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Former Oklahoma Running Back Finds New Football Home

The sturdy junior was second on the team this season as the Sooners searched for their RB1 and played in all but one game.

John E. Hoover

Former Oklahoma Running Back Finds New Football Home
Former Oklahoma Running Back Finds New Football Home /
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An Oklahoma running back has a new home.

Sooners walk-on Tawee Walker has landed at Wisconsin. He posted the announcement Friday evening on Twitter.

Walker announced on Nov. 30 that he planned to enter the NCAA Transfer Portal, but he remained with the OU football team throughout December practices and played Thursday night in the Alamo Bowl in San Antonio, logging seven carries for 17 yards and two catches for 12 yards in his final game.

Walker, a walk-on and former junior college transfer from Las Vegas via Palomar College, was second on the team this season with 513 yards and scored seven touchdowns. He also caught 10 passes for 81 yards and played 12 of the Sooners’ 13 games, missing only one contest after what coach Brent Venables termed an “in-house” suspension.

Venables said Walker was welcome at OU in December as well as next season if he shopped around in the transfer portal and didn’t find what he was looking for.

But in Madison, it seems Walker found exactly what he wanted — another opportunity.

The 5-foot-9, 216-pound Walker joins the Badgers with two years of eligibility left. As a sophomore at OU in 2022, he rushed 18 times for 62 yards in 11 games.

He started this year’s season opener against Arkansas State and was named a game captain against Iowa State. His highlights this year included two 100-yard games on the ground, including a career-high 146 and a TD on 23 carries in the loss at Kansas. He also ran for 117 yards on 21 carries against SMU.

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John E. Hoover
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.

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