(Minneapolis, MN) — Golden Gopher football coach P-J Fleck says his junior holder Casey O’Brien has passed a second straight quarterly cancer screen test with clean results. O’Brien shared the news with the team on Monday. O’Brien is a Cretin-Derham Hall graduate, who has been with the Golden Gopher football team as a holder for field goals and extra points since 2017. O’Brien was diagnosed with cancer as a high schooler and his story has been well-documented as to how he has has multiple surgeries and treatments to beat cancer multiple times. He played in a game for the first time last fall at Rutgers and played again against Maryland the following week. Fleck says O’Brien has been practicing with the team and has undergone daily COVID-19 testing during that time, as well. Fleck says O’Brien’s inspirational impact on the team has been immense. He also says O’Brien being able to be around his teammates has helped him, too. The Gophers are set to open the season at home against Michigan a week from Saturday at T-C-F Bank Stadium.
Gopher head coach PJ Fleck talked about the situation on his weekly radio show this week with Mike Grimm and Justin Gaard:
audio courtesy of Gopher Radio Network (Learfield-IMG College)
photos courtesy of Gopher Sports (credit: Brad Rempel)