NFF National Scholar-Athletes
DL – Yale University
3.67 GPA – Biomedical Engineering
Head Coach: Tony Reno | Athletics Director: Vicky Chun
Faculty Athletics Representative: Dr. George Levesque
A leader on and off the field, Oso Ifesinachukwu hopes to inspire people through his hard work, football skills and his art. The Austin, Texas, native becomes the 13th NFF National Scholar-Athlete in Yale history.
A biomedical engineering major, Ifesinachukwu boasts a remarkable 3.67 GPA at one of the nation's most prestigious universities. He is on pace to graduate in the spring and is interested in pursuing a medical degree with a focus on oncology.
This season, Ifesinachukwu leads Yale with four sacks and five tackles for loss, and his four sacks are tied for fifth in the Ivy League. He has racked up 14 tackles while guiding the Bulldogs to a 4-2 record.
In 2019, Ifesinachukwu guided Yale to a share of the Ivy League title while recording 28 tackles, seven tackles for loss and 2.5 sacks. The Bulldogs finished that season with a No. 24 final ranking while posting a 9-1 overall record and a 6-1 mark in Ivy League play. Ifesinachukwu was limited to six games in 2021 due to an injury but posted a career-high seven tackles against Holy Cross. He has recorded 62 tackles, 15 tackles for loss and 8.5 sacks in his Yale career.
Off the field, Ifesinachukwu worked as a design aide for Yale's Center for Engineering and Innovative Design, where he helped members maintain safety regulations and provided assistance on projects. He has also worked as a tutor with the Global Teaching Project, a non-profit that helps deliver AP STEM education to students in rural and underserved communities in Mississippi. Looking toward his future career, Ifesinachukwu has served as a lab assistant at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas where he helped conduct research on Ewing's sarcoma cell lines.
Learning to draw almost entirely on his own, Ifesinachukwu has become an accomplished charcoal artist, using his talent to express things that matter to him and aiming to inspire people to "feel comfortable talking about things that are uncomfortable." His pieces cover poverty in the Nigerian Civil War; confrontations of race in modern-day America; abstractions of Biblical figures; and mental health, among others.
