Early on, it looked like Taniela Tupou’s football career at the University of Washington had reached a dead end.
Called into a UW assistant coach’s office after his second season, Tupou and some teammates were told they would likely play sparingly in the years ahead. But in a surprising twist — and for Tupou, a very fortunate twist — then-Washington coach Steve Sarkisian left after the 2013 season to become the head coach at USC, and was replaced by Chris Petersen.
Given the chance to start anew under the incoming coaching staff, Tupou made the most of it. Tupou, who lives in Marysville and was a 2011 graduate of Everett’s Archbishop Murphy High School, became a fixture on Washington’s defensive line. In 2015, his senior season, he played well enough to be named to the All-Pacific-12 Conference second team.
The 6-foot-2, 288-pound Tupou, a finalist for The Herald’s 2015 Man of the Year in Sports award, was described during the season by then-UW defensive line coach Jeff Choate as a player “who kind of sets the tone for our group (of defensive linemen). He’s just a great leader. He had to kind of wait his turn and that can sometimes be a hard thing to do. … But it speaks a lot for the commitment he’s made to our program.”
Tupou hopes to play in the NFL, but also has an interest in being a college strength and conditioning coach, or perhaps police work. Regardless of where he ends up, he has already been given a valuable lesson in perseverance.
“One thing I’ve learned … you just have to be patient and wait for your opportunity to come,” he said. “And then once your opportunity comes, you have to seize that moment.”
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