With some help from Mom, Texas Longhorns' T'Vondre Sweat ascends to top of Big 12

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Before Texas Longhorns' defensive tackle T'Vondre Sweat was gobbling up opposing running backs and quarterbacks, the Huntsville High School product was feasting on anything and everything to add 100 pounds to the 6-foot-4-inch frame of what, at one time, was a tall, skinny high school recruit.

"I mean, I was a little small guy," Sweat admitted this week. "But once you come to UT, they have all the food you can eat. I took advantage."

He also took his mother's advice.

"If you're hungry, you have to eat," Lashunda Ross, T'Vondre's mother, recalled saying to her son. "You can't starve. So when you get on that field, you have to eat."

ABC13 visited Lashunda at her home in Houston. She's the mother of the newly-minted Big 12 Conference Defensive Player of the Year.

Laushunda shared photos of T'Vondre's pigskin progress from the 4th Ward Cardinals to the YMCA. She said one of the toughest tests for her baby boy came early in his Longhorns career when he was stuck behind starters on the depth chart.

"We're going to get through this together," Lashunda said to T'Vondre. "What you're going through, I'm going to go through it with you. We're going to just get through it. You're not going to give up."

Finally, this season, his fifth in college due to an extra year of eligibility from the NCAA due to COVID, Sweat's patience paid off. With career highs in tackles, tackles for loss, and sacks in 2023, T'Vondre was able to show his promise and make good on it.

"He just made a promise to me one day," Lashunda recalled. "He said, 'I'm going to do what I am supposed to do on this field because I owe you this.'"

Before the Big 12 Championship in Arlington, one of her son's final collegiate games, Lashunda said she plans to talk to T'Vondre beforehand as she does every game. While doing so, she plans to share some sage, yet savage advice.

"Get out there and get that quarterback," Lashunda revealed saying to her son. "Get out there and run over something. I need you to put your hands on something. I always tell him that, and he says, 'yes, ma'am.'"

Listening to his mother's advice has taken T'Vondre Sweat to the top of the Big 12 Conference.

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