SALT LAKE CITY — Utah defensive tackle Lowell Lotulelei, who was named first-team all-Pac-12 this year as a sophomore, will be going to the Super Bowl next week.
Not as a player, of course, but to watch his older brother, Star, who is the starting defensive tackle for the Carolina Panthers, who will meet the Denver Broncos on Feb. 7 in Super Bowl 50 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California.
Lowell, along with his parents and his seven sisters, will be heading over to California next week to support Star, who played for the University of Utah from 2010-12 when he was also a first-team all-Pac-12 selection.
“I know everybody’s excited . . . everybody is waiting for the moment,’’ Lotulelei said Wednesday, wearing his gray “Carolina Panthers football” T-shirt.
Lotulelei is five years younger than his older brother so they didn’t compete much against each other growing up.
“No, he was always too big,’’ he said. “I didn’t like playing with him, he was too rough back then.’’
However, these days the two talk almost weekly by phone or text and Lowell is happy to receive all the tips he can from his older brother.
“We talk nearly every week and he asks me how practices are going,” he said. “He helped me a lot during the season. He watched my games and would text me after and tell me what I did and what he saw and what I could do better, pretty much like a coach.”
Lotulelei says the two also like to talk smack to each other.
“Me and him do a lot of trash talking,” he said. “I told him that play he had versus Seattle when he hit Marshawn Lynch in the backfield, I told him if it was me I probably would have taken him down. We talk a lot of smack like that. It goes back and forth, but it’s just talk. It’s fun.”
Lotulelei said he hasn’t had a chance to talk to his brother yet about the Super Bowl because Star is busy with preparations for the big game, although they texted each other on Sunday night.
“I was watching the game with friends. I texted later that night and that’s when it hit me — he’s going to play in the biggest game in football. I texted him and I was like, ‘Good win bro, this is the top game and you’re going to play in it.’ He said, ‘I’m going to go home and celebrate and play video games.’”
Lotulelei says he’d like to follow in his brother’s footsteps and play in the NFL someday and, of course, in the Super Bowl. So is he envious that his older brother will be playing in the Super Bowl in 10 days?
“Definitely, that’s the big one,” he said. “I’m jealous, but I’m happy for him.”