Cancer survivor James Conner awaits new challenge: Being drafted from Pitt into NFL

It's a little strange to think of it this way, given James Conner knew everyone at the NFL scouting combine knew his name and bits and pieces of his backstory, but he really did approach the event as a reintroduction of sorts.

Yes, he was the University of Pittsburgh star who had battled and beaten cancer in a very public way. But he was more than that — he believed he could truly be the best and toughest running back in the 2017 draft class. That’s what he wanted to talk about.

So, the week before the combine, Conner went to his oncologist, Stanley Marks, in Pittsburgh. He received a clean bill of health — still cancer-free — and made 32 copies of it.

“Every team received a copy of my clean scan, so questions were kept to a minimum,” Conner told USA TODAY Sports this week. “The thing most people told me was, ‘Congratulations.' They knew my story.”

MORE DRAFT COVERAGE

NFL mock draft 7.0: First-round outlook comes into focus

Three years later, report cards for 2014 NFL draft put Raiders at top

NFL draft prospect Gareon Conley accused of rape; no charges filed

The Dak Factor: Prescott's success is cause for NFL draft reflection

That meant he could finally talk about football or whatever else team officials and coaches wanted to discuss. At both the combine — where he met with 15 teams — and Conner’s pro day, the focus largely remained on his on-field performance, though it sometimes swerved into the off-field battles that have prepared him for whatever comes his way as a professional.

“I had told them why I’m the best running back — my ability to break tackles, my yards after contact and my running style,” Conner said.

But he did occasionally talk to coaches about his diagnosis of stage 2 Hodgkin lymphoma, the 12 chemotherapy treatments that followed and the fact he played football just two months after his final scan cleared the way for a return. Or that he played in every game for Pitt last fall, rushed for more than 1,000 yards and scored 20 touchdowns … all after starting the season at what he estimates to be about 60% of his full strength.

“That’s what I like to explain to the coaches,” Conner said at the combine. “I ask the coaches, ‘What do you guys want in a running back?’ They want a tough guy. My mental toughness and my physical toughness, I feel, (are) second to none. I’ve just been through so much, and I think I’m more determined than any running back in this class — I’m just willing to make sacrifices and do whatever it takes.”

Conner has shown as much while transforming his body, reducing his body fat from 18% when he began training for the combine to 7% by the time he participated in drills there in late February. Along with other top prospects, like former North Carolina quarterback Mitchell Trubisky, Conner worked alongside top trainer Ryan Flaherty for weeks and coupled that with a consistent sleep schedule and strict meal plan to produce a dramatically chiseled frame.

The 6-1, 233-pounder known for his bruising, physical style has dropped more than 10 pounds from his playing weight last fall and is now closer to the frame that helped him win Atlantic Coast Conference Player of the Year honors in 2014, when he rushed for 1,765 yards and 26 TDs. Conner considers himself to be in the best physical shape he’s been in since his cancer diagnosis in November of 2015.

So now he waits.

Everything Conner has done to reach this point — those post-chemo days that he spent on the treadmill in a surgical mask to those pre-draft workouts this winter and everything in between — have gotten him here, days away from hearing his name called, he hopes, and seeing his childhood dream becoming a reality.

Conner will watch the draft — the first round will occur Thursday night — with close friends and family members at a Buffalo Wild Wings in his hometown of Erie, Pa. He said he feels the days passing more slowly and his own anxiety increasing. He can’t help but ask himself questions he doesn’t yet know the answers to: Who will take a chance on him? Where will he live? When will he not only be known as a cancer survivor — but also as an NFL player?

“You work your whole life for this, and now it’s days away,” Conner said.

“It’s unbelievable.”

PHOTOS: Mock draft 7.0