Swinney says Justyn Ross is moving closer to August return

Swinney points at Ross during a recent practice.

by David Hood - Senior Writer - Tue Mar 23 08:01:03 GMT-05:00 2021

Justyn Ross is moving ever closer to returning to football full-time.

The Clemson receiver has been rehabbing after last year’s spinal surgery and missed all of the 2020 football season. Ross has been wearing a yellow jersey during practice – meaning he can participate in all drills but not have contact – and has reportedly suffered no setbacks.

According to head coach Dabo Swinney, Ross will have a Zoom meeting Thursday with his spinal doctors in Pittsburgh to discuss his progress. If all goes well in that Zoom meeting, then Ross will fly back to Pittsburgh for an in-person meeting with his doctors. If both visits go well, Ross will be cleared to return to practice in full in August.

“He is doing great. He looks phenomenal,” Swinney said after Monday’s practice. “It is fun to get over here and do our team stuff and then when we get over there in competitive stuff, you notice him not there.

“So, it’s been good, though. He has done a really good job of leading and really working within the parameters he has had on him this spring. I am proud of him. I just continue to keep him in my prayers that we are going to get the news that we all want.”

Swinney said that contact is the only thing that Ross is missing.

“He s doing everything from a training standpoint. He is not missing anything,” Swinney said. “Lifting, training, running, everything. We are just not letting him have contact.”

Ross enters 2021 having recorded 112 passes for 1,865 yards with 17 touchdowns in 929 snaps over 29 career games (14 starts) from 2018-19 before missing all of 2020. He posted a dazzling true freshman season in 2018 in which he caught 46 passes for a team-leading 1,000 yards with nine touchdowns in 15 games, and that included catching six passes for 148 yards with two touchdowns in the Cotton Bowl and six passes for 153 yards with one touchdown in the College Football Playoff National Championship.

If all goes according to plan, the playmaker will be back full speed in August.

“That is the hope, but that is all up to the doctors,” Swinney said. “We will just have to wait and see and see what their final timeline is and where he is at, at that time. But that is certainly, our hope.”