College basketball star Cameron Boozer has revealed that he is nursing several fractures around his eye in the wake of Duke’s March Madness loss to UConn.
In the most dramatic moment of this year’s NCAA Tournament, Duke suffered a devastating last-gasp loss to the Huskies in the Elite Eight.
On Sunday, star freshman and top NBA prospect Boozer admitted that he is still healing – both emotionally and physically.
The 6ft 9in, 250lb forward revealed that he sustained ‘a couple of fractures’ to his face during the Blue Devils’ loss. He is expected to be a top-five pick in the NBA draft in just a couple of months’ time.
Boozer, only the fifth freshman to be named AP men’s national player of the year, was still carrying war wounds from a collision with UConn’s Eric Reibe.
In the first half last Sunday, he went up for a shot against 7ft 1in center Reibe, whose left elbow struck Boozer near his right eye.
Cameron Boozer has revealed that suffered several fractures around his eye against UConn
He was hurt going up for a shot against 7ft 1in Reibe, whose left elbow struck him near the eye
The white part of Boozer’s eye was still bright red when he spoke to reporters on Sunday
That led to nasty swelling around and under the Duke freshman’s eye. That has improved but the white part of his eye was still bright red. Boozer said he opted against having surgery in favor of giving it time to heal.
‘I have a couple of fractures, but I’m all good,’ he said. ‘I’m just going through the healing process.’
He continued: ‘It hurt in the game, but I wish the outcome would have been better, but that’s not really what I’m here to focus on. We had a great year.’
Boozer fought through the injury the rest of the way and finished with 27 points, including a tough spinning basket into the paint against traffic with Duke leading by just one in the final minute.
It was one of multiple examples this season of Boozer playing through bumps, blows and hard fouls, such as a late-season win at NC State in which Boozer had gnarly long scratches near his right shoulder after being scratched by a Wolfpack defender.
