LAWRENCE — Cornell Wheeler has been a critical piece of Kansas football’s defense this fall.

Wheeler, a redshirt senior linebacker, is the Jayhawks’ starting MIKE linebacker. He leads the team in tackles. He’s close to being the leader in tackles for loss and pass-breakups.

But ahead of Kansas’ first Big 12 Conference home game on Saturday against TCU, it’s unclear if Wheeler will be available. During the Jayhawks’ loss this past weekend on the road against West Virginia, he suffered an injury. Should Kansas (1-3, 0-1 in Big 12) win against the Horned Frogs (2-2, 0-1), it might have to do so without Wheeler on the field.

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“Cornell didn’t practice today,” KU head coach Lance Leipold said Monday. “We’ll see where it progresses with him, but he got hurt, he went back in and then we took him back out. But we’ll see here. But, again, a lot of guys are limited on Monday’s.”

Kansas’ devotion to cross-training its linebackers can help here, if there’s time that’s needed to get Wheeler healthy. Leipold mentioned as much when he referenced assistant head coach/linebackers coach Chris Simpson during his comments on Wheeler. So, that would lead the burden to fall on either senior linebacker Taiwan Berryhill Jr. or senior linebacker JB Brown.

So far this season, Berryhill has eight tackles and a quarterback hurry through four games. Brown has 18 tackles, four tackles for loss, a sack, a pass-breakup and two quarterback hurries through the same. The position has already been affected by redshirt junior linebacker Jayson Gilliom’s injury, which has caused him to past the past two games, and the positions’ depth has continued to be affected.

Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He is the National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas for 2022. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Kansas football coach Lance Leipold on LB Cornell Wheeler's injury