Cam Rising announces ‘medical retirement’ from football because of lingering hand injury

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Utah quarterback Cam Rising is giving up football — at least for the foreseeable future — because of his struggle to recover from a hand injury early last season.

“I have been advised by two orthopedic surgeons that I will never be able to return to playing football,” Rising wrote in a social media post on Wednesday in which he announced that he “will be forced to medically retire from the game I love.”

Rising added that he will seek a third medical opinion and proceed with recommended surgery and rehab, but stopped short of indicating that he foresees a path to playing again.

Rising played parts of four seasons at Utah between 2020 and 2024.

He passed for 2,493 yards and 20 touchdowns in 2021 and followed that up with 3,034 and 26 TDs in a 2022 season that landed the Utes in the Rose Bowl. But a knee injury in the bowl game sidelined Rising for all of 2023.

The Ventura, California, native’s return in 2024 was shortened against Baylor in the Utes’ second game of the season, when he was pushed across the sideline as he released a throw and ran into a hydration table, appearing to jam his finger on a cooler.

Rising tried to come back a little more than a month later, but struggled in a loss to Arizona State in October in which he was intercepted three times. He did not play again after that.

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AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-football