With just 10 measly words, Craig Robinson was able to get a crowd of 45,000 people to go crazier than Michael Jackson at a Boy Scouts meeting.

“I’m Craig Robinson, and Michelle Obama is my little sister,” he echoed throughout Denver’s Pepsi Center during the Democratic National Convention in August.

You see, Robinson is the new Head Coach of the Oregon State Beavers men’s basketball team, and a guy who just so happens to be Barack Obama’s brother-in-law; talk about luck.

“Barack is committed to making this American dream a possibility for all Americans,” Robinson exclaimed to Obama supporters who were packed into the arena like sardines.

But he wasn’t there to simply talk politics; he also gave a shout out to his basketball team. “Today, I’m proud to be the coach of the Oregon State men’s basketball team. Go Beavers,” Robinson told the crowd.

As a former two-time Ivy-League player of the year at Princeton, Robinson already knows a little something about leadership and the limelight. After graduating from school, Robinson became a bond trader in Chicago - and a good one at that. And although he was making a lot of money and living comfortably, something was missing, something that he loved. And hey, why would you give up a multi-million dollar job when you can be an assistant coach for a perennial loser?
“I’d much rather be in the gym having practice and talking hoops,” he has said.

I’m not quite sure if there is “practice” at Northwestern, so much as it’s college athletes throwing brick after brick at the rim, but hey, whatever works, right? So even though the Wildcats of Northwestern are about as competitive as girls playing hopscotch, he was able to get back into the game as their assistant coach. After a couple of years and some success, he was offered a head coaching position. It wasn’t Duke or North Carolina or even the Kennesaw State Owls; Robinson got a job back in his old stomping grounds - the nerdy Ivy League. Now, most people identify Brown with geeks and bookworms and not athletic domination, but Robinson turned it around long enough to get another head coaching offer.

And even though the Beavers have been about as good as chocolate-covered-tuna-fish recently, the opportunity in Corvallis, Oregon was just too good to pass up.

“They didn’t win a game [in the Pac-10], and some people would look at that and go, ‘Wow, I’ll be inheriting a real challenge,’” Michelle Obama recently said. “Craig sees it as a real opportunity. His view was: I really can start from scratch; I can build a program because the only place to go is up.”

And so there he was, addressing the convention, addressing the nation and addressing both current and future recruits. A lot of people might get nervous and worry about what people would say or think. Robinson, however, stood up and endorsed his sister and her husband as the change that America so desperately needs. Now that Obama has been officially elected, it just may be because of what Robinson had to say that night - and he certainly has made his mark on American politics.

And while the head coaching job at Oregon State is special, First Brother-In-Law has a nice ring to it too.

When it comes to college sports and equal opportunity, it’s not a black and white issue.

Actually, it is a black and white issue and that’s what seems to be the problem.

You’d think that everyone should be judged on their athletic and academic abilities and not by the color of their skin.

But according to The Institute of Diversity and Ethics in Sports (TIDES) annual study: “Keeping Score When It Counts: Graduation Rates for 2008 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament Teams”  white college basketball players have higher graduation rates than their African American teammates. 

Dr. Richard Lapchick the main writer of the study said: “There is positive academic news for the tournament teams when we examine the Graduation Success Rates. However, the on-going and significant disparity regarding the academic success between African-American and white men’s basketball student athletes is deeply troubling. Higher education’s greatest failure is the persistent gap between African-American and white basketball student-athletes in particular and students in general. The good news there is that the gaps are narrowing slightly.”

These are the race stats:

• 61 percent (33 schools) of the men’s tournament teams graduated 70 percent or more of
  their white basketball student-athletes, while only 30 percent (19 schools) graduated 70
  percent or more of their African-American basketball student-athletes creating a 31
  percent gap. This improves on a 38 percent gap from last year’s study.
• 70 percent (38) of the men’s tournament teams graduated 60 percent or more of their
  white basketball student-athletes, while only 37 percent of schools (23) graduated 60
  percent or more of their African-American basketball student-athletes resulting in a 33
  percent gap. This improves on a 36 percent gap from last year’s study.
•  83 percent (45) graduated 50 percent or more of their white basketball student-athletes,
  but only 57 percent (36) graduated 50 percent or more of their African-American
  basketball student-athletes creating a 26 percent gap. This improves on a 41 percent gap
  from last year’s study.

And don’t think that racism is only a sports issue.

According to Lapchick: “It needs to be noted that African-American basketball players graduate at a higher rate than African-American males who are not student-athletes. The graduation rate for African-American male students as a whole is only 37 percent, versus the overall rate of 61 percent for white male students, which is a scandalous 24 percentage point gap. Too many of our predominantly white campuses are not welcoming places for students of color, whether or not they are athletes.”

In a nation that was founded on freedom and equal opportunity, these results are a little unsettling—especially considering it’s 2008.

What kind of example are our colleges setting? They are supposed to be institutions that question, challenge and fight racism, not subtly support it.