Roads to recovery

"One, two. three Cameron!"
 
Another day of practice has come to a close for the Arizona Western College football team. Another day that linebacker Cameron Ryan's only way to be on the field is through his teammates' cheer and the "CR" decal they wear on their helmets.
 
The Matadors' 2009 season and Ryan's life were both temporarily derailed on Oct. 17 when New Mexico Military defeated AWC 40-33 and Ryan - who was not playing in the game - was life-flighted to a hospital in Phoenix for brain surgery.

The two have been working together to help each other get back on track ever since, and their efforts have landed the Matadors in a position to claim their first league title in 28 years.
 
"The sticker on the back doesn't just symbolize him," AWC linebacker Jessie Williams said. "It was a tough week with the loss, but he's inspired us to keep playing as hard as we can because we never know when our last game or our last play is."
 
No. 7 AWC will play No. 4 Snow College (Utah) at 1 p.m. today in Veterans Memorial Stadium for the WSFL championship, four weeks after a day which the Matadors are thankful the only thing they lost was a football game.

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Season-ending operations are just as much a part of football as first quarters and I formations, but they don't usually start out as flu-like symptoms and end with having a part of one's skull removed.
 
"I've been coaching for 14 years and never experienced anything like this," AWC defensive coordinator Jerry Dominguez said. "...I was telling his mom this is like an episode of "House" where a guy's got a headache and all the sudden it turns out to be a sinus infection and you wonder 'What's going on?' It's freakish."
 
Ryan, a 6-foot-3, 220-pound linebacker freshman from Grass Valley, Calif., quickly found a fall home at AWC and a football family with the Matadors. He bonded with teammates over trips to the mall and "Halo" games in the dorms, and made enough of an impression on the practice field to earn playing time in games.
 
"He was really dedicated, always out here early and ready to give 100 percent," Williams said. "He wasn't messing around. He was always doing the right thing."
 
Ryan saw action on defense and special teams as the Matadors began the season 5-0 and climbed up the national rankings heading into their bye week. But as the team began to prepare for New Mexico Military, illness and headaches forced Ryan to begin missing practices.
 
"We thought it was the flu because a lot of our kids had caught that going around so we didn't pay much attention to it," Dominguez said. "He went to Urgent Care and they let him go."
 
The day before the team left for Roswell, N.M., Ryan's health worsened and he was taken to the Yuma Regional Medical Center. Doctors began treating him for a sinus infection, and by the time the Matadors had fallen to the Broncos, Ryan had been moved to St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix for emergency brain surgery.
 
"They were pumping him with antibodies and nothing was working, so what happened was he gained paralysis on his left side and the doctors here thought he'd had a stroke but couldn't understand how that could be," Dominguez said. "Eventually they found out the pressure from the sinus infection had seeped through a hairline fracture in his head and infected his brain and caused the nerves to paralyze that left side."
 
News of Ryan's surgery reached AWC head coach Tom Minnick soon after the loss, and the rest of the team was notified before heading back to Yuma. Text messages were sent to redshirt players back at the dorms. Prayers were offered in Ryan's behalf. Upon arrival on campus early Sunday morning, the team signed a card for athletic trainer Chris Murphy to deliver to Ryan in Phoenix later that day.
 
"It's so rare," AWC linebacker Matt Miller said. "You'd think if you fractured your skull you'd be getting more than a headache, so we all thought 'God, he's one tough dude.'"

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Doctors had to remove a piece of Ryan's skull as part of their procedure, but the part of his head that stored his football and team-first mentality went unharmed. Among the things Ryan asked his mother following the surgery was the outcome of the AWC-NMMI game.
 
Minnick, Dominguez and AWC athletic director Jerry Smith visited Ryan and his mother in the hospital three days later. A portion of his head was still wrapped in gauze, surgery staples wrapped around his ear to the back of his head, and he needed a nurse's help to roll onto his side.
 
"I recruited Cameron here and have a little history with him and he plays on the defensive side of the ball, and that's not the Cameron I know," Dominguez said. "I always thought of him as a strong ox, not someone fragile, ...but Ryan's a fighter. The doctors have said they know he's a tough kid because of the pain tolerance he's been able to bear."
 
Fortunately the results of Ryan's operation were better than his team's play that Saturday, and every part of the Matadors' season, since that loss, has been dedicated to him. The "CR" decals were added to their helmets prior to their next game against Pima, and his No. 19 jersey was draped over the bench before the 53-0 win.
 
"Cameron was a big part of our team. He did a lot of things for us on special teams and he was a great addition and we miss him," Minnick said. "I know he asks about how the team's doing. We were hoping to see him down in Phoenix (last week) but they wouldn't let him out of the hospital. Hopefully we'll get to see him soon, and that will help us out."
 
Ryan has regained movement on his left side and begun to take care of life's everyday tasks on his own. He keeps in contact with coaches and teammates through texts and was allowed to go home to northern California on Wednesday before a second surgery in January to place a plate on his skull.
 
"He's still kind of out of it, but he's doing better and we're hoping to see him over Thanksgiving," Miller said on Wednesday prior to news of his release.
 
Coincidentally, the Matadors were able to catch a visual glimpse of their teammate last week in preparation for their rematch against Phoenix College.
 
"When we broke down film on the first time we played Phoenix ...Cameron was running around," Dominguez said. "I texted him and said it was fun seeing you being active, and he texted me back and said 'Yeah coach, it was really fun.'"


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Rob Weiler can be reached at rweiler@yumasun.com or 539-6883.