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At Florida A&M University, an historically black university in Tallahassee, the achievements of its athletic teams are often buried under the accolades heaped on the larger, more well-known schools in the area. That's an unfortunate reality since the university boasts an impressive athletic lineage, including Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Andre Dawson, Pro Football Hall of Famer Bob Hayes, and Althea Gibson, the first African-American woman to win a Grand Slam tennis title.

In response, the school is working to shine a brighter light on its programs' successes, and in June launched an eight-part Web series called "The Mystique," a collection of short videos highlighting notable athletes by retelling their achievements with present-day interviews. The series' third installment was a profile of the school's 4x400 meter women's relay team that earned All-American honors at the 1984 NCAA Division I Outdoor Championships. The foursome consisted of Pam Porter, Vogel Newsome, Mary Jones-Wellens, and Pam Oliver, now a well-known reporter for FOX Sports.

"Our athletic director talks about how he wants people to know why we're so proud of this school's athletic accomplishments," says Vaughn Wilson, Sports Information Director at FAMU and the driving force behind the project. "So we thought highlighting some of our history through video would be a way to achieve that. The reaction has been incredible. A lot of people didn't even know Pam Oliver went to school here."

The university tied the timing of the interviews for the video to the FAMU Relays in March, an event the school has been using to honor former runners. "In 2010, we had honored some former members of the men's team, so we thought the 2011 meet would be a perfect opportunity to bring back and showcase the 4x400 team from 1984," Wilson says. "While they were here for the filming, we asked them to be grand marshals of the Relays. We also located the NCAA certificates they received for competing in the 1984 Championships. They were overwhelmed when we presented them with the certificates."

Florida A&M Head Coach Darlene Moore says the visit from the former All-Americans had a profound impact on her squad. "I had 22 freshmen on my team this year, and most of them had no idea about our program's history," she says. "When those four came to practice and spoke, you could hear a pin drop. They related the things they had to overcome as freshmen and how by their junior year, they wanted to run over people. That really resonated with the current runners, especially the 4x400 team.

"We won the next four meets after their visit, and the effect carried over for the whole season," Moore continues. "Mary Jones-Wellens and Vogel Newsome kept in touch with me throughout the year, and that was special. In 2010, we finished in 10th place at the conference meet, but in 2011, we were fifth, and we sent three runners to the NCAA Championships. I don't think many runners on the team fathomed doing that in early March."

While the homecoming went off without a hitch, putting together the 12-minute video proved to be slightly more difficult. For one, there was no archived video of the foursome competing. "We looked everywhere, but no one had any footage," says Wilson. "So we had to come up with a more creative way to tell the story. We incorporated still photographs of them running, and we showed some newspaper clippings in the video, and we told the story mostly through the interviews.

"Their former coach, Bobby Lang, is in the area, and we wanted to interview him as well," he continues. "But we decided to talk to him separately. It gave the athletes the opportunity to reflect on what Coach Lang meant to them and vice versa. And it allowed their respective stories to intertwine."

Wilson says it's important for historically black colleges and universities to remind the public of their athletic heritage to avoid getting lost in the shuffle of big-name schools. "Other schools in the area have resources we don't, but do they have the history our program does?" he asks. "In all likelihood, they don't, so it's an opportunity for us to separate ourselves."