Starting center suffers torn ACL, MCL, out for season
Tal Volk | Daily Trojan
Down for the count · Junior center Toa Lobendahn suffered a torn ACL and MCL in the season opening game against Alabama last Saturday. He will be replaced by experienced redshirt junior center Nico Falah.
Following Thursday’s practice at Howard-Jones Field, USC football head coach Clay Helton announced that junior center Toa Lobendahn had suffered an ACL and MCL tear — thus ending his 2016 season.
“It’s very sad news for us,” Helton said. “[Lobendahn’s] one of the loves of my life … he will be missed greatly.”
Doctors discovered an MCL tear earlier in the week, then proceeded to find the ACL tear following more observations, said Helton.
Lobendahn suffered the injury during last week’s season-opener against No. 1 Alabama. On a fourth-and-7 play early in the first quarter, Alabama linebacker Ryan Anderson fell on Lobendahn’s knee following a sack — likely aggravating the injury. Lobendahn would remain in the contest until the end of the game.
“The warrior that he is, didn’t even complain about it,” Helton said. “Came off the field after the game and said [to the coaches], ‘my knee doesn’t feel right.’”
Lobendahn has a history with knee injuries. This is the second consecutive season that a torn ACL has derailed Lobendahn’s season. He missed the final seven games of the season after injuring his knee in the Utah game.
Lobendahn has a history with knee injuries. A previous ACL tear prevented him from playing over half of the 2015 season.
Replacing Lobendahn is redshirt junior Nico Falah. With several injuries at the center position last season, Falah stepped into the role in 2015 to close out the season.
“[Falah has] been in this position before. He did a great job for us last year down the latter half of the season,” Helton said. “I have all the confidence in the world in [Falah] … He’s a veteran — a redshirt junior — who has been out here every single day at practice working his tail off just for this opportunity.”
Helton said Lobendahn has already undergone surgery and that the junior will use a redshirt year.
Falah is an offensive tackle who can also play center. His lone career start came in the Pac-12 championship game last season against Stanford.
Helton said that redshirt freshman Cole Smith will serve as Falah’s backup, and redshirt sophomore Chris Brown could play center in an emergency.