Colorado head football coach Deion Sanders will have a procedure Tuesday to remove blood clots, but he does not anticipate missing time on the job.
Sanders is having an aspiration thrombectomy in the left popliteal and tibial arteries. The procedure uses a catheter to remove blood clots.
Sanders said Tuesday at his weekly news conference that he plans to be at practice Wednesday and on the sidelines Saturday when the Buffaloes host No. 22-ranked Iowa State at Folsom Field (1:30 p.m., ESPN).
“I’m having a procedure today,” Sanders said. “Prayerfully I’ll be right back tomorrow because I don’t miss practice. I don’t plan on doing such. It is what it is, and we found what we found and we knew what it was. I have a wonderful team of doctors at UCHealth and a wonderful team of trainers here.”
Sanders was in pain throughout the Buffs’ 35-21 loss at TCU on Saturday in Fort Worth, Texas, even taking the shoe off of his left foot for a period of the game. After the game, he said he might have more blood clots in his leg and that was confirmed at a doctor appointment Monday.
“Itap not like I’m doing something (to cause the blood clots),” he said. “I’ve got a lot of well-wishers and people talking about, ‘You need to slow down.’ It has nothing to do with me working at the level I’m trying to compete at. Itap hereditary. It is what it is. Itap nothing I could have done to stop whatap transpiring, nothing I could have taken or something that I’m just not abiding by. It is what it is.”
Sanders, 58, is in his third season as CU’s head coach and in the first year of a new five-year, $54 million contract signed in April.
A Pro Football Hall of Famer, Sanders has battled serious health issues for the past several years, including a bout with bladder cancer this year.
On July 28, Sanders announced that he had been diagnosed with bladder cancer in April. He had surgery May 9 at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus to remove his bladder and have a new one created with his small intestine. He and his doctors said July 28 that Sanders is cancer-free.
Sanders’ serious health issues go back to his time as Jackson State’s head coach in 2021. He had several surgeries that fall, including having two toes amputated on his left foot.
In the summer of 2023, prior to his first season at CU, he had two surgeries to fix blood clots, which improved his mobility. Prior to this week, he had been through 14 surgeries since 2021.
CU trainer Lauren Askevold has been by Sanders’ side since Jackson State and has often treated his leg to help with blood flow.
Askevold said in July that Sanders has an annual “CT scan of his vascular pattern to make sure blood clots are away,” while adding that a scan in the spring “turned out really great from the vascular side.”
That scan did reveal the tumor in Sanders’ bladder, however. And now he is dealing with blood clots again but hopes to bounce back quickly from Tuesday’s procedure.
“I’m going to go in there and I’m gonna get some of the best sleep in the world for about four hours (during the surgery),” he said. “I cannot wait to go get past this hurdle. … I’m gonna be all right.”
