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How the SEC Became Goliath.      Ray Glier. The Making of College Football’s Most Dominant Conference.   Ray Glier’s fascinating book, The Making of College Football’s Most Dominant Conference, treats readers to a delicious tale of intriguing college football in the south.    More specifically, this book is all about how the game is played in the southeastern football conference and its manifestation into the most powerful conference in America.    As Glier argues extensively, a Goliath of sorts. Full disclosure, this book was published in 2013.     I finished reading it about ten years after publication.    Some parts of the book by now are decidedly outdated.    That is not the fault of the author for our review purposes.      However, much of the insight and opinion of Glier is fascinating and still relevant in college football today, and to ardent readers of the sport, especiall...

    Across the Line.    Barry Jacobs. Profiles in Basketball Courage.    Tales of the Frist Black Players in the ACC and SEC.   This is a book that discusses and informs who the first black basketball players were in both the Atlantic Coast Conference and the Southeastern conference.       Of course, this also means that this manuscript is going to contain plenty of history and experiences of the players from that era.     The reader will also be exposed, if not engulfed, in the stories of how many of these well-known institutions came about recruiting and admitting black athletes to cross the color line.    Barry Jacobs, the esteemed sports writer, compiles a lengthy and detailed account of how lines were crossed through sports at the collegiate level in this large swath of the country.    Not surprisingly the stories for just about every athlete highlighted and showcased in the book are n...