Cooper Kupp
| Eastern Washington Eagles No. 10 | |
|---|---|
| Position | Wide receiver |
| Class |
 Senior |
| Major | Economics |
| Career history | |
| College |
|
| High school | Yakima (WA) Davis |
| Personal information | |
| Date of birth | June 15, 1993 |
| Place of birth | Yakima, Washington |
| Height | 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m) |
| Weight | 195 lb (88 kg) |
| Career highlights and awards | |
| |
| |
Cooper Kupp (born June 15, 1993) is an American football wide receiver for the Eastern Washington Eagles.
Early years
Kupp graduated from Davis High School in Yakima, Washington in 2012. A two-way All-State selection, he earned first team 4A All-State honors as a defensive back and honorable mention accolades as a wide receiver from the Associated Press, as selected by sportswriters and broadcasters. Kupp was also named by the Seattle Times as a “White Chip” selection, as one of the top 100 prospects in the state of Washington.[1]
Kupp was a unanimous first team All-Columbia Basin Big Nine League wide receiver and defensive back at Davis. He finished his senior season with 60 receptions for 1,059 yards (17.7 per catch) and 18 touchdowns, and scored 22 total touchdowns to set a school record. He also had 11 rushes for 122 yards and two touchdowns as he helped Davis come one game away from a berth in the Washington State 4A Playoffs.[1]
Kupp finished his prep career with 110 catches for 2,100 yards. He was also a three-year letter winner in basketball. Davis finished 23–2 and won the State 4A Tournament championship during his senior year.[1]
College career
2012
Kupp signed with the Eastern Washington Eagles in 2012 and redshirted that year. Kupp would eventually be named Eastern's Offensive Scout Team Player of the Year.[1]
2013
In 2013, Kupp entered his redshirt freshman year as a starter at wide receiver. Kupp finished the season having set numerous single-season school and national receiving records at the Football Championship Subdivision Level. Kupp has set national freshman records for receiving yards (1,691), total touchdown catches (21), consecutive games with a touchdown catch (14), and receptions (93).[2]
On November 26, 2013, Kupp was named to the All-Big Sky Conference First Team as a unanimous selection and was also the recipient of the conference's first-ever Freshman of the Year Award.[3]
On December 16, 2013, Kupp was named the recipient of the 2013 Jerry Rice Award, given to the top freshman player in the FCS. Kupp is the first Eastern Washington player and first player from the Big Sky Conference to receive the award.[4]
Kupp was named a consensus first-team All-American, having been honored by the four major selectors at the FCS level, consisting of the American Football Coaches Association,[5] the Associated Press,[6] The Sports Network[7] and the Walter Camp Football Foundation.[8] Kupp is the first freshman wide receiver to be named as a first-team All-American since Randy Moss in 1996.[7]
On January 9, 2014, Kupp was honored by the College Football Performance Awards with the 2013 FCS Wide Receiver Award. Kupp is the second straight Eagles wide receiver to win the award, following Brandon Kaufman, who won the 2012 award.[9]
2014
Kupp finished his sophomore season with 104 catches for 1,431 yards and 16 touchdowns in 13 games. He was named a First-Team All-American by the AFCA, AP, and TSN for the second consecutive season. He was also named to the first team All-Big Sky Conference for the second straight year as a wide receiver while also earning third team honors as punt returner. Kupp finished 18th in the 2014 Walter Payton Award voting.[10]
2015
In the 2015 season, Kupp finished the season with 114 catches for 1,642 yards and 19 touchdown in 11 games. Kupp broke the Big Sky single-season record for catches with 114, a total that ranks ninth most all-time in FCS single-season history. Kupp was named a first team All-Big Sky Conference wide receive for the third-straight year and was also named the league's Offensive Most Valuable Player. He is just the second wide receiver to be named Big Sky Offensive MVP in the last 42 years. Kupp would also win the Walter Payton Award, becoming the third Eastern Washington player to win the award and only the second wide receiver to win, after Brian Finneran of Villanova in 1997.
2016
On November 30, 2015, Kupp announced that he would return for his senior season after speculation that he was considering entering the 2016 NFL Draft.[11] He is poised to break nearly every major FCS career receiving record mark during his final season. His 4,764 career receiving yards are second-most in FCS history, passing NFL Hall of Famer Jerry Rice, who had 4,693 at Mississippi Valley State from 1981–1984. Kupp’s 56 receiving touchdowns rank second in FCS history, a record he is primed to claim, being just two touchdowns behind the 58 that New Hampshire's David Ball caught from 2003–2006.
College career statistics
All statistics from goeags.com[12]
| Year | Team | Games | Receptions | Yards | Touchdowns | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| REC | REC/G | YDS | YD/G | AVG | TD | LG | |||
| 2012 | EWU | Redshirt Season | |||||||
| 2013 | EWU | 15 | 93 | 6.2 | 1,691 | 112.7 | 18.2 | 21 | 63 |
| 2014 | EWU | 13 | 104 | 8.0 | 1,431 | 110.1 | 13.8 | 16 | 61 |
| 2015 | EWU | 11 | 114 | 10.4 | 1,642 | 149.3 | 14.4 | 19 | 78 |
| 2016 | EWU | 10 | 91 | 9.1 | 1,297 | 129.7 | 14.3 | 12 | 75 |
| Career | 49 | 402 | 8.2 | 6,061 | 123.7 | 15.1 | 68 | 78 | |
Personal
Kupp is the son of former National Football League quarterback Craig Kupp, a fifth-round draft pick by the New York Giants in 1990 out of Pacific Lutheran University who played for the Phoenix Cardinals and the Dallas Cowboys in 1991. He married Anna Croskrey on June 20, 2015. When they were pronounced man and wife, Anna grabbed an Eagle football helmet and put it on Cooper’s head, jumped on his back and he went running back up the aisle. Teammates Jordan West, Zach Wimberly, Ashton Clark, Vernon Adams Jr. his brother Ketner Kupp were in the wedding.
His grandfather, Jake Kupp, was an offensive lineman for the University of Washington and was drafted in the ninth round of the 1964 NFL Draft by the Dallas Cowboys. He played from 1964–75 as a guard with Dallas, the Washington Redskins, Atlanta Falcons and the New Orleans Saints. Named to the NFL All-Rookie team, he later was a five-time captain for the Saints. He was named to the franchise’s 25-year All-Time Team and was inducted into its Hall of Fame in 1991.
References
- 1 2 3 4 "Official Eastern Washington Eagles Cooper Kupp bio". Goeags.com. Retrieved December 12, 2013.
- ↑ "Eagles flying Big Sky high". NCAA.com. Retrieved December 12, 2013.
- ↑ "Adams and Kupp take top Big Sky honors, 25 Eags named All-Conference". KREM.com. Retrieved December 12, 2013.
- ↑ "EWU's Cooper Kupp wins Rice Award". spokesman.com. Retrieved December 16, 2013.
- ↑ "AFCA Honors T.J. Lee III and Cooper Kupp on Prestigious All-America Team". swxrightnow.com. Retrieved January 8, 2014.
- ↑ "AP FCS All-America Team, List". sacbee.com. Retrieved December 18, 2013.
- 1 2 "In the FCS Huddle: FCS All-America team shines on star power". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved December 18, 2013.
- ↑ "Eastern Washington, two wins from national title, has two players atop football All-American list". seattletimes.com. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
- ↑ "Vernon Adams and Cooper Kupp Receive Top Honors from College Performance Awards". goeags.com. Retrieved January 9, 2014.
- ↑ http://www.sportsnetwork.com/merge/tsnform.aspx?c=sportsnetwork&page=cfoot2/writers/infcshuddle/archive/haley_12_02_2014.htm
- ↑ Allen, Jim (November 30, 2015). "Cooper Kupp says he'll be back at EWU for senior season". spokesman.com. Retrieved March 15, 2016.
- ↑ "EWU Football Statistics – 2015". goeags.com. Retrieved September 20, 2015.