Bo Nix is now a rookie with the NFL’s Denver Broncos, but a cherished member of his family will play for Oregon in the Rose Bowl on Wednesday night.

Tez Johnson, Nix’s adopted brother and former Pinson Valley High School teammate, leads the top-ranked Ducks into a College Football Playoff quarterfinal game vs. Ohio State in Pasadena. Johnson was taken in by the Nix family in 2017, when he was 15 years old.

Johnson’s father died by suicide when he was an infant, and had a troubled home life growing up before his mother, Shamika, sent him to stay with the Nix family on what was first expected to be a temporary basis. Though never legally adopted by Patrick and Krista Nix — Patrick is a former Auburn quarterback who is currently head football coach at Central-Phenix City High School — he has remained a part of the family ever since.

“It wasn’t necessarily the plan for me to stay,” Johnson told ESPN’s Marty Smith in a College GameDay segment that aired Wednesday. “It was a plan for me to go over and stay two or three days and leave. I walked in and I didn’t want to leave. They took me in from all the stuff that was happening with my bio family, and it was something they wanted to do.”

Here’s the full video:

Johnson and Bo Nix led Pinson Valley to a state championship in 2018, after which Bo signed with Auburn. Johnson, a year younger, headed to Troy in 2020.

After two seasons at Auburn, Bo Nix transferred to Oregon and finished his career as a Heisman Trophy finalist in 2023. Johnson transferred in from Troy that same season.

“We needed some receivers, because some guys had graduated, some guys had transferred,” Nix said. “And I was like, ‘I know a guy.’ He got that opportunity and it was a dream come true.”

Though Bo Nix is now in the NFL, Johnson has continued to star at Oregon. He has caught 78 passes for 866 yards and 10 touchdowns in 11 games this season.

He’s also remained close with his biological mother. Shamika Johnson Posey attended the Big Ten championship game in Indianapolis on Dec. 7, a game in which Johnson caught 11 passes for 181 yards and a touchdown as Oregon beat Penn State 45-37.

“I’ve got two moms,” Johnson said. “I have a stepdad and a dad, so I have two dads. And I have seven siblings. So, we’re a big family. My mom is so grateful because she knew if this didn’t happen, who knows where I’d be?”

After the segment on Johnson aired, former Alabama coach Nick Saban, now part of the ESPN College GameDay panel, also weighed in. He lamented the fact that the Crimson Tide let what turned out to be one of the top players in college football get away in 2020.

“What I’m sitting here thinking about is, Tez Johnson’s in Birmingham, 45 minutes away from (Tuscaloosa),” Saban said. “We didn’t recruit the guy. Who was recruiting Birmingham? I should have fired their ass.”

(The answer to Saban’s query is apparently defensive backs coach Karl Scott, who was listed by 247 Sports as a recruiter for both 2020 Alabama signees Roydell Williams of Hueytown and Quandarrius Robinson of Jackson-Olin. Scott left the Crimson Tide for the NFL after the 2020 season and is now defensive backs coach for the Seattle Seahawks.)