It happened to Shea Ralph three times while she was in Storrs. Mel Thomas and Kalana Greene both suffered the same fate in the span of a month one season.
When Caroline Doty planted to haul in a Maya Moore feed on a fast break in the first half of a January meeting with Syracuse at the XL Center last season, there was hardly any doubt - on her part or the part of anyone else - that she would soon be in the same category. That day, Doty joined a star-studded list of UConn women's basketball players to experience the season-killer, the three most dreaded letters a female athlete will ever hear - she had torn her ACL.
The injury cost the Doylestown, Pa. native the opportunity to help the Huskies to their sixth National Title in the last 15 years. If everything had gone the way the first 17 games of the 2008-09 campaign had for Doty, she would have done so as a starter. In those 17 games, she was averaging nearly nine points and shooting an even 40 percent from the three-point arc. She was living up to her billing as a sharp-shooter in the backcourt with ball-handling ability.
Instead, she was on the operating table six days after her injury, ready to begin rehabbing the same knee that had prevented her from playing any basketball in her senior season at Germantown Academy. Yes, this was the second time she'd torn the ACL in her left knee, the first of which came on the soccer field. This one kept her off the floor while her teammates finished what she helped them start - the third undefeated season in UConn history.
The road to recovery from restructured knee ligaments typically takes anywhere from six to nine months. Having spent the summer rehabbing and preparing for the moment she would reenter the fray that is live game action, Doty went into this year's preseason eager to turn the page. If her on-court entrance at the team's First Night festivities were any indication - she came out with crutches before tossing them aside, executing a spot-on version of Michael Jackson's patented leg kick and launching into her dance routine - Doty is energized and ready for the ball to tip on Saturday against Northeastern.
"I feel great right now," Doty said. "I feel stronger than ever. [There are] little kinks here and there but nothing that can't be worked out."
Doty struggled from beyond the arc in the preseason opener against St. Rose, turning in a disappointing 1-for-7 effort. But she did finish with 11 points and six boards in a performance that coach Geno Auriemma lauded for its all-around merits, adding that he's cautious about how quickly she can have the kind of impact she's expecting of herself out of the blocks.
"She did more than just shoot the ball," Auriemma said. "She was able to get to the basket a couple times, find people passing the ball a little bit. When you haven't played for a whole year almost, that's hard. It's been hard on her in practice. She's kinda hard on herself to begin with. She wants it to come real easily and it's not gonna come easily, it's gonna take a month or so."
Auriemma tends to favor the high end of the estimated recovery time on ACL injuries, and he certainly possesses the unfortunate background it takes to make that kind of assessment.
"Everybody says, 'six months and you're ready to go,'" Auriemma said. "No you're not. Those ACL's are more eight-nine months before you feel like you're playing."
Doty improved her shooting in the second exhibition against Vanguard, a game held at the spot where she suffered her injury some 11 months earlier. She finished 3-for-8 from three and matched freshman Kelly Faris for a team-high in assists with five. Afterward, she talked about how Ralph has aided her personally in her return, speaking from her own experience.
"I've been talking to Shea a lot about her comebacks and what they've been like," Doty said. "She's been really supportive and positive about everything. Playing back here at the XL Center, I felt great, had no restraints or anything."
While it was tough to watch her teammates roll through the NCAA Tournament on their way to 39-0, Doty hopes that she'll be joining a different club - one with a lot more members - come next April.
She'll walk off the court in San Antonio the way she walked onto the one in Gampel Pavilion this October: a National Champion and a Husky minus the crutches.
Be the first to comment on this article!