Stand against segregation

BUFFALO - Willie Evans doesn't know if his mind is failing or he's repressed the memories of what happened 50 years ago. For the life of him, Evans is unable to remember the fateful team meeting at which he felt the bite of racism and learned about the power of friendship to overcome it.

If the details have faded, it doesn't matter. When his University at Buffalo teammates retell the story, they can place exactly where Evans was sitting in the classroom when the team unanimously rejected a chance to play in the 1958 Tangerine Bowl, the school's first - and it turns out, only - bowl bid.

“Well, I'm getting old,” said Evans, a former coach and physical education director for Buffalo schools who turns 71 this month. “Maybe, I've blocked it out. You really don't understand how your subconscious works all the time, or your conscious. But I really draw a blank.”