Matt Rogers injury update: American star heads to locker room for second time vs. Mount St. Mary’s

In the first couple minutes of Wednesday’s First Four game against Mount St. Mary’s, American forward Matt Rogers went down with a knee injury. He later returned, but aggravated it again in the final minutes of the first half and returned to the locker room.

Rogers initially went down just minutes into Wednesday’s NCAA tournament play-in game. However, with 5:28 to go in the first half, he again hit the ground after immediately grabbing his right knee again on a cut inside the paint.

The training staff attended to Rogers, and he later was helped off the court by two teammates. He later walked into the tunnel on his own, though, and back toward the locker room.

Just before halftime, CBS Sports and truTV’s Jon Rothstein reported American would go the rest of the way without Rogers due to the injury. He was ruled out for the remainder of the game.

“Bad news from the American locker room,” Rothstein said on the broadcast. “Matt Rogers is out for the rest of the game with a knee injury. Obviously, a lot of very emotional people back here in the locker room for this young man. But Matt Rogers, out for the rest of tonight’s game with a knee injury.”

Rogers was crucial to getting American to Dayton for the First Four this season. He leads the Eagles with 17 points per game while adding 5.6 rebounds on average. American went 21-12 during the regular season, including 13-5 in Patriot League action before winning the conference tournament to become a 16-seed in March Madness.

Wednesday’s game marks American’s first NCAA tournament appearance since 2014. For Rogers and the other Eagles who have helped get the program to the big stage, it’s the culmination of a journey, although they weren’t ready to be done quiet yet even as Duke would loom in the first round of the big dance.

“It’s just exciting to actually fulfill the dream with these guys,” Rogers said during a press conference earlier this week. “We’ve been talking about it for four or five years. As everybody else has said, we’ve watched March Madness, we’ve seen our name not being up there, we’ve watched all the losses. So it’s great to achieve this goal and keep playing.

“We’re not done yet. We want to compete in all these games that we’ve been playing, and it’s just exciting to do it with these guys.”