Xavier Restrepo blog: My progress off foot fracture prior to Texas A&M, my message to Tyler Van Dyke, and where team goes from here

Presented by Gonzalez & Cartwright, our personal injury attorneys

Miami Hurricanes WR Xavier Restrepo will have a weekly blog all season at CaneSport.com. In this edition, Restrepo shares his thoughts coming off the upset loss on Saturday and updates the status of his foot injury.

THIS IS MY FIRST MAJOR INJURY

This is the first critical injury I’ve ever had in my life. It was definitely I wouldn’t say frustrating, but it was taxing emotionally and spiritually on me. But honestly I know everything happens for a reason. I have great faith. So I know God always has a plan and His timing is never late. I’m taking this as Him just saying `You need to sit down, take a break for a little bit’ and whenever he allows me to come back I’m going to be ready.

The injury itself, I had a reoccurring stress foot fracture injury from high school. I guess it fractured in high school or whatever, I played on it. And then one day in practice it just broke. It officially broke the week of Texas A&M, that Wednesday. I’ve known that it was bothering me. Football. If I’m going to get hurt, I’m going to get hurt playing football. I knew something was wrong with it, but at the end of the day I was running a route, it just popped.

When it happened I was super excited for that Texas A&M game. You can ask anybody inside the building. I was going around lifting up the whole energy of the building. They had me on a practice regiment, and Wednesday was my practice day so I was just going around, woke up that morning knowing I could play football that day. I was stoked about that and unfortunately I just had the injury. And it wasn’t bothering me the game before, it was all of a sudden `bam.’

Now I’m putting in four hours of rehab each and every day, trying my hardest. It’s not too much pain – the training room staff are all doing an amazing job with me and keeping as much stress as I can off of it and allowing it to feel a lot better. It’s just feeling amazing right now. Like at the game, I was like `Man, take me out of this boot and dress me up, I’m ready to play.’ But those people in there are doing an amazing job. I’m super thankful to have a team like that.

Everybody is saying that it’s looking good, I’m healing good. I just got my stitches removed. I’m looking good, am just working every day and God will tell me when it’s time. The doctor says I’m looking awesome, that I’m healing really well and I should be back soon.

So for now I’m staying off it, on a scooter to keep pressure off my leg. I try to find elevators, find rides to class – Tyler gives me a lift with his car. It’s just all going really smooth. They’re trying to make the process as smooth as possible because they know how much I really love football.

MY MESSAGE TO MY ROOMMATE, QB TYLER VAN DYKE

At the end of the day the dude is a baller. And obviously he’s been not playing like himself.

But I just told him at the end of the day, you’re the best quarterback in the nation and you need to start acting like it. Obviously you have to deal with all the cricumstances that you’re under right now and just be the baller that got you here. Tuesday in practice, he had an amazing practice, so I think his confidence is getting back up and I’m super excited to see that. Because when he’s playing confident, man it’s very scary.

Jake Garcia is a great quarterback as well, he’s obviously here for a reason. The kid’s got tremendous talent. And Tyler has tremendous talent as well. I’m excited to see both of them battle it out this week and we’ll see who’s starting.

And the offensive issues, fans obviously just see the outcome. They don’t see the actual details. When you sit back and watch film, there’s so many things we left out on the table each and every game whether we’re winning by 60-something points or lose by 20-something. There’s so much left out on the table that we can get better on as a whole. It all comes down to execution. The plays are there, we just have to execute way better.

MY VIEW OF THE LOSS AND WHERE THINGS GO NOW

This past game, if you were on the sideline, you’d have definitely heard me. The whole entire game I was boosting my guys’ confidence up, trying to keep us level-headed and allow us to execute on the next drive as best we can.

That game, just like coach Cristobal said, they out-executed us and they out-performed us that day.

Now North Carolina is up next. After coming off the loss we had Saturday and having the practice we did on Tuesday, you don’t really see that often, guys had a really good practice. So I feel confident in my guys.

As for my position group, all the receivers are doing great right now. Frank and Key’Shawn stepped up last game, the younger guys are stepping up as well. And Tuesday’s practice was really good, so it should be exciting.

I also talk to coach Gattis every single day, coach Cristobal every single day. We just go through the film, break little stuff down, all the little details. We also have daily players meetings where we try to lift up the confidence. That’s the main thing.

So the mood of the team right now, if I had to put it in one word, I’d say `Motivated.’ We’re motivated to prove us right, that we have enough, that we have everything that we need to win. We’re taking it one week at a time, 1-0 every week.

I’LL HOP RIGHT BACK INTO IT WHEN I’M CLEARED TO RETURN

When I come back I think I’ll be way better. I mean you can say I’ve played great and I appreciate that, but that’s really nothing yet. 100 yards is nothing. At the end of the day it’s not even really about all the stats. It’s about helping my team win right now, you know? I feel like as soon as I get back I don’t think I’ll miss a beat.

And for me really watching my team lose has been more difficult on me than the injury. It’s all lessons, we can learn from them, stuff like that. But I’d definitely say the hardest thing is seeing my team lose.

MY SUPPORT SYSTEM

Everybody is really doing a good job keeping my spirits up through the injury. My parents are obviously doing an amazing job, my uncles, grandmothers and everybody. Coaches are doing an excellent job just keeping me positive-minded. Teammates are also doing an amazing job. I feel super loved and cared for. Just everybody. And most importantly I’ve been getting my connection with God closer. I’ve been getting with him and just talking with him. I’m super positive-minded right now.

I’ve always prayed, but my bond with God has been getting really close. I’ve been reading more, what is called the First15. Pastor Mike actually told me about it, it’s five minutes praying, five minutes listening to worship music and five minutes of reading scripture and stuff like that. So I’ve been doing that every day, and it’s been awesome. I’ve been doing that for two months now.