He cut his Gamecocks football career short. Something more important called him home

Will Putnam stood at an inflection point in life out in front of Colonial Life Arena.

He posed by the venue’s fountain with a pair of former South Carolina football teammates and all three’s significant others. They toasted the degrees they’ll be given this week.

Behind one of the camera phones taking pictures: Putnam’s mother, Christie.

This past spring, his name disappeared off the Gamecocks roster. That isn’t uncommon in the flow of an offseason, especially a few years into a career when a player doesn’t see the field much. But he had a reason he was capping his college football and academic career at three years.

His mother is sick — cancer — and while a football team is a family of sorts, his real family meant moving on from that, something not lost on his mother.

“It’s amazing,” Christie Putnam said. “It’s heart-stopping, heartwarming. To have such a big kid who is such a rough guy out on the field but truly just cares about people in general and not just me. To know that I have Stage 4 cancer and will never be done with it, but that he’s willing to kind of cut his social life short and come hang with his mom is pretty dang cool.”

She was diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer last February. It has since spread to her lungs and liver. She’s going through chemotherapy and, according to her son, is doing well.

He said it was important to him and her to finish up the degree. Now that it’s done, he wants to go care for her.

“Football obviously was fun,” Will Putnam said. “I love it, it’s a brotherhood. I’ll never forget the guys, the coaches, everything like that.

“I kind of wanted to go back home and be closer to her.”

When she got sick, he went to position coach Eric Wolford and head coach Will Muschamp. He said they were understanding and offered to help in any way they could.

Will Putnam’s decision to cap his career at this point didn’t come immediately, but eventually the plan came into focus. He was among 80 other athletes graduating this spring, many who attended a ring ceremony and group photos Tuesday.

The last day of classes was Monday with exams starting this week. Graduation ceremonies are May 10-11.

Even though Will Putnam is moving on, the impact of his South Carolina education will loom large.

He has already applied for a few police jobs in Charlotte. He hoped to get a few years of experience there and transfer to a federal agency such as the FBI or the Secret Service. A criminal justice major, he said he had family who worked for the ATF and that agency had been good to them, but it was part of his Gamecock experience that helped crystallize his plans.

“One of the professors on campus, Leslie Wiser, I talked to him and he was a former FBI agent,” Will Putnam said. “A lot of stuff he talked about, some of his duties, really helped me decide what I wanted to do.”

He called getting his degree a major milestone, something “honorable” that will help him down the road.

Oh, and it definitely made his mother proud.

“He’s worked his own way through college and did all the work,” Christie Putnam said. “It’s amazing.”

He added, “It was just important to me to finish a degree because that’s what she wanted and then go back home and try to take care of her.”

Despite the grim sound of her diagnosis, Christie Putnam sounded upbeat beside the fountain at Colonial Life Arena. It was a happy day. Her son will get his degree and was celebrating with friends and family.

She’s looking at the time she has left in the best possible light, and she’ll have her son with her for the rest of it.

“Who knows?” Christie Putnam said. “Could be years, could be months, don’t know, and I think that’s part of the influence on him. We never really talked about it, but that he made the decision. It makes a mom proud.”

This story was originally published April 30, 2019 at 2:43 PM.