Notre Dame's hiring of Tyrone Willingham is being hailed by minority coaching advocates as a major step in creating more opportunities for African-American head coaching candidates in Division I-A college football.

"The fact that an African-American head coach was hired at the most storied school in college football history helps drop a lot of barriers," said Charles Farrell, director of Rainbow Sports, a division of the Rainbow/Push Wall Street project, which seeks to expand and improve minority advancement in the sports industry.

	Compiling a 44-36-1 record at Stanford helped land Tyrone Willingham a six-year contract worth at least $2 million annually at Notre Dame.

"Schools don't have to make apologies or excuses anymore when they interview a black coach," he said. "The bottom line is that if Notre Dame can do it, anybody can do it and with today's hiring, we've come a long way."

In July, Farrell and the Rev. Jesse Jackson met with NCAA officials to encourage the organization to do something about the lack of minority head coaches in Division I-A college football. Since 1992, their data showed that there were 156 head coaching openings and only 12 positions -- 7.6 percent -- were filled with African-Americans.

In the five months since the meeting, the current number of African-American Division I-A head coaches actually has dropped from five to four, and not one coach hired by nine schools in the offseason has been an African-American previous to Notre Dame's expected hiring of Willingham.

There are currently four African-American head coaches in Division I-A football: Willingham, Bobby Williams at Michigan State, Fitz Hill at San Jose State and Tony Samuel at New Mexico State. Jerry Baldwin was fired as Louisiana-Lafayette's head coach on Nov. 26 after compiling a 6-27 record over three seasons.

Certainly Willingham's successful track record at Stanford helped to win the job at Notre Dame.

"Notre Dame's hiring is more about the green than the black and white," said David Carter, principal of The Sports Business Group, a sports consultancy firm. "The question is: Will he be able to, with a winning tradition, generate the booster support, merchandise sales and bowl money like he did at Stanford? That has very little to do with race."

This fall, the Black Coaches Association submitted a list of 52 qualified head coaching candidates -- all African-Americans -- to all college football programs, from Division I-A through Division III, BCA executive director Floyd Keith said. The list includes Baldwin, Hill, Samuel, Williams and Willingham, all current Division I-A head coaches, as well as longtime Nebraska receivers coach Ron Brown, South Carolina defensive coordinator Charlie Strong and former Wake Forest head coach Jim Caldwell.

"The fact that a premier school, without any prior history of having a minority head coach in any sport, has hired a minority head coach certainly says something," Keith said.

Rainbow Sports has been particularly active in pushing for a head coach at Notre Dame. While Notre Dame has never had an African-American head coach in any capacity, nor an African-American offensive or defensive coordinator for that matter, the school has one associate athletics director and two assistant athletics directors who are African-American.

"Notre Dame was obviously not going to pick a coach -- black or white -- who didn't have previous success," Farrell said. "But we think that there are other successful black coaches in Division I-A and Division I-AA that will now be looked at. They will be able to get interviews more easily and if they can get interviews, they can get jobs."

"The best thing Tyrone can do for other African-American head coaches waiting in the wings is do the same thing he did at Stanford," Farrell said, "win."

Darren Rovell, who covers sports business for ESPN.com, can be reached at darren.rovell@espn.com