Buccaneers assistant head coach Harold Goodwin threw his support behind Eugene Chung.

Last month, Chung, a former player and assistant coach of Korean descent, claimed he was once told he was “not the right minority” while interviewing for an NFL coaching job.

“Being a minority in this league, there’s ups and downs, and we know the process has been pretty hard for us at times,” Goodwin, a black man, said on Thursday.

Chung, as an assistant offensive line and tight ends coach with the Eagles in 2019, did not name the team or interviewer.

Goodwin expressed optimism that Chung’s allegations will be resolved by an on-going NFL investigation.

“We’ve got to keep fighting the good fight,” Goodwin said. “Hopefully the NFL will investigate and get to the bottom of it and just move on and make the whole situation better so we can put this issue to bed for one time in the near future,” he said.

Chung said he was not trying to “bash” the league with the claim, which came during a webinar.

“It’s just when the Asians don’t fit the narrative, that’s where my stomach churns a little bit,” he said.

Goodwin has previously spoken out about concerns involving the NFL’s minority hiring. In 2019, he alluded that teams weren’t serious about the Rooney Rule, which requires every NFL team to interview at least one minority candidate for head-coaching and general manager positions. The NFL has since expanded the Rooney Rule to promote minority hiring to include front-office and coordinator positions. 

Through the years, Goodwin, whose NFL coaching resume stretches back to 2004, has interviewed for head coaching jobs with the Buccaneers, Jaguars, Rams and Bills.

“It’s just up to us as coaches to keep putting our faces out there, to keep putting our work on tape and to just keep striving to get to the table, to have the conversations to possibly be a head coach or a GM or whatever it may be,” Goodwin said. “That’s how we got to live. We can’t get up, as far as being too high or being too low, as far as the situation. Just keep stepping forward each and every day and just trying to get better, to put ourselves in positions to have that access at the upper level of the club.”