Long to miss rest of season; Greene and Akere return to team

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Virginia’s defense has been hit hard by injuries this season, and during his game-week presser for the North Carolina game, Cavaliers coach Tony Elliott revealed that another starter has been lost for the season.

Junior strong safety Lex Long had been nursing a foot injury for several weeks, but has elected to undergo a season-ending surgery to get it corrected.

“It was the right thing to do,” Elliott said Tuesday. “[Long] was trying to come back from the foot (injury), and just after we got him back, he practiced for a day and it didn’t quite feel the way that he thought it would after the rest.

“So we sent him to a couple of more specialists to look at the foot, so he has decided to have surgery on it. That was the best thing. So I don’t anticipate we’ll have Lex for the rest of the season.”

Elliott shared other injury updates — some good news, some not so good.

The coach said that cornerback Malcolm Greene, who was injured in a violent collision at Boston College a few weeks ago, has returned to the team and that “bandit” Paul Akere is also back, while Dre Walker is still a couple of weeks away and linebacker Josh Ahern is out for the UNC game.

“Unfortunately, Ahern broke a bone in his thumb in the last game, had surgery already and has to let the suture set,” Elliott said. “He has probably another week, then we take that off and then it’s a pain-tolerance deal.”

Elliott provided an update on defensive tackle Olasunkonmi (Su) Agunloye, who injured both knees in a freak accident on the sidelines of the opening game of the season against Tennessee and was lost for the season.

“The best thing was to see ‘Su’ up on crutches, walking around. That’s been awesome to have him at practice, but definitely feel like some of the bumps and bruises have had another week to heal (Virginia had a bye week last week), so I feel better from a health standpoing going into [Carolina],” Elliott said.

Running back Xavier Brown, who was injured in training camp, has missed most of the action this season, so at this point, Elliott would like to redshirt the sophomore from Lexington, Ky.

“I would love to be able to protect his year considering how much time he missed on the front end of the season,” Elliott said. “Our biggest thing is getting him back in shape, because with his arm (injury), he was not able to do a ton while he was out for the first several weeks of that injury.

“Right now, it’s really just focusing on getting him in shape, getting him back in tune with the playbook, and then as we go down the stretch, I’m pretty sure there will be some gameplan-specific things you can use him for.”

A player can appear in up to four games and still be eligible to declare a redshirt for the season.

“I would like to protect his year considering that there’s depth in the room and the depth has been productive, too, while he’s been out.”

Sixth-year back Perris Jones and seniors Kobe Pace and Mike Hollins have carried the bulk of the load at running back thus far.