WASHINGTON

Antoine Bethea’s Super Bowl ring looks pretty good to Geoff Pope. And not just because they’re close friends.

Bethea is an inspirational story for any NFL prospect at a historically Black school. Chosen late in the sixth round last year by the Indianapolis Colts, the safety from Howard University became a starter as a rookie, had two interceptions in the playoffs and provided one of the biggest plays in the Colts’ Super Bowl XLI victory.

Now Pope has a chance to be the next Howard player headed for the pros. His speed alone — 4.29 in the 40-yard dash — has him projected as a late-round pick at this weekend’s draft.

“Seeing Bethea go through that, it doesn’t get any better than that,” Pope says. “He had a lot of people saying he couldn’t play at that level, and to go on and star like that throughout the playoffs and the Super Bowl and get raves, that’s huge not only for me, but for anybody else at a small school that’s trying to make it big.”

Howard also had safety Ron Bartell selected by the St. Louis Rams in the second round in 2005, and tackle Marques Ogden went to the Jacksonville Jaguars in the sixth round in 2003. Not bad for a Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference school that isn’t exactly piling up the trophies. Howard head coach Ray Petty’s contract wasn’t renewed at the end of last season after a 25-30 record over five years.

But Howard’s modest draft success doesn’t even touch what’s happening this year at Hampton University, a MEAC school in Virginia and one of the country’s better-known HBCUs. The Pirates had five players invited to the NFL combine, a record for a Division I-AA school and one more than the number invited from the University of Southern California, a perennial football powerhouse.

“I think it’s probably a testament to what you are seeing in HBCUs, the staffs are a lot more organized,” says Hampton head coach Joe Taylor, whose team has won three straight MEAC titles. “They go out and do a great job of recruiting and then, of course, the actual development, the teaching, the film study. You put that with a real good strength and conditioning program, it shows that we are developing young men and if they have aspirations for going on, then that opportunity can come at the HBCU.”