Coach Brian Kelly says Sevyn Banks suffered ‘spinal cord bruise’ similar to LSU teamate, both on road to recovery

BATON ROUGE, La. (WGNO) — In talking to local media during his weekly press conference at Tiger Stadium, LSU head coach Brian Kelly addressed the health of Tigers football players recently suffering neck injuries.

On Saturday, defensive back Sevyn Banks was carted off the field after a head-first collision with an Auburn runner on the game’s opening kickoff.

With both teams kneeling on the field, Banks was wheeled out of the stadium and taken to East Alabama Medical Center where he was reported as “alert and mobile” after a battery of tests were conducted.

“The diagnosis is a spinal cord bruise, which is similar to Major Burns’ situation where there was a bruise, nothing else. No structural issues. That’s probably going to take five, six weeks before we can get him back,” said Coach Kelly, referring to Banks and his teammate Burns, who has missed the past two games due to his own neck injury.

“Talking about similar patterns here, Major Burns starts running today,” continued Kelly. “Next week he’ll be in non-contact drills with us, so there will be a similar protocol and procedure provided there are no setbacks along the way.”

Coach Kelly went on to praise both LSU Football medical support on hand, as well as those from Auburn for their expedient and thorough care of Banks following hit.

“So, really fortunate,” he said. “And really appreciate all the help that we got from our own medical team and certainly Auburn’s as well in what was a very scary situation.”