CHAMPAIGN — The phone call was one Josh Whitman never wanted to receive.
So when the Illinois athletic director first heard word of Bobby Roundtree suffering a severe spinal injury in a swimming accident last month, it nearly floored him.
"As you would imagine in a job like this," Whitman said Tuesday afternoon, "you would get some difficult phone calls."
One happened in March 2018 when Illini wrestler Francis Edelen died in a hit-and-run accident on Interstate 57.
"The second one was the call about Bobby," Whitman said.
Roundtree, a rising junior defensive end who was projected as the Illini's top defensive player for the 2019 season after leading Illinois in sacks last season with 7 1 / 2, was moved from a hospital in Florida last Wednesday to a rehabilitation facility in Chicago, Whitman said.