Ahead of schedule

A lifetime ago, a torn Achilles tendon could spell the end of an athletic career.

At the very least it meant a lengthy rehab and a season or two on the sidelines recovering. Lacey McNulty still isn’t up to full speed just yet, but the second-year Lakehead University women’s basketball star is well ahead of schedule.

Last week the Belleville, Ont. native was back on court with her teammates, knowing the Wolves, minus their all-time leading scorer Tasia McKenna, need to re-invent themselves to continue to battle for supremacy in the OUA West Division.

“It was an incredibly nasty injury,” said McNulty, second on the Wolves in 2010-11 with 6.8 rebounds a game, part of a double threat in the paint with team-leading rebounder Lindsay Druery.

“But I have a great group of girls behind me and I have a great training staff, medical staff and coaching staff. Everybody kept pushing me not to give up and to stay positive. I’m way ahead of schedule, so I can’t really be made at that.”

Initially told it would take at least eight months of recovery time, McNulty was cleared by doctors to start workouts after five, and she plans to be in the starting five when the regular season kicks off Nov. 11 on the road at Queen’s, a hop-skip-and-a-jump down the 401 from where she grew up.

At the time of her injury, she knew it was bad, it was no run-of-the-mill sprain that a player of her caliber routinely plays through.

A NCAA transfer from the University of Toledo, McNulty was instantly aware there were rough roads ahead, as she lay in agony on the Waterloo court.

But personal pain and recovery were the last things on her mind

“My first thought, as soon as I went down, was I knew immediately that I wasn’t going to be able to play the rest of the season. And I just felt I was going to let my teammates down, going into playoffs,” she said.

“That’s not really an injury you really want to have, obviously, I was not going to be there for my teammates. But I tried as best as I could to stay positive for them and not try to bring them down with me.”

Sure enough, the following weekend, with a cast on her foot and confined to a wheelchair, there she was on the sidelines, cheering her teammates on to a 76-72 win over the visiting Brock Badgers.

Coach Jon Kreiner, who is facing the loss of McKenna and fellow Nova Scotian Sarah Gordon to graduation, not to mention the early and somewhat unexpected departures of Emily Ross and Corinna Bruni, said McNulty’s inside presence was dearly missed against Windsor in a second-round playoff exit last spring.

“I think if we’d had Lacey in that game we would have competed a lot more,” he said of the 55-point thrashing. “But she’s really come along, she’s really healing quickly. She’s way ahead of schedule and she’s been cleared to practice.

But she can’t do that until she builds strength and her conditioning is back up to par. But she’s been working really hard with everything she can possibly do and she’s looking really good out there.”

McNulty, who last played competitively in 2007 before joining the Wolves last fall, is nervous about pushing herself too far, too fast. But on the other hand, she’s as anxious as she’s ever been to get back on the court.

“I’m super happy that I’m even practicing right now. That’s all I can really ask for at this point. I didn’t that I’d be doing that so soon.”

The injury will always be there, she added, but it’s not something she plans to dwell on as she enters season two with the Thunderwolves.

“Obviously it’s always going to be in the back of my mind, but the doctor said it’s going to be stronger than my healthy one. He said it’s never going to tear in the same spot, so I’ll just try to keep it out of my mind as much as possible and go like I normally would.”