A mistake in college could’ve ended UTSA’s Joshua Cephus’ career and life. He’s now trying to make it to the NFL.

Joshua Cephus doesn’t even flinch when you bring it up.

His mistake from nearly two years ago nearly cost him everything he’s worked for his entire life, and not just in the football sense. As a 6-foot-3, 185-pound receiver who left The University of Texas at San Antonio as the school’s career leader in receiving yards, he might have never played the game again if the worst-case scenario came to be. He also could have lost himself, a lifetime of faith completely undone by his own hubris.

But when that mistake is mentioned — a DWI charge from a one-car crash back in 2022 — Cephus doesn’t run from it. He’s no longer hiding from the darkest moments of his life. He sits, contemplates the questions he’s asked, and speaks from the heart about that moment he wishes he could have back.

He made a mistake. He’s learned from it. That moment doesn’t reflect who he is. It’ll never happen again. His faith is keeping him centered.

And his football career was sidetracked only briefly. He didn’t lose the thing he’s loved to do since he was in preschool. While it’s far from a guarantee that Cephus will be selected in this week’s NFL draft, he at least got to make it to this week, his complete self intact.

Draft day is all about new beginnings, new opportunities. For Cephus, that is more true than ever.

Cephus started playing football at 4 years old, following in the footsteps of his two older brothers, including Aaron Cephus, who played receiver at Rice from 2017-18. (He also has an older sister and younger brother.) Cephus idolized NFL quarterback Michael Vick growing up, hoping to one day be like him. He split time as a receiver and quarterback until college, throwing for over 2,300 yards and 20 touchdowns at Dekaney High School in Harris County, Texas.

His father, Rodney Cephus, played defensive back at historically Black Texas Southern and has been a high school football coach for two decades. Like many football dads, he pushed his son to be the best possible football player.

“I learned everything about football from him,” Cephus told Andscape.

Cephus came out of Dekaney as a two-star quarterback-receiver with offers from multiple mid-major schools, including UTSA, where he eventually signed. One of his top college goals was to reach 1,000 yards in a season. He struggled his first two years, catching just a combined 66 passes for 700 yards in 2019 and 2020. Cephus had been enjoying the spoils of being a collegiate athlete and all the vices that come with that. But ahead of the 2021 season, after some pushing from some of his coaches, Cephus made lifestyle changes.

He became more of a student of the game and learned the details of being a receiver. He learned how to run better routes, how to better get open, how to get more yards after the catch. He even had to learn how to simply catch the ball, since the football spins a certain way depending on the dominant arm of the quarterback making the pass.

“It blew my mind when I figured that out,” Cephus said. “I just did not have a clue what I didn’t know.”

He also had to change his personal life. He had to let go of some friends who weren’t as serious about football. He used to party a lot, enjoying the college life like any teenager would. But when he noticed all of that fun wasn’t translating to production on the field, he cut it out, at the request of the adults around him.

“It’s the thought that somebody that doesn’t even know you, doesn’t understand your background, who you are, can all of a sudden now form an opinion about you that may be untrue or unfair,” Joe Price III, associate head coach and wide receivers coach for UTSA, said of the reputation he wanted Cephus to avoid as a Black football player.

By Cephus’ junior, senior and supersenior seasons, he was a recluse, staying in on the weekends to digest football. “If it wasn’t football,” Cephus said, “I didn’t want anything to do with it.”

Cleaning up his diet was also a top priority.

“I ain’t going to lie, it should have been Whataburger,” Cephus said of foods he was supposed to drop. “But I ain’t never putting Whataburger down. I’m sorry.”

The results were immediate. After just 700 receiving yards from 2019 to 2020, Cephus hauled in 71 passes for 819 yards in 2021. The following season, he was 15 yards short of 1,000 (more on that below), before finally reaching that goal this past season, finishing 2023 with 1,151 yards, a single-season school record. More importantly, he left the UTSA program as the career leader in receptions (313) and receiving yards (3,639).

But those achievements were nearly missed by what happened during the 2022 season.

In early December 2022, UTSA had just completed its second-best season in program history, winning 11 games and back-to-back Conference USA championships. Cephus was still chasing those school records, and believed he was at the peak of his achievements and success. In other words, Cephus was feeling himself.

“I had a little pride with me,” he said.

The Roadrunners beat North Texas 48-27 in the Conference USA championship on Dec. 2, 2022. Six days later, on the night of Dec. 8, Cephus and some of his teammates were out celebrating the title at Privat Social Club, a popular nightclub near the UTSA campus. 

While there, according to court records, Cephus said he took two shots of either vodka or tequila but stopped drinking an hour before leaving the bar in a rideshare car. Cephus got hungry when he returned to his campus housing, but instead of ordering food in, he decided to hop into his Nissan Maxima and drive the few blocks to a Whataburger at about 3 a.m. Dec. 9.

Driving southbound on Babcock Road, Cephus attempted to make a left turn on UTSA Boulevard, but while making the turn he lost control of the vehicle and hit a curb on the right side of the road, flipping the car onto the driver’s side.

As Cephus climbed out of the car through the passenger window, he noticed a light pole a few yards away. In that moment he imagined the worst possible scenarios: Instead of walking away from the crash with just bleeding to his hand, what if he had hit that pole instead of the curb? What if the curb were a little higher and flipped the car completely over? What if it were hours earlier and more cars were on the road? What if he had killed himself and his passenger, former UTSA teammate Emmanuel Odetola?

“I think about it all the time,” Cephus said. “I always say I could have been a rock away from killing myself or killing my friend.”

According to San Antonio police, when they arrived at the scene, Cephus’ breath smelled of alcohol, he had a slurred speech, and his eyes were “glassy, bloodshot.” He also couldn’t keep his balance and couldn’t recall what time of day it was. While Cephus declined to perform a field sobriety test at the scene, he did provide a breath and blood sample. A Texas Department of Public Safety blood analysis later found that Cephus’ blood alcohol level was .183, over twice the legal limit of .08. In Texas, a blood alcohol level over .15 is considered a misdemeanor for a first-time offense, which could lead to up to a year in jail.

Price was the first member of the UTSA staff to find out about the accident, which means he was the one to make the call to Cephus’ parents to let them know what happened. Receiving an early morning phone call from a child’s coach can send a parent’s mind spiraling.

Trenesa Cullins, Cephus’ mother, said hearing that her son was in an accident was gut-wrenching. Rodney Cephus knew something was wrong when he received the early-morning phone call.

“It was like all of my insides dropped out,” he said.

Neither chose to criticize their son in the moment, deciding that he needed their love more than their anger at that time. His fear and embarrassment was enough of a lesson.

“If you browbeat a person, you can push them over the edge,” Rodney Cephus explained.

Cephus couldn’t believe what happened. He was still in shock when he spoke to his parents, but they helped keep him calm. They reminded him that no matter what happened, he didn’t harm himself or others. He was still alive.

“They just did a great job of painting a picture that it could be worse,” Cephus said.

“I think about it all the time. I always say I could have been a rock away from killing myself or killing my friend.”

— Joshua Cephus

The university immediately suspended Cephus, causing him to miss the following week’s Cure Bowl against Troy, leaving him at 985 yards for the season. It was the only game he missed in his five years.

Cephus was reinstated to the team in January 2023. He was charged with a DWI in July 2023. In November 2023, he was given 15 months’ probation after pleading no contest.

Cephus and those close to him say the DWI was out of character for him. Growing up, he never got in trouble or was suspended from school. While Cephus drank before, he said, he’d never driven under the influence of alcohol. He said he was the friend who took car keys away when someone seemed too drunk to drive.

Rodney Cephus said his son is a natural people-pleaser who, since he was young, strove to avoid the mistakes that others made. So it made Cephus feel like the biggest hypocrite when he was the person who wasn’t smart enough to put the car keys down. He knew he was “a little bit drunk” at the time, but his destination was across the street from UTSA’s campus, so it didn’t feel dangerous.

“I think I felt like I could make it,” Cephus said.

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data says that about 37 Americans are killed in a drunk driving crash every day. In 2022, the agency reported 13,524 people died in traffic crashes involving drunken drivers, accounting for 32% of all traffic crash fatalities in the United States.

“Our nation has taken a dangerous and deadly step backwards in traffic safety and impaired driving,” then-Mothers Against Drunk Driving national president Alex Otte wrote in a 2022 post. “We are seeing the tragic impact of deprioritizing traffic safety enforcement, stretched law enforcement resources and a reckless shift in attitudes toward drunk driving in our justice system and in our everyday lives.”

I ask Cephus if he understands that, no matter how accountable and remorseful he is, that those who have been affected by drunken driving may never forgive him.

“I would just say meet me before you make those decisions in your mind that I’m just a drunk driver, like that’s my profession,” he said. 

The crash is a teachable moment for Cephus. He told the San Antonio Express-News in August 2023 that he spoke at an elementary school and several nonprofit organizations in the wake of the accident, and that he planned to partner with MADD.

Cephus violated the conditions of his bond twice in 2023 when he failed to calibrate his in-home breathalyzer and skipped a breathalyzer test. (He told reporters in November 2023 that keeping up with the testing was “very challenging” with his football schedule.) He also is yet to partner with MADD, though he explains that his probation limits the organizations he can work with to meet the requirements of his community service.

For two weeks after the crash, Cephus never left his room, didn’t even turn on his TV. He sat in the dark, leaving only to get food deliveries at the front door. He preferred not open his phone or talk to anyone.

What people thought of him now that he was associated with drunken driving consumed him.

“A lot of times I was either just looking at the ceiling or I was asleep,” he said. “My mental wasn’t right. Not necessarily suicidal thoughts or anything, but just thought a lot less of myself than I should have.”

This became a time to lean more heavily on faith.

Cephus grew up in the church. His grandfather was a pastor at a church in Houston. The family attended services three times a week, with Cephus serving on the usher board and singing in the choir. He sang in a gospel group with his sister and two older brothers, going from church to church singing the gospel. Cullins named them The Fab Four.

His name — Joshua — is the English translation of Jesus’ Hebrew name, “Yeshua.”

But Cephus called the time leading up to the crash the least amount of God that he’s had in his life. He wasn’t praying. He wasn’t attending church regularly or reading his Bible consistently. He wasn’t, in his words, acting “Christian-like.”

“I feel like that was him trying to slap me on the wrist. Letting me know that I’m getting off path, and to humble me, really.”

— Joshua Cephus

Missing last season’s bowl game hurt Cephus deeply. He believes that God used football to get his attention, taking the game away from him as a message to stray no further.

Cephus has invoked God in most of his press availability in the last year and a half, praising God for not killing him that night, for not taking football away.

Scripture says that every result in life has a higher purpose. Proverbs 19:21 reads: “Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand.” 

Whether it was to get his mind straight on football or life, or to be a testimonial for others who consider drinking and driving, Cephus believes there was a purpose for his crash.

“I feel like that was him trying to slap me on the wrist,” Cephus said. “Letting me know that I’m getting off path, and to humble me, really.”

His mother understands that it may seem like Cephus is using religion to deflect from his actions, but he’s been serious about his faith since he was younger.

“It’s not something that he’s putting on when he says, ‘I want to thank God,’ like that’s generally what people say, and it’s become cliché,” Cullins said. “He really, honestly does.”

Cephus credits family, friends and teammates for supporting him.

His mother called him regularly to check on him. His father told him to pray about it.

A teammate drove over to check on him after those two weeks, which made Cephus realize that he still had people who loved and cared for him. All of those things combined pulled Cephus out of his funk.

For the UTSA program, the designation for team captains is having a single-digit jersey number. For the 2019 and 2020 seasons, Cephus wore Nos. 80 and 12. But since the 2021 season, he’s worn No. 2. When Cephus returned to the team in January 2023 following his suspension, he felt less himself. He was less vocal, feeling ashamed. He called this one of the hardest times of his life, having to face his peers after such an embarrassing situation. He didn’t feel worthy of being a team captain.

“I didn’t feel like my teammates would respect me as much as they did before,” Cephus said.

However, during Cephus’ return to the program, teammates embraced him, made sure he was good. They told him this singular moment didn’t define him. UTSA coach Jeff Traylor told reporters Cephus had “my 110% full support.”

Cephus was voted captain for the third time.

“It really made me realize that those guys had my back, and they believed that the person who has a DWI isn’t the same person who leads them on the field and really leads them off the field as well to be a better man,” he said. “So, it meant everything to me.”

Cephus didn’t consider himself that big of a drinker before the crash. During that 2022 season, he said, he usually only went out to drink after a win, but UTSA happened to win 10 straight games from the end of September to early December. Still, he says he didn’t drink every weekend. After the crash, Cephus said, he gave up alcohol, regardless of it being a condition of his release on bond.

The abstinence from alcohol has improved his health and made him more focused on football. He trains four hours a day, six days a week for the draft, working on his strength and his speed. 

Cephus is staying with Cullins while preparing for the draft. He only trains and plays video games, she said.

“It’s definitely cleared my mind on the things that are important to me,” Cephus said. “It was pretty easy putting it down.”

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After the Roadrunners’ 35-17 win over Marshall in the 2023 Frisco Bowl, in which he was named offensive MVP for catching seven passes for 102 yards and a touchdown, Cephus participated in two postseason showcase games, the East-West Shrine Bowl in Frisco, Texas, and the Hula Bowl in Orlando, Florida. He had only one reception for negative-1 yard in the Hula Bowl. He caught four passes for 46 yards at the Shrine Bowl, also hauling in a two-point conversion in the second quarter.

At the Hula Bowl in January, Cephus said, he met with coaches from 28 of the NFL’s 32 teams. Each team asked him about the DWI charge, but he’s been less reluctant to talk about it for some time now: After UTSA’s Nov. 17 game against South Florida, Cephus brought up the DWI unprompted when addressing the media. He is slowly moving past the shame of it, making himself an open book to the teams, letting them know he held himself to a higher standard than what he exhibited back on Babcock Road.

Talking to the teams about the crash was “kind of like therapy” for him.

“I wanted them to know that it was a one-time thing,” he said. “I wanted them to know that I’m not going to lie about it, because it’s not going to happen again.”

Cephus is not projected to be taken in this week’s draft: His name was not mentioned in ESPN’s NFL draft analyst Matt Miller’s seven-round mock draft in March. Cephus’ personal team believes he could be a Day 3 selection, while he is banking on being an undrafted free agent.

His former coaches believe he’s one of the most versatile players in the nation, with Price calling him a “Swiss Army knife.” At receiver, Cephus could line up in the X, slot or Z positions. He can run down on kickoff coverage or be a return man (Cephus returned nine punts in 2022). Traylor once described Cephus as “arguably the best blocking receiver in the history of the school.”

Price said Cephus never stops wanting to learn and he’s constantly trying to improve.

“The most valuable part of his game is his mind,” Price said. “The dude understands the game.”

Whatever happens this week, Cephus is grateful to even be in this position.

Grateful to still be playing football.

Grateful to still be alive.

Grateful to be back in the proper mindset.

“If I do this – no, when I do this – it’ll just prove that, for one, God is continuing to show up in my life,” Cephus said of making it onto an NFL roster.

“… I feel like I’d make my parents very proud of everything that we’ve been through when I was a kid, and the process that I dragged them through when I was in college with the DWI. So, man, I’d just be so grateful to be on the team.”