In January, the hopes of both the coaches and the fans of the Washington Huskies for the 2011 season were buoyed when Chris Polk announced he was foregoing early entry into the NFL draft and returning for another season.
Unfortunately, the start of the running back’s likely final season could be delayed due to injury.
According to Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times, Polk underwent arthroscopic surgery to repair a meniscus tear and could be sidelined for a couple of weeks. The initial prognosis for a complete recovery could very well keep him out of the season opener.
“We went in this morning just to clean up a little bit of a meniscis thing in there,’' Sarkisian said. “It’s not serious but I just didn’t want it to linger and I thought the doctors handled it really well, and let’s just do it now so we are not dealing with this thing come October, November. It potentially could be a couple of weeks but I think he already feels good about it.”
When asked specifically if Polk would be out Sept. 3, Sarkisian said only “potentially... we don’t know.”
Fortunately for the Huskies if Polk is sidelined for the opener, and with no offense intended, their opponent in that first game will be Div. 1-AA Eastern Washington at home. In fact, with games against Hawaii and Nebraska the following two weeks, it would likely be wise to err very much toward the side of caution when it comes to getting Polk his first live action of the season.
If Polk does miss any game action, Jesse Callier would likely take over as the No. 1 RB until he returns.
Last year, Polk’s 1,415 yards were second in the then-Pac-10 and 13th in the country. Polk was named to the second-team All-Pac-10 in 2010, and this year Phil Steele named the senior to the all-conference first team alongside Heisman finalist LaMichael James of Oregon.
