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Pat Swilling Jr. transitions from basketball to football at Tulsa

swilling

After a four-year college basketball career, former guard Pat Swilling Jr. will stay at Tulsa and compete for one final season on the football field, according to a report from Bill Haiston of the Tulsa World.

Swilling Jr. was suspended from the Tulsa basketball team for the final 11 games of the 2013-14 season because of a university and police investigation stemming from an alleged sexual assault, but the native of New Orleans was cleared and he’s finishing up his college athletic career on the football field.

A 6-foot-3 guard, Swilling Jr. started his basketball career at Saint Joseph’s before transferring to the College of Southern Idaho and finishing up at Tulsa. Swilling Jr. averaged 8.6 points and two rebounds per game during his senior season at Tulsa.

Swilling Jr. is the son of former NFL All-Pro and College Football Hall-of-Famer Pat Swilling. The elder Swilling was a dominant linebacker and had a prolific college career at Georgia Tech, becoming a first-team All-American in 1985, before moving onto the NFL and making five consecutive Pro Bowls from 1989 through 1993. Swilling spent his 13-year NFL career with the New Orleans Saints, Detroit Lions and Oakland Raiders and finished with 107.5 career NFL sacks.

The move to the football field won’t be completely foreign to Swilling Jr. Besides knowing the game from his father, Swilling Jr. played both football and basketball at Brother Martin High School in New Orleans and according to Haiston, Central Florida, Oklahoma State and Tulane also showed interest in Swilling Jr. as a football player before he opted to stay at Tulsa and play for head coach Bill Blakenship. Swilling Jr. will likely line up at H-Back for the Golden Hurricane and he could also see time at wide receiver or corner.

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