Junior linebacker Stephen Cooper and veteran head coach Jack Cosgrove of the University of Maine football team have been recognized as finalists for two of Division I-AA’s most prestigious honors.

Cooper is a finalist for the Buck Buchanan Award given to the division’s top defensive player, while Cosgrove is among 16 candidates for the Eddie Robinson Award presented to the leading coach in Division I-AA.

Cooper, a 6-foot-1, 220-pounder from Wareham, Mass., leads the playoff-bound Black Bears with 95 tackles, including 62 solos. He has registered 16 tackles for a loss, five of them sacks, and has made two interceptions.

Cooper ranks seventh in the Atlantic 10 with 9.5 tackles per game. Linebacker Derrick Lloyd of James Madison, whose 157 tackles lead the conference, also is among the 16 Buchanan finalists.

Cosgrove, in his ninth season at UMaine, has guided the 16th-ranked Bears to an 8-2 record, a share of the Atlantic 10 championship and the program’s first postseason appearance since 1989.

UMaine has been ranked among the top 25 teams in the country for seven consecutive weeks.

The Buchanan and Robinson trophies, along with the Walter Payton award given to the country’s best player, will be presented Dec. 20 at the 15th College Football Awards ceremony in Chattanooga, Tenn., site of this year’s I-AA national title game.