UPDATED: Former Oklahoma RB Marcus Dupree Helps Save Woman After Highway Crash
Oklahoma football legend Marcus Dupree had the greatest run of his life on Tuesday.
Dupree, arguably the most gifted running back in college football history for his undeniable 1982 season at OU, was in the right place at the right time when he helped extract a woman from her vehicle following a high-speed crash on the Turner Turnpike.
“I couldn’t even believe it was happening in front of my eyes,” Dupree said.
Dupree was in Norman over the weekend for the Sooners’ annual Red/White Game, and he was en route to Tulsa for an NFL Draft charity event to raise money for high schools to buy sports equipment.
He said the motorist passed him in the right lane and tried to swerve left to pass a tractor-trailer rig, but said he thought the truck changed lanes and she clipped it before spinning and flipping. Her SUV hit the guardrail and came to rest on the driver’s side.
Dupree pulled over, ran ahead and immediately assessed the situation.
This SUV crashed Tuesday on the Turner Turnpike, and Marcus Dupree rescued the driver.
Photo via Facebook
“The back part was blocked. It was bent. She couldn’t get out,” Dupree told SI Sooners in a phone interview Wednesday morning. “The window was busted. Luckily it wasn’t on fire, because she was a big girl and I wouldn’t have been able to get her out if she was knocked out or whatever. It was tough getting her out of there.”
Dupree said he called 911 and began to help the woman get out with their vehicles on the shoulder of the highway near mile marker 164 just east of the Wellston exit. When they were safely out of the vehicle, local firefighters arrived. He said the woman was taken into an ambulance and first responders told him she was OK.
Wellston Police Chief and Fire Chief Todd Beesley described the scene when he arrived – and his surprise when he learned the Good Samaritan’s identity.
“We got on scene and I made contact with him initially,” Beesley told SI Sooners. “He was walking towards me and I asked him if he was in a crash. He said he wasn’t, that he witnessed it, and told me that he’d helped remove the driver through the back window of the SUV, and said he pulled her out and helped her get out through the back window.
“Then he told me who he was,” Beesley said with a laugh.
Marcus Dupree and a team of first responders from Wellston, OK.
Photo via Facebook
Beesley said he immediately recognized Dupree’s name and likeness.
“Well, I was kind of surprised,” Beesley said. “Pretty sure you could see that on my face. Because when he said his name, I looked at him and he said, ‘Yeah, that’s me.’ So yeah. It’s not every day you get to meet somebody like that on the side of the turnpike. That’s for sure.”
Beesley said Wellston’s ambulance service was on scene in “probably less than five minutes” and paramedics had the woman inside the ambulance when he arrived.
Dupree said the whole incident was over relatively quickly.
“I was talking to (Beesley) and the Highway Patrol, and then I left,” Dupree said. “So I think she was fine. I think she was kind of dazed a little bit.”
Dupree said he was shocked that no other motorists stopped to render aid.
“Nobody stopped,” he said. “That’s what tripped me out. Nobody stopped. I guess there was this (Latino) guy over in the pasture and he heard it and he came running. He jumped the fence and came running. I couldn’t understand nothing he said, but yeah, she was OK.”
Dupree said he was thankful for the stranger’s assistance, and said people don’t need to think he’s now some kind of highway hero.
“I just think that’s what we’re supposed to do as human beings, is stop,” Dupree said. “Nobody really stopped. If she had went over into that ravine – what if that was at night? Nobody would have known. The only thing that stopped her from going into the ravine was the rails. Right there.”
He said he didn’t think the motorist didn’t recognize him as a famous football player, but Beesley sure did.
‘He was the first one to get there when I called,” Dupree said. “He introduced himself and I said, ‘I’m Marcus Dupree.’ He took a step back, he’s like, ‘Who? What?’ I said, ‘Yeah. I’m Marcus.’ He was like, hey, can we take some pictures? So we’re taking pictures on the side of the interstate.”
Marcus Dupree against Arizona State in 1982
Photo by Icon Sportswire via Wochit
Dupree took the college football world by storm as a true freshman in 1982 when, in a little more than half a season of full-time action, he rushed for 1,144 yards and scoring 14 touchdowns for Barry Switzer’s Oklahoma Sooners. Dupree was the No. 1 recruit in the nation out of Philadelphia, MS, and his talents helped convince Switzer to change from his traditional wishbone offense.
Dupree began the 1983 season as the Heisman Trophy frontrunner, but midway through the season, he was gone, homesick and lured away by false promises from a family friend. He sustained a severe concussion in the Texas game, went home to Mississippi for the weekend and never returned to Norman. Dupree tried to play in the original United States Football League and had a brief stint with the Los Angeles Rams, but never fully recovered from a major knee injury sustained in the USFL.
Marcus Dupree against Kentucky in 1982
Malcolm Emmons-USA TODAY Sports
In 2010, Dupree was the subject of an ESPN “30 for 30” film by Jonathan Hock called “The Best That Never Was.”
Regardless of his fame or standing, Beesley said he was thankful Dupree was on scene.
“Based on what Marcus told me, what he witnessed, she hit the back end of that semi and then rolled – he said like, three times,” Beesley said. “Basically, any time somebody walks away from a crash like that, it’s amazing. A miracle.
“I’ll tell you what, he was a super nice guy. Very impressed. Very impressed. And the fact that he stopped and helped was even more. He could have just drove on by. But he didn’t. He saw it. He told me, ‘I was a little nervous about walking up on it first.’ And I think anybody would be. You watch a car at 75 miles an hour flip three times, you’re wondering what you’re fixing to walk up on. You know? Even for people who are full-time or volunteer, they're seasoned, that’s still in your mind, when you walk up on something like that, for sure.”
Dupree said it’s not something he’ll forget any time soon.
“It was something to see, I’ll tell you that.”
