‘We’ll pray for the best’: K-State QB Skylar Thompson out indefinitely with knee injury
For the second straight year, Skylar Thompson’s health status is in question.
Kansas State football fans are once again worried about the future availability of the Wildcats’ starting quarterback after he was forced to leave a 31-23 victory against Southern Illinois with an injury to his right knee on Saturday at Bill Snyder Family Stadium. He suffered the injury when he came up lame attempting to throw a block for running back Deuce Vaughn.
It’s unclear when, or if, he will play his next game in a K-State uniform.
Chris Klieman declined to share an injury update during his postgame news conference, but he did say the Wildcats will be depending on backup quarterback Will Howard “for the foreseeable future.”
So it sounds like Thompson will miss at least some time moving forward, even if he avoided a season-ending injury, starting with K-State’s next game against Nevada in a week.
“We’ll pray for the best,” Klieman said, “ and see what happens.”
Thompson’s injury was a strange and scary moment.
It came without warning. Thompson didn’t make contact with anyone on the play, but something went wrong with his right knee as he began to charge forward, and he collapsed face first on the field. He then rolled over on his back and appeared to either cry or scream in pain. Two trainers and Klieman all came onto the field to evaluate his injury, but none of them looked happy.
In fact, Klieman looked as if he had seen a ghost. Pictures showed him in tears as he clutched Thompson’s helmet.
The sight of Klieman kneeling on the ground next to Thompson, both expressing some emotions, made it seem like they knew it was a serious injury.
“I visited with him at the time and I was pretty emotional,” Klieman said. “He’s a pretty special kid to me and I saw it happen last year in third game, and I kind of had deja vu going through my mind. I’m sick for the kid, devastated,”
After a few moments, two trainers helped Thompson walk off the field and escorted him to the team’s injury tent on the sideline, where he was further evaluated.
His long-term injury status is unknown, but it sounds like K-State is hopeful he may not miss the remainder of the season as he did last year.
He showed a few positive signs. For starters, Thompson was able to leave the injury tent and walk under his own power into the K-State locker room. Perhaps that is a sign that the injury was not as severe as it originally appeared. Teammates said he was also active in the locker room after the game.
They said he was in good spirits and congratulated them on winning the game without him.
“I just came around to him and told him I loved him,” offensive lineman Cooper Beebe said. “I hope he gets healthy. I don’t know about the injury, but he was up and moving around. He was high-spirited.”
Thompson has started 31 games for the Wildcats during his six years in a K-State uniform. But he missed all but three games last year when he suffered a season-ending injury to his throwing arm on an illegal tackle against Texas Tech.
This was his first game back in Manhattan since then, and it ended in ominously similar fashion.
K-State was leading 7-0 when Thompson exited the game in the first quarter. He had completed 3 of 4 passes for 96 yards and an interception.
Sophomore quarterback Will Howard took over for Thompson and guided the Wildcats to touchdowns on their next two drives. But then he began turning the ball over and Southern Illinois surged to a 23-21 lead.
Howard completed eight of 17 passes for 76 yards and an interception. K-State mostly ran the ball in the second half and escaped with victory thanks to three touchdowns from Vaughn and a strong defensive performance.
But everyone was talking about Thompson when it was over.
“I’m obviously heartbroken for Skylar,” Howard said. “Me and him have built up a really close relationship over the past year, and I hope for the best with him.”
This story was originally published September 11, 2021 at 7:30 PM with the headline "‘We’ll pray for the best’: K-State QB Skylar Thompson out indefinitely with knee injury."