside Commonwealth Stadium.
According to The Courier-Journal, Nate Northington and Greg Page, who became the program’s (and SEC’s) first two black players in 1967, along with Wilbur Hackett and Houston Hogg – the first black players to finish their careers at Kentucky – will all be honored.
The news was announced Friday when Northington and Page were inducted into the UK Athletics Hall of Fame.
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Wildcats athletic director Mitch Barnhart told The Courier-Journal that the statues are "the right thing to do."
“It’s the right thing to do. It’s four guys that changed the face of college athletics, especially in the South, and it’s a story of courage and a story of honor,” Barnhart said. “So to have an opportunity to let that be the face of our football program going forward is a remarkable thing. You can put your mascot out there and that’s all good – and we’ve done that on one side of campus – but I don’t know if there’s anything more unique than something that changes culture and changes society and changes the way people think, and these four guys did that.”
Page tragically died after suffering a neck injury in practice and never played for the Wildcats. Northington became the first black player to appear in an SEC game but later left school following the death of Page, his close friend.
Paul Karem, a former Kentucky quarterback who is leading the effort to release a documentary about the four players called “Black in Blue,” said Northington was “speechless” when he learned about the statues.
“Could hardly talk when he got up to make his speech, said it’s always been a dream,” Karem said. “He said right after he left school, somebody told him the experiment of African-Americans in the SEC was a failure. And then he said, ‘Now it doesn’t look like a failure to me.’ ”
The life-sized statues are scheduled to be unveiled next fall alongside the completion of UK’s new practice facility.
For more Kentucky news, CatsIllustrated.com.
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Sam Cooper is a contributor for the Yahoo Sports blogs. Have a tip? Email him or follow him on Twitter!