Fast Break
College football
Barkley: Auburn hiring racial
Charles Barkley was pulling for Auburn to hire Turner Gill as football coach long before Gene Chizik (above) emerged publicly as a candidate for the job.
Barkley’s take on why his alma mater hired Chizik instead: Gill is a black coach, Chizik is white.
“I believe race had a factor. Of course I do,” Barkley, a former Auburn and NBA star, said Monday. “First of all you can’t compare these two, their records. That’s not even close to being fair.
“I look at things from a commonsense standpoint, how do you interview Turner Gill and pick Gene Chizik over Turner Gill?”
Athletic director Jay Jacobs denied that race was a factor, saying he picked “the best fit for Auburn.”
Chizik took over a difficult rebuilding project at Iowa State and went 5-19 in his first two seasons as a head coach.
Gill led Buffalo to a Mid-American Conference championship this season.
Barkley said the decision “doesn’t surprise me at all.”
He said he agreed to serve on Auburn’s search committee to hire a basketball coach before the 2004-05 season on the condition the school hire a black candidate. He pitched Mike Davis, Mike Anderson and Jeff Capel as worthy candidates, and says now all three wanted the job. Auburn hired Jeff Lebo.
“They said, ’We’re ready to hire a black coach,’ ” Barkley said. “I figured out right away they were not going to hire a black coach.”
He said he went public with his complaints.
“They kicked me off the committee the next day,” he said. “I have kept the secret about that for quite awhile. Clearly it’s got something to do with race.”
College football
Huskies hire ex-WSU lineman
University of California offensive coordinator Jim Michalczik has been offered the same job on Steve Sarkisian’s staff at Washington, according to a report in the Contra Costa Times.
Michalczik, a former Washington State lineman, was a teammate of current Cougar coach Paul Wulff.
The Seattle Times reported that linebackers coach Chris Tormey will not be re-hired.
Tormey, the former Gonzaga Prep player and University of Idaho player and coach, has worked at UW 16 years in two different stints.