USC teammates rallying behind Austin Jackson amid bone marrow procedure
USC junior offensive tackle Austin Jackson recently made public a very personal family matter, sharing on Twitter last week that he was set to donate bone marrow to his younger sister Autumn.
As his aunt explained in the tweet he shared, Autumn has Diamond-Blackfan Anemia, which the DBA Foundation describes as a "rare inherited bone marrow failure syndrome" in which the marrow fails to produce red blood cells. The procedure -- which took place Tuesday -- was termed "life-saving" in the tweet.
After USC's player-run practice later in the day Tuesday, a couple of fellow Trojans offensive linemen offered an update on their teammate while also sharing their thoughts on what he's been going through over the last three-plus weeks.
"Austin is one of my best friends. I'm so proud that he's doing that for his sister. The whole team honestly supports him and we know what's going on," center Brett Neilon said. "He'll be back, I think, next week is the plan. He had surgery today and it went well. … I know he's doing well, he posted an Instagram story, so we're all happy and proud for him."
In his tweet last week, Jackson directed those wanting to help to a fund set up to cover the medical costs for his sister.
"It's delicate. Honestly, the words are hard to find for it," right tackle Jalen McKenzie said. "We've spent a lot of time together, especially our class, we all came in together -- we've known each other since we were 17 so that's our guy. If you knew him, this is a crazy situation that you would have never expected to happen, but just that it's happening to him and the way he's responding to it, if you knew Austin, you wouldn't be surprised because of his character. …
"He went into surgery today, just sent us [something]. So we're praying for him and we're letting him handle everything he needs to handle because it's larger than life."
Neilon noted that Jackson has been away from the team for about three-and-a-half weeks while preparing for the bone marrow procedure. It would be totally understandable if that stressful family matter consumed his full focus and attention, but McKenzie shared that Jackson has actually been doing the team workouts from home in the meantime.
"Austin Jackson is one of the most amazing athletes I have ever known. You're getting videos of him at home doing our workouts at home before he's about to go into bone marrow surgery," McKenzie said.
Jackson holds a leadership stature among the USC offensive linemen, and his handling of such a difficult and serious personal matter has resonated with his teammates in multiple ways.
First, of course, for the selfless act itself and becoming a donor for his sister. But, as McKenzie noted, he's also inspiring the Trojans in another way.
"It makes you know that when you're here, because we know as an offensive line that it kills him that he's not able to be here and it's n unimaginable reason that he can't be here and we know that, so just us as a room, we want to do our best for him," he said. "Because we know when he comes back, with him, he won't lose a step. So we just know that we have a guy like that, so … that even raises the bar higher.
"We have a standard in our O-line room. You look at a guy like him and he is the standard so you try to reach what he's doing. Just the fact of what he's going through and how he's handling it."
Jackson started all 12 games last season at left tackle for USC and returns as a key to what the Trojans hope will be a more consistent collective offensive line this fall despite getting younger with new starters at three spots. McKenzie and Neilon, both redshirt sophomores, are two players vying to earn starting spots up front alongside him.
With Jackson the tone-setter for the group, McKenzie said the rest of the linemen have felt a greater responsibility in his absence with his personal sacrifice in mind.
"Really, what we need to do is just make sure we have all our stuff, all our ducks in a row because we know he's our leader, so when he comes back he doesn't feel like, 'I let the team down,'" McKenzie said. "Guys like me, Alijah [Vera-Tucker], [Andrew] Vorhees, Brett, now that he's gone we have to come into a role where we take a hold of things in his absence to let him know that, like, everything's going to be all good, we've got your back, handle your business because you need to handle that. Don't even worry about the stuff going on over here.
"That's the biggest thing that we can do is just let him know that everything's going to be all right, we got it, do your thing, we're praying for you and [when you] come back we're going to be right here for you."
There's been no indication as to how long Jackson would need to recover from this procedure before resuming activity, nor is that of paramount concern with respect to everything he and his family are going through with this.
"There's nothing else you can do, there's no magic words to say. You really just support him and his family, honestly, because there's no way to sugarcoat how the experience is going to go, how he's going to recover," McKenzie said. "He's already a crazy athlete so I don't have any doubt, he'll probably blow them away with his recovery time. So you just be there for him if he needs to talk. If he doesn't want to, you're there for him as a friend and you're there for his family. We all know his dad. His dad is another upstanding human being, so you just be there for the whole family.
Neilon added: "We give our full support to him. It's a family matter, it's a pretty big deal and kind of a touchy subject, but we love him and we give him our full support. Austin's a great guy to have in that room so we obviously miss him and having his leadership, but he'll be back same-old."