Huskies Deal with Painful Practice, Twice Stopped by Injuries
University of Washington football practice can be so upbeat, with players yelling and flying around, pads popping, whistles sounding and even music reverberating in the backdrop.
Then someone gets it hurt — and everything comes to a crashing halt, gets real quiet and people scurry around to aid the fallen.
On Monday, this happened twice in Dempsey Indoor, with senior linebacker Edefuan Ulofoshio going down in noticeable pain, and junior offensive guard Julius Buelow following him in agony a half hour later.
At 9:54 a.m., Ulofoshio got caught in the middle of a high-impact collision between safety Makell Esteen and running back Tybo Rogers on a running play, and came out of it rolling on the ground appearing to hold his arm.
Fortunately for Ulofoshio, the 6-foot-1, 234-pound veteran defender after several minutes was able to return to the drills and finish practice, but not before a concerned coach Kalen DeBoer and All-American wide receiver candidate Rome Odunze had come over to check on him.
He's been one of the real positive situations involving UW football, finally fully healthy again after arm and knee surgeries forced him to miss half of each of the past two seasons.
Buelow was not quite so lucky.
At 10:25 a.m., the 6-foot-8, 310-pound Hawaiian got caught awkwardly in a tangle of people while effectively picking up a blitz from defensive back Tristan Dunn and he was left lying on his back in noticeable discomfort.
He had to be helped to a nearby training room by two staffers, walking gingerly on what appeared to be a knee injury, and didn't return. It was unclear how serious his situation was.
Husky offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb could be seen entering the on-site training room to check on his downed lineman.
Buelow also had been an upbeat spring development, given a chance to start at left guard again after opening the first five games of the 2021 season in that role and losing the job. He served as a sub and special-team player only last season.
Replacing him, sophomores Gaard Memmelaar and Geirean Hatchett took snaps in the scrimmage-like plays over the remainder of the morning.
On the plus side, the Huskies had sophomore edge rusher Maurice Heims fully involved in practice long periods for the first time since he had his own injury scare. On March 6, he suffered a neck injury, was strapped to board and taken by an emergency vehicle to Harborview Medical Center for further testing.
On Monday, Heims had no limitations as he mixed it up with his teammates. Everybody initially had thought the worst for this young German.
"It was just some of the things he was saying and in this day and age you make sure you're going to take every precaution when you start talking about next injuries and everything like that," UW edge-rusher coach Eric Schmidt said of being careful in clearing him. "He went and got checked out. It was one of those things where maybe it wasn't as serious as we thought."
After holding their first of three spring scrimmages last Friday, the Huskies had a spike in the number of players held out of Monday's practice with assorted health issues.
Those out of uniform were running backs Richard Newton and Dillon Johnson, tight end Jack Newtown, safety Vince Nunley and edge rushers Zach Durfee, Sav'ell Smalls and Lance Holtzclaw, plus running back Daniyel Ngata, who was in uniform but limited to watching.
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