Wake Forest head coach Dave Clawson announced this morning that junior wide receiver Donavon Greene will be sidelined for 3-5 months after sustaining a knee injury in camp last week.
Greene started 12 of 13 games for the Demon Deacons last year, hauling in 37 receptions for 642 yards and nine touchdowns. He was returning from an injury that had sidelined him for the entire 2021 campaign.
In 2020 as redshirt freshman, Greene produced 29 catches for 582 yards and two TDs in eight games. As a true freshman in 2019, Greene redshirted after participating in four games in which he had 13 receptions for 249 yards and two TDs.
In 25 career games, Greene has 79 catches for 1,473 yards and 10 TDs. He has 259 career yards and one TD on eight kick returns for an average of 32.4 yards per return.
Greene was a four-star recruit coming out of high school in the 2019 class. According to the 247Sports Composite, he remains the highest-rated recruit in program history.
There’s no bright side to this for Wake Forest, but WR is the team’s best and deepest position group. Phil Steele’s preseason magazine ranked the Demon Deacons’ WRs No. 15 nationally. Steele also had Greene as a preseason first-team All-ACC selection and the No. 22 available WR in the 2024 NFL Draft.
Mitch Griffis, who is expected to be the new starting QB after Sam Hartman transferred to Notre Dame, will still have WRs Jahmal Banks, Taylor Morin and Ke’Shawn Williams to target.
Banks, a junior entering his fourth season in the program, had 42 catches for 636 yards and nine TDs in 2022. Morin, a junior who has started 27 games in the past two seasons, caught 47 balls for 575 yards and nine TDs last year.
Morin has 122 career receptions for 1,601 yards and 17 TDs. He also serves as the team’s primary punt returner. Morin has averaged 9.0 yards on 47 career punt returns.
Williams, another junior who is entering his fourth year at Wake Forest just like Banks and Morin, finished 2022 with 39 catches for 553 yards and one TD. In 31 career games, he has 69 receptions for 1,001 yards and four TDs. Williams also returns kicks, averaging 18.7 yards on 25 career returns.
With Greene possibly out for the season, Wake Forest now only has four starters returning from an offense that averaged 36.1 points per game last year. The Deacs have six starters coming back on defense.
FanDuel has Wake’s season win total at 6.5 (‘under -144, ‘over’ +118). Clawson’s teams have won at least seven regular-season games in three of the last four years, but the lone exception was 2020 when the Deacs played only nine times.
They open the season at home against Elon on Thursday, Aug. 31.