‘Let your life speak’: OU’s ‘Unity’ jerseys carry special meaning for Prentice Gautt’s family, players who designed and wore them

Sandra Gautt led her 15-year-old godson around OU’s campus Friday, hoping to immerse him in the knowledge of her late husband, former Sooners running back Prentice Gautt.

They touched the grass of Owen Field that Prentice once graced, toured the Prentice Gautt Academic Center on the north end of Oklahoma Memorial Stadium and listened to stories from those who knew Prentice well.

Sandra, 78, even took her godson to see the funny picture of Prentice and two teammates wearing tutus that hangs on a pillar next to Crossroads Restaurant at the south end of the Oklahoma Memorial Union.

Then, on Saturday, they watched as OU defeated Kansas 52-42 while debuting its new crimson and anthracite Prentice Gautt “Unity” uniforms, which feature the words “Together” on the collar and “Unity” on the back, in place of each player’s last name.

During a first-quarter timeout, Sandra and her son, Roger, stood alongside athletic director Joe Castiglione and Jay Wilkinson, son of Gautt’s former Oklahoma coach Bud Wilkinson, before 83,874 Sooners fans and accepted a framed No. 38 “Unity” jersey in Prentice’s honor.

The weekend held special meaning for Gautt’s family, for the former OU players who began designing the “Unity” jersey amid a period of racial reckoning in America and for the current Sooners who honored the memory of a man who paved the way for many of them.

“(Prentice’s) early years here were really about what I think the whole unity movement and the basic concepts that they've embraced means,” Sandra said of seeing Prentice immortalized in dark gray and red thread. “It's such a fitting tribute in that way, and I think to me, that's his real legacy.”

One of Sandra’s favorite quotes she has used to describe Gautt is “Let your life speak,” and he did that certainly as an athlete, academic and administrator, but even in his day to day ventures, which impressed upon one couple, David and Emily Lewis, very clearly.

Years ago, Sandra and Prentice frequented a coffee shop called Milton’s Cafe near their home in Lawrence, Kansas. The establishment was owned by David and Emily and named after David’s father, Milton. At the time, Sandra worked in the provost’s office at the University of Kansas, while Prentice was assistant commissioner of the Big Eight Conference.

Before his career as an athletics administrator, Prentice became the first Black scholarship football player at the University of Oklahoma in 1956. He persevered through racial prejudice to unite his teammates on the path to four conference championships during his college career and became a two-time All-Big Eight running back and an Academic All-American.

He went on to play in the NFL and was later a professor and coach at the University of Missouri, where he met Sandra. Later, as special assistant to the commissioner of the Big 12, he helped create and develop the conference’s life skills program, which worked to help athletes prepare for careers after sports.

Beyond athletics, Prentice, who died of flu-like symptoms at age 67 in 2005, touched David and Emily’s lives so much that they named their son — the now high school sophomore who shadowed Sandra around campus — Milton Prentice Hamlin Lewis when he was born about a year later.

‘Nobody’s gonna say no to Prentice Gautt’

Following the death of George Floyd at the hands of white Minneapolis police in May 2020, former Oklahoma head coach Lincoln Riley formed a team leadership council to cultivate and enact reform as the nation grappled with recurring instances of racial injustice.

Linebacker Caleb Kelly, safety Pat Fields, center Creed Humphrey, H-back Jeremiah Hall and defensive back Chanse Sylvie met on a near-daily basis to discuss avenues for social change. Wide receivers coach Dennis Simmons encouraged them to boil their big ambitions down to smaller projects.

Sylvie created a plan for police reform that he has since transitioned to community reform and is now implementing in his hometown of Shreveport, Louisiana. Humphrey and Hall were liaisons to the locker room, encouraging their teammates to register to vote in the 2020 primary election, and Hall was also on the Big 12 Black Student-Athlete Council.

“We all had different wants and ambitions that transpired during the George Floyd times and then from there, we all had different goals that we wanted to accomplish,” Sylvie said. “But we all were on the same idea of the jerseys.”

Fields and Kelly headed up designing an alternate uniform the group hoped would make a statement to the entire nation about the need for unity during unharmonious times. They wanted something more pronounced and permanent than the black shirts coach Bob Stoops and his players wore in response to the Sigma Alpha Epsilon racist incident on OU’s campus in 2015.

“We wanted to take it bigger than just wearing all black for one week, or just wearing it at practice to something that the nation can see,” Sylvie said. “And from there, just the nation seeing that the black uniform now was not just about Black Lives Matter, but about the unity that we have on our team and on our campus.”

Kelly had played around with Nike’s uniform creator in high school and, using some concepts he saw online, mocked up alternate uniforms and presented them to a panel including Castiglione, university President Joseph Harroz and Dean of Students David Surratt.

His pitch included over 100 videos sent to him from other OU student-athletes who shared their experiences with race, positive and negative, and offered their support for the project. He also acquainted himself with Prentice’s story and chose the Prentice Gautt ‘Unity’ uniforms as the name.

Castiglione, who worked closely with Prentice during his time in Missouri’s athletic department, later told Sandra he was blown away by the players’ thoughtful craftsmanship.

“Nobody’s gonna say no to Prentice Gautt,” said Kelly, now a director of the Sooners’ SOUL Mission program, an initiative Gautt likely would’ve championed himself.

“I think what stood out was the fact that that's the 1950s, and still the same issues back then. Not the exact same, but the same genre of issues with race, racial injustices and racial equity and all those things. I think (we’re) still having the same conversations today, or very similar conversations today. That’s important. Unity is still something that we're still talking about today.”

‘Work together for a common cause’

With the endeavor approved, OU associate athletic director for internal operations Brad Camp, who has designed past Sooners uniforms, assisted with the next wave of creation.

The base of the jersey was initially black but was adjusted to anthracite gray because the university had previously used that color for other sports, basketball and softball among them. The player leadership council was willing to compromise — striking the balance of adhering to tradition while still sending a message.

After the 2020 season, the official mockups were presented to Kelly, Fields, Hall and Drake Stoops, who gave the final approval. Kelly saw the finished uniforms before the 2021 season, after which Riley jetted for Southern California.

When Brent Venables was hired, Kelly presented the “Unity” suits to the Sooners’ new coach, who has repeatedly expressed his love for deeper messages behind several traditions in his first season leading the program.  

For the leadership council, there was real fulfillment in seeing efforts that began two years ago brought to life on the field Saturday and in knowing that OU’s other varsity sports will wear “Unity” uniforms during this academic year as well.

“Just to say that I had a hand in something that's bigger than myself, I can't help but smile,” Hall said. “I keep bugging Joe C., I'm like, ‘Hey, like, Can I get one?’ So we'll see if I can nab me a jersey, but just to be able to say that I was a part of something that will last, it's not like OU puts out a new alternate jersey very often. So, I'm hoping that one day my kids see this, and I can say, ‘Hey, your dad played a part in that.’

“When you hear the word Heisman as an OU fan, you think of (Baker Mayfield), you think of (Kyler Murray). You see the jerseys now and you see the word ‘Unity’ on them, and you think of Prentice.”

The football uniforms were presented to the team on Wednesday alongside a documentary about Prentice. During her and Milton’s tour, Sandra was told you could “feel the emotion” in the room as current Sooners came to understand the example her husband set and the legacy they now carry.

For a team that has struggled in its first season under Venables and now looks to sustain success after its first conference win, can the story behind the fresh set of threads carry broader significance?

“I hope that it would, because I think in many ways the Unity initiative as I understand it is kind of a diversity, equity and inclusion initiative, but to me, it's broader than that,” Sandra said. “It’s being able to work together for a common cause, and the greater good. Obviously, I never played football, but it seems to me that in order for a team to be a cohesive team, you have to have that concept.”

Jerseys don’t win games, Kelly reminded, and OU linebacker David Ugwoegbu concurs not to give the uniform too much power. Still, the message within the material is meaningful enough that he’d roll the jerseys out again after the bye week when the Sooners visit Iowa State.

“For this team (unity) is huge because these coaches did a great job of building a family environment,” Ugwoegbu said. “Family is going to argue and have a little bit of beef here and there, but at the end of the day, we're going to be unified, we're going to be together. So putting these jerseys together, putting the word ‘unity’ on the back, it’s just huge for us because it emphasizes everything that Coach Venables and this program are about.”