Oklahoma DB Patrick Fields a candidate for Big 12 Sportsperson of the Year
Oklahoma senior safety Patrick Fields, a former three-star class of 2018 recruit out Union High, has been announced as a candidate for the Big 12 Sportsperson of the Year honors, the conference office announced Wednesday.
Fields, who stayed home in the Sooner State to join Lincoln Riley’s first recruiting class, served as a team captain for Oklahoma in 2020 after earning All-Big 12 honorable mention in 2019. Over his two seasons as a starter in the Oklahoma secondary, he’s logged 109 tackles, a pair of sacks, an interception and five pass breakups. Perhaps his most memorable moment as a Sooner was that lone interception, which came in the 2020 Big 12 Championship game off a deflected pass from Brock Purdy. It was one of three interceptions on the day for the Oklahoma defense, and behind the glut of takeaways, the Sooners would emerge with a 27-21 victory.
Fields’ contributions off the field throughout his career in crimson are extensive: he founded “Town Business,” a financial literacy seminar that teaches high school football student-athletes about budgeting, money management, credit and personal branding. Along with other collegiate student-athletes and former NFL players, he conducted the first seminar in May in his hometown of Tulsa, Okla. He has worked as part of the leadership team of OU athletes that promoted social justice initiatives, voting education and registration and helped develop the Sooners for Humanity patch featured on all OU athletics uniforms for the 2020-21 athletics year.
Fields recently completed a two-year term as one of two student-athletes nationally serving on the NCAA Division I Football Oversight and Competition Committee. He was an Academic All-Big 12 First Team honoree in 2019 and ’20, and was a recipient of the Dr. Gerald Lage Academic Achievement Award, OU’s Dan Gibbons Outstanding Scholar Athlete of the Year Award and the 2020 Cotton Bowl’s Dan S. Petty Scholarship Award. He is simultaneously pursuing a Bachelor of Business Administration degree in accounting and a master’s degree in accounting, and is projected to complete both in December 2021.
The Big 12 Sportsperson of the Year Awards began in 2000-01 to annually recognize student-athletes who display an extraordinary degree of sportsmanship, community service and academic achievement. A 10-person media panel selects the male and female honorees. The award winners will be announced Thursday, June 17.
