Oklahoma defensive tackle Dusty Dvoracek was limping around Tuesday when he was asked how his injured right foot was healing.
He was wearing a medical boot and he hadn’t practiced since suffering the injury Nov. 12 against Texas A&M.; The frustration was hard to hide.
“It just hurts,” he said. “I can’t move around that much yet. I just want to practice and be out there with my teammates. But the doctors think it’s smarter to let it rest than try to be a tough guy.”
He showed how tough he can be last Saturday at Texas Tech. Despite the injury, he played the entire game and even registered his fourth sack of the season.
It was an impressive performance by the fifth-year senior. He’ll try to come up with another at 2:30 p.m. Saturday at Owen Field when OU faces Oklahoma State.
Pain or not, Dvoracek will be out on the field.
“The only way I wouldn’t play is if I couldn’t walk,” he said. “There’s no way I’m going to miss my last game. Against A&M;, I only got to play about one quarter and that was my next-to-last game in this stadium. There’s no way I wouldn’t play in the last one.”
Not after everything Dvoracek has been through over the last 14 months.
Many thought Dvoracek’s last game in a Sooner uniform was going to be Sept. 11, 2004. That night, he helped the Sooners roll to a 63-13 victory over Houston. Hours later he was involved in an incident that left a man hospitalized.
OU coach Bob Stoops had no choice but to remove him from the team. At the time, he believed it was for good.
“We had no intention of bringing Dusty back when he was let go a year ago,” he said. “I figured he’d enter the NFL Draft and that would be it.”
Dvoracek certainly had the talent to do so. He’d been a standout on the Sooners’ defensive line since his freshman season in 2001.
By 2003, he was a consensus All-Big 12 performer and entered the 2004 season billed as OU’s next All-American defensive lineman.
It would have been easy to bolt after that.
Instead, Dvoracek stayed in school after the dismissal and continued to work out. OU set a stringent set of guidelines for him to return to the team. Among the things he had to do was receive alcohol and anger management counseling.
Dvoracek complied with all of them. OU petitioned the NCAA for a hardship ruling to regain another year of eligibility.
The NCAA agreed.
“I felt really in my heart that if there was any risk that this could happen again, I wouldn’t have had him back,” Stoops said. “But I felt that there wouldn’t be. I felt that he’s a strong enough character in what he’s done that this is a sure thing.
“The administration felt the same way and, in the end, he was given that opportunity. He’s made the most of it and I believe it will end in a really positive way for him.”
And positive for OU, too.
Dvoracek gave a heart-felt apology for his off-the field actions before the season began. He’s followed it with an All-American type season on the field.
He’s registered 34 tackles thus far with 15 going for losses. Off the field, he was named to the All-Big 12 Academic team for the third time in his career this week and will graduate with a degree in management.
Saturday, he and 19 other seniors will play their last game at Owen Field.
Stoops said he has a tremendous amount of admiration for the entire group. But Dvoracek had to earn it twice.
“This guy has been, as far as all the things we require, the best we’ve ever had,” Stoops said.
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