Maa Junior Tanuvasa (born November 6, 1970) is a former

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

defensive end Defensive end (DE) is a defensive position in the sport of gridiron football. This position has designated the players at each end of the defensive line, but changes in formations over the years have substantially changed how the position is ...

, mainly for the

Denver Broncos The Denver Broncos are a professional American football franchise based in Denver. The Broncos compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) West division. The team is headquar ...

. He played nine years in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

, winning two Super Bowl championships as a main component of the Broncos defense.

High school and college years

Tanuvasa was an Interscholatic All-Star in football and

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping eve ...

Mililani High School Mililani High School is the only public high school located in Mililani Town CDP,2000 Map: - Compare to addresses of schools. City and County of Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S. on the island of Oahu. Serving an enrollment of over 2,600 students in grade ...

in Mililani, Hawai'i. He moved on to the

University of Hawaii A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...

, where he starred for three years, amassing 190

tackles Tackle may refer to: * In football: ** Tackle (football move), a play in various forms of football ** Tackle (gridiron football position), a position in American football and Canadian football ** Dump tackle, a forceful move in rugby of picking u ...

and 10 sacks and helping Hawaii to the 1992

Western Athletic Conference The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, New Mexico, Utah, Washington, and Texas. Due to mos ...

championship.

Professional career

He was drafted in the eighth round by the Los Angeles Rams in the

1993 NFL Draft The 1993 NFL draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held April 25–26, 1993, at the Marriot Ma ...

and spent his

rookie A rookie is a person new to an occupation, profession, or hobby. In sports, a ''rookie'' is a professional athlete in their first season (or year). In contrast with a veteran who has experience and expertise, a rookie is usually inexperienced ...

year with them. In 1994, he was cut by the Rams and spent a part of the season on the Pittsburgh Steelers' practice squad. His first NFL season was with the Broncos in

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake str ...

, when he played one game. He worked his way into the rotation by the 1996 season, and by

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

, was a regular starter. He led the Broncos in sacks in the

and

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

seasons. He was on the Bronco teams which won the

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

and

Super Bowl championships. After the 2000 season with the Broncos, he joined the San Diego Chargers for one year, and the Atlanta Falcons for the next. He has not been in the NFL since, having returned to his native Hawai'i, where he served as an assistant football coach at his alma mater, Mililani High School. He was inducted into the Hawai'i Sports Hall of Fame in 2006.StarBulletin.com , Sports , /2006/02/08/
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References

External links

NFL player page
1970 births Living people American sportspeople of Samoan descent People from Oahu American football defensive ends Hawaii Rainbow Warriors football players Los Angeles Rams players Pittsburgh Steelers players Denver Broncos players San Diego Chargers players Atlanta Falcons players Players of American football from American Samoa People from Nu'uuli {{defensive-lineman-1970s-stub