Despite Injury Setback Last Year, Lathan Working His Way Back Into Mountaineer Defense
Lathan’s seven QB hurries were one shy of Lee Kpogba’s team-lead of eight in seven fewer games.
“Trey said he knew his season was finished the moment he was injured.
I felt it, and then I looked at my leg and it was just dangling over, so I already knew it was over,” he said following today’s practice inside the stadium. “It basically snapped in half, so they went in and repaired it with a rod and four screws.”
Lathan said the ambulance ride to the hospital consisted of him trying to keep track of the outcome of the game while listening to his mother, Kankina, crying.
“Honestly, I forgot I was even hurt,” he said. “I felt like I was out there with my team.”
When he returned to Morgantown later the following week, he had gotten rid of his crutches just days after the surgery and was walking on his surgically repaired leg. He said doctors told him the fastest way to recovery was to get on his feet.
“They got me going fast,” he explained. “I started walking and ditched my crutches after just three days. After that, they told me the faster I walk normal the faster I’ll be back. I just did that, and I’m back in now.”
The Goulds, Florida, resident said he allowed himself about a week to feel sorry for himself before it was time to get back to work.
“The roughest week of my life,” he admitted.
“Football is my life, but I learned my life wasn’t over after that,” he added. “It basically put things in perspective. One day I’m going to be done with this and basically that’s what it felt like for those six months (recovering), ‘I need to focus on my life and get things on track.'”
Out of that has come a desire to one day own his own trucking business, which he began exploring a little bit this offseason as part of West Virginia’s Fifth Quarter Program.
“In high school, I took an economics class, and with Covid and everything, the shortage of drivers and things being stuck in a port for like six months, it’s a billion-dollar industry, and the shortage of drivers took to my interests because I like driving,” he said.
That’s for later, of course.
For now, Lathan wants to get back to where he was five weeks into the season as one of the team’s defensive leaders. The 6-foot-1, 226-pounder thought he was really beginning to jell at the time of his injury.
“I feel like I was getting better each and every week,” he admitted. “A lot of things were becoming clearer once I started playing more and getting more snaps. I’m just taking that and running with it.”
