Rutgers QB charged after bar fight; victim may not survive: Report

Rutgers quarterback Philip Nelson — a transfer from Minnesota — who spent the weekend cooling his heels in a jail cell was finally released after making bail.

Nelson, who left the police station with a towel covering his head, is charged with one count of first degree assault and one count of third-degree assault in connection with a bar fight that left 24-year-old Isaac Kolstad in critical condition.

The 20-year-old appeared in Blue Earth County (Minn.) court Monday wearing an orange jail jumpsuit, with his hands cuffed and his ankles chained. First-degree assault carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.

That's if his victim survives.

While Nelson was in court Monday, Kolstad was in the Mayo Clinic in Mankato, Minn. struggling to stay alive.

According to the complaint filed Monday afternoon, a neurosurgeon with the hospital said Kolstad was suffering from “a severe head injury and a severe pulmonary injury,” and he’s not sure if the victim will survive.

Kolstad has a wife and a child with another on the way.

See 9 pics of Isaac Kolstad, who is fighting for his life: http://t.co/JzGmJdwzou #22strong #prayforisaac pic.twitter.com/Y1dv5y6M47
— EveryJoe (@everyjoedotcom) May 12, 2014

A police sergeant who viewed surveillance video described Kolstad — who played at Minnesota State — as striking Nelson in the back, then moving away and being pursued and struck by an unidentified man, who fled the scene.

Witnesses described Nelson as being upset over attention being paid to his girlfriend. 

“Nelson pushes past others, approaches I.K. [Kolstad] and delivers at least one kick to the left side of I.K.’s head. Sergeant Knutson noted the video clearly shows that I.K. was defenseless as Nelson delivers the kick or kicks to the head,’’ the complaint reads. Witnesses said words had been exchanged between Nelson and Kolstad, with video showing Kolstad hitting Nelson on the back, causing him to fall into another person.

Witnesses said the two had a “heated exchange.” The statement of probable cause said witnesses notified police Kolstad was lying on the ground near Blue Bricks bar. Nelson was arrested at 2 a.m. but his lawyer, Jim Fleming, said he “was not an aggressor in this situation” and added he wasn’t sure who caused Kolstad’s injuries.

Nelson participated in spring practice at Rutgers and would have to sit out next season — the Scarlet Knights’ first in the Big Ten — as a transfer, and would have had two more years of eligibility. But all that seems up in the air now.

Rutgers officials had no comment.

Here's surveilance footage of the incident: