Virginia Football Injury Report: Updates on Kam Robinson, McKale Boley

Matt Newton | Sep 10, 2024

UVA head coach Tony Elliott is "hopeful" that sophomore linebacker Kam Robinson will be able to play in Virginia's game against Maryland on Saturday night after he suffered a knee injury against Wake Forest. / Virginia Athletics

Though the Virginia Cavaliers came back from their weekend trip to Winston-Salem with an unblemished 2-0 record, they did not return to Charlottesville totally unscathed, as their 31-30 comeback victory over Wake Forest exacted a heavy toll in terms of injuries. Several defensive playmakers went down with injuries during the game, though many of them were able to return to the field.

The most notable injury was to sophomore linebacker and 2023 Freshman All-American Kam Robinson, who suffered a non-contact knee injury in the second quarter and, after warming up in an attempt to return to the field, spent the second half in sweatpants on the sideline. In his weekly press conference on Tuesday afternoon, UVA head coach Tony Elliott said that Robinson had sprained his knee in the Wake game, but was pleased to report that the scan results were positive. Elliott is "hopeful" that Robinson could play in Virginia's week 3 game against Maryland.

"Kam [Robinson] is a little bit limited. We believe that we got positive returns on all of the scans and everything," Elliott said of Robinson's injury. "Now it's just more of getting to a point of being able to deal with the pain tolerance from that standpoint. Hopeful for this week. He's out there moving around, involved in pretty much everything today, but still a little bit limited... Right now, it looks like it might be like a sprain, so just got to let it calm down. Obviously all the checks and scans worked out good. A little bit scary there anytime a guy goes down with a knee. But it seems like it's really positive and it's more sore with just a pain tolerance type deal."

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With Robinson out, Trey McDonald stepped up at the linebacker spot against Wake Forest and recorded nine tackles and a sack, the first sack of his career.

Elliott also noted that graduate Corey Thomas, who occupies the SPUR spot in the Cavalier secondary, was back as a full participant in practice on Tuesday after suffering an injury in the Wake Forest game. Meanwhile, junior offensive tackle McKale Boley, who remains the starting left tackle on UVA's depth chart this week despite missing the first two games of the season with an ankle injury, is still "day-to-day" according to Elliott, who once again said he's "hopeful that we'll get [Boley] back here pretty soon. In the meantime, converted tight end Jack Witmer has started the first two games of the season at left tackle.

Even when Boley comes back, Witmer will likely be called upon to play a high number of snaps as Virginia's offensive line depth has taken a hit. It was reported on the ESPN broadcast of Saturday night's game that Ethan Sipe broke a bone in his foot last week in practice and is out for the season and Drake Metcalf, who was expected to be able to return sometime this season after injuring his Achilles in the spring, has reaggravated that injury and is now expected to miss the rest of the season.

Elliott did not give an update on junior wide receiver JR Wilson, who was absent from this week's depth chart for the third game in a row as he continues to recover from a minor knee operation back in August.

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