How Pitt's James Conner exercised his way through cancer

ERIE, Pa. — Next to the collection of trophies and plaques sits a surgical mask, displayed just as prominently as the All-America honors and MVP awards.

It’s symbolic, a reminder of the biggest challenge James Conner has overcome. But it had also served a real purpose: That mask allowed him to feel like a football player, and not just a 20-year-old cancer patient.

He’d wear the mask while working out, something he tried to do the day following each of his 12 chemotherapy treatments.

“The day after, many patients spend it taking it easy,” said Dr. Stanley Marks, who treated Conner at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. “He would go and workout. I emphasized to him the importance of staying active and working out with obviously limitations based on his fatigue, but he took it to an extreme.”

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Conner had one moment in mind throughout the light lifting, the running, everything: What it would feel like to run out onto the field for Pittsburgh’s opener against Villanova on Sept. 3, cancer-free. Now, that moment is just more than two months away from reality.

“I can't be out there crying on the field,” Conner says, smiling. “They're going to look at me like, ‘This man is soft. What's this running back doing crying on the field?’ I ain't going to be doing any of that. It will be an emotional day, but it will also be a good day.

“I’m going to run really hard.”

Conner isn’t sure exactly when he’ll be back to full strength; he says he’d never been in better shape than he was a year ago, before the season-ending knee injury he suffered in last year’s opener — and that includes his freshman season, when then-Panthers coach Paul Chryst occasionally deployed him at linebacker too.

Pittsburgh star RB James Conner says he is cancer free

“I’m getting there,” he says, adding that his knee is fully healed. “I'm being strict with the diet. I'm being focused in the weight room. Everyday I'm trying to get back there. Come September 3rd, I'll be in the best shape of my life.

“I feel like I got it all back. I feel like I'm ready. It's been a month since my medicine. Everyday I'm approaching it as, I know, it all can be taken from you. I was at the high of ACC Player of the Year. It was going smooth and this knocked me down a whole bunch of levels.”

Football-wise, Conner says he feels great. He’s finishing entire workouts with his teammates, both in the weight room and on the practice field. He says he won’t use cancer as a reason to be anything less than full strength for the season opener. And he still focuses on playing in the NFL, his ultimate goal.

Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi has seen glimpses of the big, punishing running back that dominated college football two seasons ago, when Conner rushed for 1,765 yards (5.9 yards per carry) and 26 touchdowns. He watched Conner take handoffs in spring practice and couldn’t believe what he was seeing from a 20-year-old in between chemo treatments.

“He just took off running,” Narduzzi says. “This guy didn't look like he has cancer or just underwent treatment yesterday. I think you've seen it all along. You didn't see, ‘Here he is, ACC Player of the Year, oh gosh he's got cancer.’ He was steady the entire way, to be honest with you. We didn't get to see him compete and break that tackle and play for four quarters (in spring). Those are the things he's going to have to work through here as he prepares for the season.”

Marks said he’s already noticing a significant difference in Conner’s body about a month after his final chemo treatment.

“He's really getting a lot more muscle mass,” Marks says. “His arms are just a rock. I'm amazed at how he's really bulked up. I know it's related to how he's been working out. He really is a specimen to begin with, and now it's like I think he's back to where he wanted to be.”

Or, where he will be come September. Conner is back to focusing on football, not cancer.

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“That was my biggest opponent,” Conner says. “I feel like I'm not worried about anybody on the schedule. I'm not being cocky, it's just confident. Once you go through something like this of this magnitude, no other human, really, I believe can stop me. That's the edge I have.

“On the day of the first game, I'm going to take it all in. From the hotel the night before, the pre-game meal, the bus ride over to the stadium, in the locker room putting the pads on and I come out the tunnel, I’ll soak it all in. It’s going to be a great day.”