Yahoo Sports Report: Indiana QB Kurtis Rourke 'believed' to have played entire 2024 season with re-torn right ACL
Rourke first tore his right ACL at the end of the 2022 season while at Ohio
Did Kurtis Rourke play the 2024 season with a torn ACL?
The Indiana quarterback’s agent told NFL Network that Rourke would undergo revision surgery on the ACL in his right knee after suffering a preseason re-tear.
Indiana star QB Kurtis Rourke, a 2025 NFL Draft prospect, will undergo ACL revision surgery Wednesday, per his agent Casey Muir at @octagonfootball.
Rourke is believed to have re-torn his ACL in August — yet amazingly played and led the Hoosiers to the playoff. One tough dude. pic.twitter.com/0bZze2ZMrC— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) January 3, 2025
The Indianapolis Star reported that Rourke partially tore the repaired ACL in July before potentially tearing the rest of it at some point before the season began.
Per IndyStar’s source, Rourke partially tore the ACL during the summer. Pelissero reported the full tear was believed to have occurred in August. Rourke did not alert Indiana’s medical team to any further discomfort or aggravation after the initial injury, and thus no new examination or imaging was conducted across the course of the season itself.
If Rourke played the entire season with a torn ACL, it would be a remarkable footnote to the best year in Indiana history. The Hoosiers went 11-1 in the regular season and made the College Football Playoff before losing to Notre Dame in the first round on Dec. 21.
Rourke was a big reason why. A fringe Heisman candidate who finished ninth in the voting at the end of the season, Rourke was 222-of-320 passing for 3,042 yards and 29 TDs with just five interceptions in 12 games. He struggled in Indiana’s losses, however. Rourke was 8 of 18 for 68 yards in the Hoosiers’ Nov. 23 loss to Ohio State and was 20-of-33 passing for 215 yards with two TDs and an interception.
The fifth-year QB missed the team's game vs. Washington after the nail on his right thumb came off in the team's win over Nebraska.
Rourke first tore the ACL in his right knee at the end of the 2022 season when he was at Ohio. He was the 2022 MAC MVP that season as he was 244 of 353 through the air for 3,257 yards and 25 TDs over 11 games before his injury.
He played the 2023 season at Ohio before transferring to Indiana for the 2024 season as former James Madison coach Curt Cignetti became the Hoosiers’ head coach.
