SPOKANE, Wash. — When JuJu Watkins crumbled to the hardwood last week with a torn anterior cruciate ligament, it wasn’t just the end of her sophomore campaign, but the beginning of a long, grueling journey.
Watkins is about to learn a lot about herself.
She’s going to have to dig deep and unlock strength that she might never have known she had. Get comfortable with the uncomfortable. Be tested in a way she’s never been before.
It’s not only about mourning the loss of the game she loves and accepting the betrayal of a small part in her knee. But she’ll have to discover the strength to remain persistent on the hardest days and stay positive while experiencing one of the most physically and mentally taxing processes of her career to this point.
UConn coach Geno Auriemma has been around the game for more than four decades and has seen a lot of players, including Paige Bueckers and Azzi Fudd, go through similar struggles that Watkins is about to endure.
“I don’t know that anyone that I’ve coached that suffered an injury like this that was the quality of player that we’re talking about that didn’t come back better because that’s what makes them who they are,” Auriemma said Sunday. “For them, it’s another challenge, it’s another game to win, it’s another opponent that they have to beat. And if you’re a competitor, if you’re somebody like Paige, somebody like JuJu, or some of the other kids that have gone through this, they come back better, they come back stronger, they come back more determined, more resilient, more understanding that they can fight through things and overcome just about anything.”
Watkins couldn’t travel with USC to the Spokane, Wash., regional. She watched the Sweet 16 win against Kansas State from her Los Angeles apartment and FaceTimed the team after the win.
But if Watkins turned on the TV to watch the game before USC, she would’ve seen a perfect example of an epic comeback story.
Bueckers has had her college career derailed multiple times because of injuries. She experienced her own ACL tear that caused her to miss the entire 2022-23 season.
But Bueckers hasn’t let those setbacks define her career. On Sunday, she carried the Huskies to a Sweet 16 win against Oklahoma.
Connecticut was down at the half before Bueckers scored 29 of her career-high 40 points. She single-handedly outscored the entire Sooners team in the second half.
“I do think it will be a source of inspiration for JuJu to see someone like Paige literally go through a similar thing at about the same point in their career and come out the other side,” USC coach Lindsay Gottlieb said.
Fudd, who returned from a major knee injury in November after being sidelined for a year, said the mental grind was the hardest part of recovery.
“As an athlete, we know how to get through the hard stuff physically,” Fudd said. “Every day in practice is hard, during the season is hard, lifting is hard. So for me, it was mentally and just trying to figure out — trying to be in a good place that I can find positives in this rehab process when the only thing I want to do is be on the court with my team and playing.”
Bueckers drew inspiration from her teammates and other athletes, who overcame similar injuries, including Kelsey Plum and Breanna Stewart. She used their stories as the blueprint for her own.
That’s why, when Bueckers heard the news about Watkins, she reached out to her fellow star and offered support.
“I know last year, a huge part of my journey was wanting to inspire people who have gone through terrible injuries, devastating blows, that you can come back better and stronger, and nobody can write you off,” Bueckers said. “Nobody can put you in a box to the injury-riddled narratives, this, that, but you can break all those narratives, and you can come back better than ever mentally, physically, emotionally.”
Watkins is at the starting line of a potential 12-month rehabilitation marathon. But she has plenty of support to help her push through.
