SURREY, BC – There were days this fall when BC Lions quarterback Nathan Rourke had to take his mind off football.
After a stellar start to the CFL season, the Canadiens were sidelined in mid-August with a foot injury that required surgery and doctors ordered him off the field.
“For a good second there, I tried to forget football,” Rourke said on Tuesday. “I was trying to distract myself with my friends and family and their support.
“I watched a lot of stuff on the internet. … There were days you didn’t even want to think about it. So I just did movie marathons and stuff like that.”
Now, after almost nine weeks of recovery and rehabilitation, the 24-year-old returns to action.
Lions head coach and co-general manager Rick Campbell said Tuesday he expects Rourke to start on Friday when British Columbia (12-5) wrap up their regular-season campaign against the Blue Bombers ( 14-3), league leaders, in Winnipeg.
Rourke will play “about a quarter” just to get back into game rhythm, Campbell said.
“That’s part of what we’ve been talking about over the weeks,” he said. “We could just let him play in (Western Division semi-finals) but I think he’ll feel better coming back to get some live action and get back to it. So that’s all part of this whole journey to return to play.”
The Ohio University alum is happy with the plan.
“I’m just happy to be able to get a chance to play and I think this week is a bonus, of course,” Rourke said. “I think throughout the process we were pretty sure I was going to be able to play in the playoffs and we were kind of a wait-and-see for everything else. To be at this point is pretty cool.
The six-foot-two, 209-pound quarterback has been a dominant force early in the CFL season, throwing for 3,281 yards and 25 touchdowns with 10 interceptions in nine games.
He couldn’t run during rehabilitation, so Rourke stayed in shape by swimming three or four times a week, starting about four weeks after the operation.
The diet did him well, veteran receiver Bryan Burnham said.
“Looks like he didn’t miss a beat, man,” he said after practice on Tuesday. “It’s fun to watch him. He’s a special player. And it’s good to have his energy back there.
Burnham, too, is recovering from an injury after fracturing his wrist in a 25-11 loss to the Calgary Stampeders on Sept. 24.
The Lions have removed the University of Tulsa product from the six-game injured list, but he is not expected to return to the roster until Nov. 6, when BC host Calgary in the divisional semifinals. West.
BC will have other key players back for Friday’s game, however, including catcher Lucky Whitehead, who missed three games with an ankle injury.
“I have to be smart, obviously. I’m still in the healing process, but obviously I can’t think about it too much,” Whitehead said of his comeback. “I have to go out there, be myself, play fast, be smart about it.”
Despite the injury streak, the Lions are 4-4 since Rourke was injured in a 28-10 win over the Saskatchewan Roughriders on Aug. 19.
The team found lots of different ways to win games, said the QB, who remained a fixture around the team’s facilities in Surrey, B.C., and on the sidelines.
“I’ve seen a lot of different guys step in,” Rourke said. “It wasn’t just me who fell, but a lot of guys who gave us precious minutes and a lot of guys got up. So it was really good to see.
“We weren’t winning games like we usually did in the first half of the season, so it’s good to know we can win in different ways.”
Now players who were sidelined are coming back into the roster – and that’s exactly what you want just before the playoffs, Burnham said.
“Injuries happen in football, so to have all these guys healthy and ready to put in the effort for this year’s Gray Cup is really special,” he said.
“I just have to play one game at a time, and we still have one regular season game to play. So even though the playoff positions are set, (Friday) is still an important game.”
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on October 25, 2022.
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