Football is a game of inches, they say, but that can mean different things to different people. For Purdue defensive tackle Will Colmery, the inches came inside his head. They were the difference between him rejoining the Boilermakers for spring practice last week and having his football career, if not much more, derailed by a brain tumor.
Nobody in West Lafayette, Indiana -- where new coach Jeff Brohm has started to teach his nation-leading, head-turning offense to a struggling Purdue program -- was more excited to start spring workouts in late February than Colmery. Doctors say he won’t be able to participate in contact drills until this summer at the earliest, but the junior has been suited up and on the field for all five of the Boilermakers’ practices thus far.