BREAKING: Selmon Brothers Statue Coming to Oklahoma in 2022

Lucious, Dewey and Lee Roy are three of the greatest players in OU history and will be commemorated next year with a statue near the stadium.

John E. Hoover | Sep 18, 2021

NORMAN — Rumors have been around almost as long as the fans’ hopes and wishes.

But now it’s really happening.

Oklahoma is finalizing plans for a Selmon Brothers statue.

The statue, which will stand at the corner of Jenkins Avenue and Brooks Street, was formally revealed during Friday night’s OU-Nebraska reunion activities.

Players from both sides of the 1971 Game of the Century, as well as plenty of other dignitaries from both schools, are in Norman for Saturday’s game between the Sooners and Cornhuskers.

The Selmons — Lucious, Dewey and Lee Roy — came to OU to play for Chuck Fairbanks and Barry Switzer out of Eufaula High School. Lucious came first in 1970 (and was a sophomore during the 1971 season) and made All-America in 1973. Dewey and Lee Roy arrived in 1972 and made All-American in 1974 and ’75.

During Friday night’s events, Switzer reiterated to the assemblage that the most important person in OU football history was the Selmons’ mother, Jessie Selmon.

During the Sooners’ pregame hype video Saturday, the announcement was confirmed: “There’s only one … Mrs. Selmon.”

After winning both the Outland and Lombardi Awards, Lee Roy Selmon was the No. 1 overall draft pick of the expansion Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 1976 and played nine seasons for the Bucs. He made six Pro Bowls and three first-team All-Pro teams. He and Tommy McDonald are the only two Sooners to be inducted into both the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame.

Currently, OU’s only statues stand at Heisman Park and include five of OU's seven Heisman Trophy winners (Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray are just waiting for their NFL calendars to line up with a dedication ceremony), and the four coaches — Bennie Owen, Bud Wilkinson, Switzer and Bob Stoops — who have at least 100 career victories.

OU has commemorated the Selmons on plaques in All-America Plaza on the northeast corner of Memorial Stadium, but now the three of them will have their own statue.

The statue is currently being sculpted and will be formally unveiled early during the 2022 football season.

Published Sep 18, 2021

JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.