When Kansas State football team leaves the locker room to hit the field against Iowa State Saturday, Veryl Switzer will open the locker room door for the Wildcats.
Nearly 70 years after Switzer became the first African American scholarship player to graduate from K-State, inspiring others to follow in his footsteps, the 89-year-old, a charter member of the K-State Athletics Hall of Fame and member of the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame, will be recognized as one of eight breakthrough Wildcat athletes K-State will recognize at Saturday's contest, which will serve as the athletic department's Diversity and Inclusion game for the 2021 football season.
Three permanent "Trailblazers" displays will honor those athletes in four sports. On the west concourse at Bill Snyder Family Stadium, Switzer will be honored alongside Harold Robinson, the first African American scholarship player in Big 7 Conference history; Hoyt Givens, the first African American non-scholarship player in Big 6 Conference history; and Ray Romero, one of the first Hispanics to play in the NFL.
Switzer was a three-time All-American halfback, and remains the highest-drafted player in school history, taken with the fourth overall pick by the Green Bay Packers in the 1954 NFL Draft.
Switzer helped guide African American K-State student-athletes to their own college degrees while serving in a variety of administrative and athletic department positions until his retirement in 2005 – assistant dean of student affairs, assistant vice president of special programs, co-director of the affirmative action program and assistant director of athletics.