Virginia Safety Lex Long to Undergo Season-Ending Foot Surgery

See the UVA football injury report ahead of Saturday's game at North Carolina
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Virginia has lost another key defender for the season as junior safety Lex Long will be undergoing surgery for a foot injury suffered earlier this season and will miss the remainder of the season, as announced by UVA head coach Tony Elliott on Tuesday. A junior from Woodbridge, Virginia, Long was expected to be a vital contributor for UVA's defensive unit this season as a versatile player who could fill in at linebacker and in the secondary, but those plans have been derailed due to injury. Long started the season opener against Tennessee, then missed the game against JMU, returned for UVA's week 3 game at Maryland, but then suffered the foot injury that caused him to miss the next three games. Including the bye week, Long got nearly a full month of rest and then tried to practice this week, but did not make enough progress to avoid surgery. 

"We got him back in practice for a day and it didn't quite feel the way that he thought it would after the rest," Tony Elliott said of Long. "And so, you know, sent him to a couple more specialists to look at the foot and so he's decided to have surgery on it - was the best thing - so I don't anticipate we'll have Lex for the rest of the season." 

Long is the latest in a growing list of key Virginia defenders to be lost for extended periods of time or the entire season due to injury. UVA will be without defensive linemen Olasunkonmi Agunloye and Kam Butler and safety Antonio Clary is still expected to be out until late in the season. 

In other injury news, freshman cornerback Dre Walker is still a couple of weeks away from returning after suffering a knee injury in Virginia's week 5 loss at Boston College. Graduate cornerback Malcolm Greene was also injured in that game and missed the William & Mary game while in concussion protocol, but Greene is back and on the depth chart for this week's game at North Carolina. Similarly, graduate defensive end Paul Akere is expected to be back after missing the last three games with a knee injury. 

Virginia will be without fifth-year linebacker Josh Ahern, who suffered a broken thumb against William & Mary and will miss at least one week and possibly more depending on pain tolerance. 

Virginia (1-5, 0-2 ACC) travels to take on No. 10 North Carolina (6-0, 3-0 ACC) on Saturday at Kenan Memorial Stadium in Chapel Hill. Kickoff is set for 6:30pm on The CW Network. 

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Matt Newton
MATT NEWTON

Matt launched Virginia Cavaliers On SI in August of 2021 and has since served as the site's publisher and managing editor, covering all 23 NCAA Division I sports teams at the University of Virginia. He is from Downingtown, Pennsylvania and graduated from UVA in May of 2021.