Are ACL tears alarming for Illini?

Published Jun. 29, 2015 4:17 p.m. ET

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Illinois football has had three players go down with ACL tears in three months. Normally, you chalk that up to football being a violent sport and the old saying that "injuries happen."

However, Orange and Blue News took a deeper look into the trend and spoke with Doctor of Physical Therapy Ben Kim of the Mettler Center, a whole-life fitness center in Champaign, to learn more about preventing ACL injuries.

Here is what Dr. Kim had to say about whether or not ACL injuries were just more common these days:

"I don't think there's more ACL injuries, per se. I just think people are talking about them more, and because of the internet and things like that, a lot of people are just more educated and aware about what it is. That's why more people are talking about it. Fatigue definitely has a factor into ACL injuries. There's a lot of research going into that as well. People go through some training or exercises and then do a landing test versus someone who has not gone through training and do a land test. They observe the muscles firing and the knee angles and stuff like that. They're doing a lot of research into that, and they're saying fatigue does factor into ACL injuries, but people who go through a proper protocol in training and endurance … those people are at much less risk to get injured."

So while awareness of knee injuries may be rising, we still need more evidence to prove the theory that more players are tearing their ACLs. Here's hoping to a speedy recovery for the injured Illini players.

(h/t Orange and Blue News)

Photo Credit: Jeff Hanisch/USA TODAY Sports