Football: Quave’s Cajun career ended abruptly

Tim Buckley, The Advertiser, December 3, 2015

 

UL offensive lineman Mykhael Quave participates in practice in March at the Leon Moncla Indoor Practice Facility in Lafayette.(Photo: Advertiser file photo)

 

 

Ragin’ Cajuns offensive guard Mykhael Quave initially had no idea his rotator cuff was torn.

He played on, not knowing two tendons were shredded and UL’s season was about to be torn to pieces too.

Two months later, speaking for the first time since that fateful early October Saturday at Louisiana Tech that the Cajuns lost both a game and a cornerstone, the NFL prospect looks ahead to a possible pro career knowing the path hasn’t been made any easier by what happened in Ruston.

“I’m just hoping I can get my foot in the door – whether it’s free agent, or whatever,” said Quave, who before his injury seemed like a lock for a Senior Bowl invitation that might have led to him being picked at some point in the 2016 NFL Draft.

Now, there’s no telling how what happened then impacts him later. All Quave knows it is really didn’t seem season-ending at first.

“I felt it as soon as it happened. I was blocking a guy, then my arm kind of popped,” he said. “After the play, it was just throbbing pain.

“But I kept rotating it, just kept moving it, so it wouldn’t get stiff. It was manageable – kind of – but I could tell something was wrong.”

He found it hard to hold a block, and got pushed back on a costly pick-six late in the opening half against the Bulldogs.

At halftime, the shoulder did grow stiff.

But he finished, bound-and-determined to do so.

Then reality crept in.

“Every time I tried to punch off the ball,” Quave said, “it was just excruciating pain.

“I wasn’t thinking it was anything like (a tear), then after the game I was trying to take off my shoulder pads, and that’s when I really felt like, yeah, something’s really wrong.”

He had to bend forward, and have teammates help. Even then, though, Quave’s instincts suggested he wouldn’t miss a beat.

Not even a game.

His shoulder, after all, had been sore before, and he’d always played the next week.

“I was just thinking it was gonna be another one of those,” Quave said, “so it was just kind of like ‘whatever’ and ‘I’ll be ready for Saturday.’ ”

Then he had the MRI, and the talk with Cajuns trainer Travis Soileau.

“Mr. Travis sat me down and … I was like, ‘Wow,’ ” Quave said.

Comprised of four tendons, the rotator cuff essentially connects the upper arm with the shoulder joint. With two tendons torn, according to Quave, “from the bone … it was just hanging.”

Quave’s first thought in Quave’s?

“ ‘Dang, Daniel’s gonna beat me with consistent starts,’ ” he said, referencing older brother Daniel Quave.

Daniel Quave, who briefly spent time with the Dallas Cowboys last NFL offseason, started 52 straight games as a Cajun.

Mykhael Quave was tracking for the same had he not gotten hurt and if UL had made it to a bowl game.

“That was before it got real to me that I had played my last collegiate game,” Quave said, “and (then) it was just like, ‘Dang – all this work I’ve been putting in, just for it to end like this.’

“It really hurt. I kind of broke down a little bit.”

Surgery soon followed.

“After a while,” Quave said, “It was like, ‘Now, what’s next? … I can’t just sit and pout about it for too long, because life’s gonna keep going on.’ ”

Good question.

Before he could answer, Quave simply had to learn how to sleep without waking for water or a post-surgery pain pill. He rested on his back, pillow on his side, bulky brace in place.

It took almost three weeks before he’d snooze eight hours without stirring.

“Sleep usually is my favorite part of the day,” Quave said, “but I hated it.”

The next hurdle: Saturdays with no football.

Quave still is dealing with that, even with UL’s Senior Day coming when the Cajuns plays Troy this Saturday at Cajun Field.

Typically upbeat, smiling doesn’t always come easy nowadays.

“I feel I did a pretty good job of trying to keep high spirits and everything,” Quave said, “but every game day – I’m not gonna lie – every single game day we’ve had was horrible for me.

“Being in the locker room, seeing everyone else get dressed and I get to my locker and I don’t have my helmet or my cleats or my pants in my locker anymore – that was always a tough moment.

“I held it in, but you could tell something was wrong with me,” he added. “It was just tough to come to that realization that I’m done with football.”

Or at least college football.

Without playing in a postseason all-star game, Quave said he’ll miss “an opportunity to go against bigger competition and showcase my skills against other people at a high level.”

“So I can only rely on working out and what I have on film,” he said.

The injury really has been pricey – personally, and for UL.

“It crushed him,” Cajuns coach Mark Hudspeth said.

“It crushed all of us, and not just because we knew we lost a great player, but because we knew what the senior year meant to him – his start streak, and he wanted to finish the season leading his team to a bowl game. … I still feel for him, and hate it for him.”

Having seen teammates miss a game or two with sprains and strains, opening 43 straight was no easy task for Quave.

He remembers a game against Arkansas State last season, when turf toe made him want to scream with every step.

Quave played anyway.

“I really took a lot of pride in it,” he said, “especially because my brother did it before me and that sibling rivalry we have of always trying to one-up each other.”

On the field, with Daniel Quave gone, Mykhael Quave become the UL offensive line’s rock.

When the rock cracked, so did the Cajuns.

Players bounced here and there to plug the hole, but there frequently was a leak because someone almost always was out of position or not quite ready.

In UL’s seven games since Quave exited, the Cajuns went 3-4 including a current skid of three straight losses. Star running back Elijah McGuire failed to gain more than 75 yards in five of those seven outings. And after four straight New Orleans Bowl wins, 4-7 UL failed to secure a fifth straight bowl bid.

“I feel like it affected it a good bit,” Quave said of his injury, “because from as far as an offensive line standpoint as a unit we had such good chemistry.

“Every time (center) Eddie (Gordon) made a call, everyone already knew the call before it was made and we (were) relaying it to each other.

“There were never any miscommunications,” he added, “and I feel like when I went down we lost a bit of that cohesion.”

All that’s left now is for Quave to communicate how he really is intent on chasing an NFL career.

“My main focus right now is just getting my shoulder back to 100 percent and being able to play again,” Quave said, “because I feel in my heart if I can get my foot in the door then I can produce on the field enough to make something happen.”