Channing Crowder has been very vocal in the past about his thoughts on HBCUs and, in a recent interview with the Rolling Stone, he's adding even more to the conversation. While Crowder, co-host of the widely successful sports and lifestyle podcast The Pivot didn't rule out his children attending a n HBCU, he didn't openly endorse it after a recent trip to Howard University.

Rolling Out writer Rashad Milligan asked Crowder, “Why have you been so adamant about advocating for young athletes to attend traditional Power 5 programs instead of HBCUs?”

“I don’t not want it to happen. We’re just too far behind,” Crowder replied, “It’s just too far … I’m [a] Florida guy. I know to be a Gator, there are 10s of 1000s of people who donate over $100,000 a year just to have a little sticker on their collar of their suit. It’s so much money pumped into those universities. My wife took me to Howard for the first time. I’m used to Florida. I’m used to stone crabs and sirloin steaks every night. I’m used to unlimited meal tickets so I can go in there all day, 24/7 and get me a steak whenever. I’m used to a 96,000-person stadium. A $4-6 million weight room. I went to Howard and I’m like, “This is where y’all play? Like, this is the football field that you play on?” My high school field was bigger than that…”

He added, “With NIL now, Caleb Williams is making $5 million leaving USC. Could Jackson State do that?”

To Channing Crowder per his comments to Milligan, it appears as if college is an NIL opportunity more than an educational and social experience and a possible pathway to a professional league. Resources, in which he says institutions such as Deion Sanders's former employer Jackson State lacks, appears to be a euphemism for money.

“If it’s my son, who plays baseball, football and basketball, or my daughter, who’s a crazy tennis player and amazing basketball player, I can’t push them to go somewhere if these people are offering them a million dollars a year.”

Crowder has been consistent in his skepticism about top-tier athletes attending HBCUs. When Sanders was coach at Jackson State, he was adamant in his take that a top athlete wouldn't pick Jackson State over a Power Five institution.

“I'll tell you now, I'm not against HBCUs, I'm not a hater or whatever,” Crowder said. “But Prime I went to Florida. What Florida can give a kid with the dorms, with the training tables, with the exposure, with the 100,000 people in the game…y'all cannot compete with the teams that's got so much resources, those Power-5 Prime, you cannot compete with those power-Five schools,” Crowder said in a May 2021 episode of the I AM ATHLETE Podcast.

After Sanders recruited 5-star prospect Travis Hunter to Jackson State that December, Crowder atoned for his words in a later episode The Pivot.

“I want to apologize because I said that, I did, and it was very strong. I said there's not going to be a top recruit that chooses and HBCU over a Power-5 school and I want to apologize to Deion because he did pull him. As Deion he did pull Travis Hunter to an HBCU.”