After an ACL injury, McCready is better than ever

The Mail Tribune reports:

Christine McCready isn't afraid to say what many in the Rogue Valley have been thinking as the volleyball season has progressed.

With McCready leading the charge, Eagle Point has churned out wins over every Class 6A and 5A squad in the vicinity and now stands one victory away from posting its first season with double-digit wins since 2003.

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Ashland, Crater, Grants Pass, North Medford, South Medford ... they've all fallen prey to the Eagles (9-4) thus far and the season's barely over the midway mark. Such success at the local level hasn't been seen at Eagle Point since before most of the current players were born — or at least were out of diapers.

"I think it's actually surprised us how we're doing so good because we haven't had this much success in past seasons," McCready says in all honesty. "I think we're just enjoying the moment and trying to keep beating those hard teams we play." Click here to continue.

Struggling to stay positive after two ACL injuries

Devil's Advocate reports: 


Going through a season-ending injury at any point in an athlete’s life is something that is certainly tough to go through. Emily Rodes learned that the hard way as a freshman three years ago when she tore her left ACL.

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Fast forward to 2011, and after an awkward play in a matchup against Tates Creek on Aug 20, she has to go through it again in an even tougher way as a senior, this time tearing her right ACL and meniscus. 

“When I was a freshman, it sucked,” Rodes said, “but not nearly as much as it does not because then, I didn’t understand what it was to play for your school and how amazing the whole experience is. When I was a freshman, I didn’t understand the school spirit or pride that came along with each game.” To read more, click here. 

Back and better than ever after an ACL injury

Presidio Sports reports: 

In Leah Sully’s return to the Thunderdome for her first game at home in two years, she showed the UC Santa Barbara home crowd what they’d been missing.

Even before the fourth set, the sophomore Sully was playing some of the best volleyball of her collegiate career.

Then, she played better.

Sully, who missed all of last season with a torn ACL, served the first 15 points of the fourth set, including three of her four service aces, as the Gauchos dominated Pacific on Friday night in the Thunderdome, 25-21, 25-18, 22-25, 25-6.

It was UCSB’s first home match of the season and the Gauchos improved to 9-6 overall and 2-1 in the Big West. UOP falls to 10-6, 1-2. To read more, click here.

Chapel Hill working on ACL injury prevention

Chapel Hill News reports:

Kelsey Reeves knew lots of girls soccer players who had torn their anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), but she never thought it would happen to her.

She didn't think she had injured the crucial knee ligament even after she lay on the ground in pain during a Leesville Road High game last spring. There was no contact, just one misstep.

"I had never been injured," she said. "I knew anything could happen, but I never thought something like this would happen to me. Even after I was hurt, I didn't think it could be an ACL." Click here to continue reading.

North Carolina high school tennis star out for the season

News and Record reports:

Page sophomore Elizabeth Ansari is out for the season after likely tearing the ACL in her right knee during girls tennis practice Tuesday, Pirates coach Jason Allen said. She had an MRI on Thursday.

“It’d be safe to say that she’s out for the season,” Allen said. “It’s only about another two or three more weeks, and she can’t even walk.”

Ansari was playing at No. 3 singles for the stacked Pirates. Last season, as a freshman, she went 10-3 at No. 1 singles, was a Midwest Region semifinalist and a News & Record all-area selection. She was 11-0 this season.

“We were going to make a run for a state championship this year, but without her it’s going to be next to impossible,” Allen said. “She was a pivotal part of that.”

Top girls basketball player in Kentucky out for the season

WDRB.com reports:

The top girls basketball player in [Kentucky] and one of the best in the country will miss her Junior season.

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Becca Greenwell, a 6' 1" forward from Owensboro Catholic High School suffered a torn ACL in her right knee Sunday while playing for the U.S. team in the FIBA 3-on-3 Youth Championships in Italy.

Greenwell led the state in scoring as a Sophomore with 32 points a game and has already amassed over 28-hundred points in her career. She's ranked fifth in the class of 2013 nationally by ESPN's HoopGurlz.

Stanley hasn't missed a beat since she's been hurt.

BlueRidgeNow.com reports:

With her 2010 senior season abruptly cut short by a torn ACL during a match in the team's first tournament, University of Albany volleyball player Brooke Stanley spent what should have been her final and best year yet with the Great Danes in physical therapy.

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Now that her 2011 senior season has arrived, after Stanley was redshirted for 2010, she's finally getting to execute those goals she set for herself and her team a year later — now with even more gusto than before.

And she's wasting no time. To read more, click here.

Jade Rogers has a great attitude about recovery

The Gazette reports:

Iowa Coach Lisa Bluder  announced today  sophomore Jade Rogers will undergo surgery Thursday to repair her injured left knee and will miss the entire 2011-12 season.

Rogers suffered a torn ACL while at Cedar Rapids Kennedy  and has also had meniscus injuries during her time at Iowa. Thursday’s surgery will realign her left leg to help her knee heal. To read more, click here.

Rockford volleyball player Halle Peterson puts ACL in past

Mlive.com reports:
It was a seemingly innocent play on a volleyball court, an attempt to set up a successful attack so the Rockford volleyball team could score a point in its Class A district final against Lowell.

Instead, it ended up a painful experience for the Rams’ Halle Peterson. What she thought was a simple bone bruise in her right knee turned out to be a costly torn anterior cruciate ligament.

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"I think it was when I jumped up that it happened," Peterson said. "I just felt like someone hit me really hard above the knee. I thought it was a bruise and I’d be able to go back in and play."

Instead, despite a valiant effort, Peterson’s junior season ended after 1,303 assists and a verbal commitment to Michigan State University made three weeks before her injury. Peterson also missed her junior year in basketball. Click to continue.

Happy to be Healthy

The Chicago Tribune reports:


St. Charles East junior setter Erienne Barry recalled the date without hesitation.

"It was October 5th when I tore my ACL," Barry said of an injury to her right knee suffered last year against St. Charles North.



Barry had surgery Oct. 27 and missed the rest of the season, possibly taking the Saints' Class 4A title aspirations away in the process.

"It was definitely hard on me," Barry said Saturday at the Conant Early Bird Invite. "I knew I had to stay with my team. It made me stronger." Click to continue.

Back in Action After and ACL Injury

wkuherald.com reports:

After tearing the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in her right leg last December, WKU senior middle hitter Tiffany Elmore says she didn’t even consider missing time this season.

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“I had in my mind the whole time that I was going to be back ready to go for the start,” she said.

The injury happened in WKU’s NCAA Tournament match against Cincinnati.

Elmore said after the injury she knew she was going to have to work to be ready for the start of the volleyball season. Click to continue.

Kristi Kingma Out for the Season after ACL Injury

King5.com reports:

Kristi Kingma will miss the entire 2011-12 season after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in her right knee. The injury comes less than a month before the Washington women’s basketball program reports for the start of the regular season.  

The senior guard from Mill Creek, Wash., sustained the tear recently in Norway when she was driving to the basket during Washington’s foreign tour game against Asker. Although the prognosis was initially optimistic, an MRI test back in Seattle revealed the full extent of the injury. Click to continue.

Gohuskies.com reports:

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Kristi Kingma will miss the entire 2011-12 season after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in her right knee. The injury comes less than a month before the Washington women's basketball program reports for the start of the regular season.

The senior guard from Mill Creek, Wash., sustained the tear in Norway when she was driving to the basket during Washington's foreign tour game against Asker. Although the prognosis was initially optimistic, a magnetic resonance imaging test back in Seattle revealed the full extent of the injury.

"I'm extremely disappointed for Kristi," said first-year coach Kevin McGuff. "She's worked really hard in the offseason to put herself in position to have a wonderful senior season. I still look forward to her having a positive impact on our team and program this year." Click to continue.

Monique Currie returns from ACL injury in victory

The Washington Post Reports:

Washington Mystics forward Monique Currie was cleared to play by members of the team’s medical staff several weeks ago, but they wanted Currie to hold off on returning to the court during a game until Thursday. The staff had told her she wasn’t yet mentally ready for the rigors of competition eight months after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee.

“The biggest part is mental,” Currie said. “You can have a surgery, you can feel good, but there’s still a lot that goes into going out there and playing and being confident and being sure of what your knee or whatever you injured can do.” Click to continue.

Purdue expecting fewer injuries through better sports conditioning

jconline reports:

What happened to high-profile athletes during an 11-month span in 2010 remains one of those hard-to-believe periods in Purdue University athletic history.

Each of the school's marquee sports teams -- football, men's and women's basketball, and volleyball -- were affected by torn anterior cruciate ligament tears, or ACLs.

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The football team was hit the hardest, not just by ACL tears, but by a rash of other injuries. And this past week, another football player was added to the list. Click to continue.

A first hand account of dealing with an ACL injury

Mary Koppy is a sophomore in English writing at MSU, where she is a thrower on the track and field team.

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Great Falls Tribute reports her first hand account of dealing with an ACL injury:


When I tore my ACL in February, I thought the world was ending. Pop culture turns this into the bogeyman of sports injuries. The acronym pops up in hundreds of sports stories each year, and it always seems as if it ends careers.


In fact, the most serious problem a tear in the anterior cruciate ligament poses is the surgery required to fix it. That surgery has vastly improved in the last 60 years as a result of significant medical advances. It now offers the possibility of a full recovery, as well as a greatly diminished chance of complication.


Prior to injuring my knee, I had this vague idea that if your ACL tore, you were done with competitive sports for life. To read more, click here.

Caroline Doty refuses to give up

The Hour reports:

Caroline Doty refuses to give up, refuses to quit, refuses to be beaten by the bands of ligaments and tendons inside her own body which are being so uncooperative and cruel.

More than anything, though, Doty refuses to get down about the setbacks she keeps encountering as she tries to bounce back from the third ACL tear in left knee and the post-injury surgery that followed.

“I’m just thinking positive thoughts,” Doty said last Friday, sitting in front row of the Gampel Pavilion stands, the brace on her left knee unstrapped, a scar, running north and south, clearly visible. “Going into this season, with the group we have, it’s going to be a lot of fun. I’m really excited, especially to be able to be a part of it on the floor is even more exciting. I can’t wait to run out and hear the crowd.”

To read more, click here.

WPS helps players prove their fitness after injuries

ESPN W Reports:

Here's a big reason to keep an eye on the pulse of Women's Professional Soccer: A healthy domestic soccer league has an instant and far-reaching effect on a national team.

WPS has helped players prove their fitness after injuries. Midfielder Megan Rapinoe, one of the breakout stars of the World Cup, came back strong in WPS after suffering ACL injuries as she finished her career at Portland.

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To read more, click here.

5 ways to prevent sports injuries

Your sports require you to have strength and skill to excel in the game. Not only do you need to hone your technique, but you also need to be proactive about injury prevention to guarantee you’ll have the opportunity to compete.  Below we’ve listed five great ways athletes can prevent sports related injuries. This list is by no means exhaustive, but it’s a great place to start.

1.      Condition – To stack the odds in your favor, it’s important to stay in shape year round. If your body is constantly in top form, you’re muscles are more likely to react in sync and your body move properly.  Your sport requires your muscles to be able to pivot and move at a moment’s notice. Conditioning prepares your body. (Source http://www.stopsportsinjuries.org/sports-injury-prevention.aspx)

2.      Hydrate – If your body does not take in the proper amount of water in relationship to your exertion, you run the risk of dehydration. Not to mention, drinking more water can actually improve your performance as well as prevent injury. Renee Melton, MS, RD, LD, director of nutrition for Sensei, a developer of online and mobile weight loss and nutrition programs states, “If you start out dehydrated, you won’t get a good workout. You’ll get dizzy, lethargic, your muscles won’t work as well, you won’t feel as sharp mentally, and you’ll get cramps sooner.” (source: http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/water-for-exercise-fitness?page=2)

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3.      Ice – Proper recovery after exercise is just as important to injury prevention as what you do before exercise. Icing sore or heavily worked muscles will help speed recovery and reduce inflammations so you can get back out there and play the game. (source: http://sweatscience.com/ice-baths-for-recovery-15-minutes-at-10-c/)

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4.      Don’t ignore pain – If your muscles and joints are sore, that’s one thing, but if you are in real pain, don’t play through. Pain is your body telling you that something is wrong. A twinged muscle can heal in a couple of days, but ignoring that twinged muscle could lead to a pull or a tear and derail a season.

5.      Wear technical compression gear – Aspaeris designed their shorts specifically to help the female athlete prevent ACL injuries and tears by guiding the wearing into proper posture. It is also a compression short that will help your muscle recovery post exercise.  (source: aspaerispivotshorts.com)

Stay in the game.

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Injuring your ACL stinks, but you’re in good company. Everyday another 548 people suffer too. Are you injured? Have you been injured? I’d love to hear your story. Email me at Aspaeris@gmail.com and we’ll feature you on our blog!