Oklahoma football: Two Sooners selected in 1st round of 2020 NFL Draft
By Chip Rouse
For the second year in a row, a couple of Oklahoma football players have been selected in the first round of the NFL Draft.
Wide receiver CeeDee Lamb was selected by the Dallas Cowboys with the 17th overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft, and his Sooner teammate, linebacker Kenneth Murray went six spots later, 23rd overall, to the Los Angeles Chargers.
AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, will be familiar territory for Lamb, who played on three Big 12 championship teams there with Oklahoma. In the last two Big 12 championship games, Sooner wins over Texas in 2018 and Baylor in 2019, Lamb hauled in 14 catches for a combined for 340 yards and one touchdown.
Lamb, who hails from Richmond, Texas, near Houston, is the second Oklahoma wide receiver taken in the first round in as many years. Marquise “Hollywood” Brown was selected by the Baltimore Ravens with the 25th overall pick in last year’s draft, joining OU teammate Kyler Murray, the No. 1 overall pick a year ago.
This is the third time since 1996 that a receiver from the same school was selected in the first round in back-to-back drafts.
Lamb was the third receiver selected in the 2020 draft. He followed a pair of Alabama receivers — Henry Ruggs III, taken No. 12 overall by the Los Vegas Raiders, and Jerry Jeudy, 15th overall, by the Denver Broncos.
Murray is the first OU defensive player taken in the first round of the draft since Gerald McCoy was selected by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with the No. 3 overall pick in 2010, and is the first Sooner linebacker to be drafted in the opening round since Brian Bosworth was the No. 1 pick in the 1987 supplemental draft.
The Chargers traded up to take Murray, trading a second- and third-round pick to the New England Patriots.
Murray, who is from Missouri City, Texas, is credited with 325 tackles in his three seasons at Oklahoma and 36.5 tackles for loss. Seventeen of those tackles for loss occurred this last season.
The last Oklahoma player selected in the first round by the Chargers was Joe Washington in 1976.