Three Oklahoma football players named to 3 different All-America First Teams
By Chip Rouse
The award season continues. Three Oklahoma football players have been named to three different All-America First Teams.
It seems only fitting that the best offense in college football this season would place the most players on the First Team All-America offensive unit.
Quarterback Baker Mayfield, offensive tackle Orlando Brown and tight end Mark Andrews have been in the news a lot this season, and deservedly so. All three are first-team selections to the Associated Press, Football Writers Association of America and the ESPN All-America teams for the 2017 season.
Even the Sooner defense, which has faced more than its share of criticism this season, got into the act. Senior defensive end/linebacker Ogbonnia “Obo” Okoronkwo, undeniably the backbone of the OU defensive unit this season, was also named to all three of the aforementioned All-America teams, albeit as a second-team selection.
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Since leading the Sooners to their third consecutive Big 12 championship with a decisive win over TCU 10 days ago, Mayfield has been on a whirlwind tour accepting awards and honors, including the 2017 Heisman Trophy, college football’s most treasured individual award.
You can also add the Walter Camp Award, Associated Press Player of the Year, and the Maxwell Award, all for being voted college football’s most outstanding player this season, and the Davey Obrien National Quarterback Award to Mayfield’s hardware haul over the past week.
Aside from the Heisman, the honor that perhaps means the most to the Oklahoma All-American quarterback is the Burlsworth Trophy, which he did not win this year but did receive the past two seasons as the best player in college football who began his career as a walk-on. Incredibly, given his lengthy accomplishments over an outstanding college career, Mayfield walked on not once, but twice (first at Texas Tech in 2013 and then at Oklahoma in 2014) before earning a scholarship his redshirt sophomore season, in 2015, playing at OU.
Mayfield will be the first to tell you that the enormous protection provided to him by one of college football’s best offensive lines is a major reason for the Sooner quarterback’s uncanny performance record at Oklahoma and a prime factor in all the accolades he is now receiving.
It’s only appropriate then that the anchor of the Sooner offensive line, Orlando Brown, would also receive first-team All-America recognition three times over like the quarterback he so vehemently protected.
Because of the protection provided by Brown and his Sooner O-line teammates, Mayfield was able to get the ball on target and often to his most dependable receiver – and a big target, at that – 6-foot, 5-inch, 250-pound, junior tight-end Mark Andrews.
All four Sooners – Mayfield, Brown, Andrews and Okoronkwo – will be counted on heavily to make big contributions for the 2nd-ranked Sooners in the upcoming College Football Playoff.