Barack Obama broke this country's most daunting racial barrier last week when Americans elected him their first black president. At universities around the nation, though, black men remain a very rare presence in another primary seat of power and leadership: that of the head football coach.

Two days after an historic election, the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport released its annual report of minority representation among college athletic leaders and football coaches. The numbers remained paltry. The season started with six black head football coaches at 120 Division I-A schools; with Washington's Ty Willingham and Kansas State's Ron Prince stepping aside at the end of the season, that leaves only Randy Shannon (Miami), Kevin Sumlin (Houston), Sylvester Croom (Mississippi State) and Turner Gill (Buffalo).

The most ever? That was in 1997. There were eight then. It's bad enough that the numbers always have been ridiculously low. It's even more troubling considering that black athletes now make up half of all D-I football players.

Those young men fuel the flow of billions of dollars through college football's massive profit engine. Their bodies and hearts pay the often-bloated salaries of coaches who wield immense clout. But black men seldom get the opportunity to share in that wealth and influence as pigskin power brokers, and the numbers illuminate a disturbing lack of progress.

"The leadership which is the power structure in college sport remains overwhelmingly white," said Richard Lapchick, co-author of the report and a longtime advocate for diversity in sport. "Overall, the numbers simply do not represent the diversity of our student-athletes. Moreover, they do not reflect the diversity of our nation."

The problem, it seems, isn't necessarily overt racism. It's more a product of the crony system. University presidents and athletic directors tend to hire people like themselves, those already in their network of colleagues and professional acquaintances.

According to the report, 92.5 percent of the presidents of D-I football schools are white. So are 87.5 percent of the athletic directors, 92.6 percent of the faculty athletic representatives and 83.3 percent of the faculty. Every conference commissioner is a white man.

Gophers athletic director Joel Maturi said he and his colleagues are acutely aware of the paucity of blacks among their ranks and in their football offices. Concern, he noted, has not translated to progress.

"I know the efforts people are trying to make," Maturi said. "I don't believe it's racism, that people don't want to hire blacks. But most ADs are white males, and most of their associates are other white males.

"Until that changes, it's going to be tough. We have to provide more opportunities at the entry level for people of color so they can move forward."

Maturi said he used the Black Coaches and Administrators association as a resource when he was searching for head football and basketball coaches. He asked it for recommendations, and he sought its input on candidates. Maturi chose two black coaches as finalists: Tubby Smith, hired for basketball, and Charlie Strong, runner-up to Tim Brewster for the football post.

McKinley Boston, the former Minnesota Gophers AD now at New Mexico State, is taking an even more proactive approach. He is among a group of athletic directors mentoring minorities who aspire to join their ranks.

"We're providing networking opportunities and programs for them," said Boston, one of 11 black ADs at Division I football schools. "We are aggressively trying to find ways to get them into the pipeline. It's going to take that kind of additional effort. The numbers have been consistently poor for as long as I remember."

Lapchick has urged the NCAA to adopt a college version of the Rooney Rule, the NFL mandate that requires teams to interview minority candidates for head coaching jobs. That rule has helped the NFL improve its minority hiring record. The Division I-A Athletic Directors Association created hiring guidelines earlier this year that mimic the Rooney Rule, but it has no power to enforce them.

All of these efforts should be supported. Many black athletes have become icons on our college football fields. It's time for more black head coaches and administrators to have the opportunity to do the same.