Five Longhorns named to Preseason All-Big 12 team
By Steve Lansdale
IRVING, Texas — Five members of the University of Texas football team were named to the Preseason All-Big 12 team, according to a Thursday announcement from the Big 12 office.
The media members who cover the conference voted on the team, selecting just four players, including redshirt junior Texas tackle Samuel Cosmi, unanimously.
The other four Longhorns to make the team were senior quarterback Sam Ehlinger, junior defensive back D’Shawn Jamison, junior JACK Joseph Ossai and junior safety Caden Sterns.
Cosmi enters his redshirt junior season with 27 appearances on his résumé, including 26 starts. He started his playing career as a USA Today Freshman All-America in 2018, and earned second-team All-Big 12 honors last season, finishing as an honorable mention for the Big 12 Offensive Lineman of the Year. After he helped Texas upset Utah in the Valero Alamo Bowl, he earned “all-bowl” honors from the Associated Press, ESPN and Sports Illustrated.
(photos courtesy of texassports.com, Jose Mendez / Don Bender / Horns Illustrated)
Ehlinger has started 33 of the 36 games in which he has played. He leads all active Football Bowl Subdivision players in career passing yards (8,870), passing touchdowns (57), total offense (10,400) and total touchdowns (93). He also ranks third among active FBS quarterbacks, and tops among Power 5 quarterbacks, in career rushing yards (1,530) and second in rushing touchdowns (25). Ehlinger is the only FBS player to record at least 50 passing touchdowns and 20 rushing touchdowns over the past two seasons.
Jamison started nine of the 13 games in which he played last year, collecting 35 tackles, 3.5 tackles for loss, three interceptions (two of which came at West Virginia), three pass breakups, one forced fumble and one fumble recovery.
A former defensive end, Ossai has played in 27 games for UT, starting 15. He started all 13 games in 2019, leading the Longhorns in tackles, with 90, tackles for loss (13.5) and sacks (5.0). He also picked off a pair of passes, broke up another, forced a fumble and blocked a kick. He had at least eight tackles in eight games in 2019, falling one game short of the nine games in which Emmanuel Acho reached the eight-tackle mark to set the program standard over the last two decades. He earned Defensive Most Valuable Player honors in UT’s win over Utah, thanks to nine tackles, six tackles for loss and three sacks, the most sacks by a UT player in a bowl game since Alex Okafor set the program record with 4.5 in the 2012 Alamo Bowl.
Sterns has been a fixture in the UT secondary since he arrived, starting 21 of 22 games over the last two seasons. Despite missing four games in 2019 because of injury, Sterns collected 58 tackles (43 solo), four tackles for loss, a sack and a pass breakup. As a freshman, he was a semifinalist for the Jim Thorpe Award, which is given annually to the nation’s premier defensive back, was named Big 12 Defensive Freshman of the Year and earned first-team all-conference honors.
