Syd in Honduras – a “risky trip”

For most of the summer Syd has been on campus at Louisville taking classes, working out and doing rehab on her knee. She took a break this week to go on a mission trip to Honduras with her mother’s church. They will be doing construction work and providing a shoe ministry.

The Courier-Journal, a newspaper in Louisville, ran an article on her trip. I thought that was great that they would take the time to promote Syd and her fellow travellers in this ways – until I looked at the title of said article – Sydney takes “a risky ministry trip.” Not the thing that parents want to read about.

This is a good opportunity for her and I know she is excited to be able to participate. Here’s the text of the article. I’m sure all those who are taking part in the trip and their family members back at home would appreciate prayers while they serve in Honduras.

At the time of year most teammates are on campus and focused on basketball, Louisville women’s player Sydney Brackemyre on Friday left for a city often referred to as the murder capital of the world.

The Ohio native’s home church raised $10,000 to build a worship space in a small town outside of San Pedro Sula, Honduras, and with it the group took hundreds of shoes for children in the impoverished Central America nation.

“My family has just always been about service, and it’s something really important to me,” said Brackemyre, who redshirted her freshman season at U of L after suffering a preseason knee injury. “In high school, I was always so busy and working hard. I never got to go outside the country. So when this came up through my home church…I really just couldn’t turn it down.

“Coach (Jeff) Walz has been amazing letting me go because this is the time everybody is getting better. But he’s letting me go and get off campus, so I’m really grateful for that.”

Brackemyre’s trip will tally nine to 10 days, with a week in Honduras bookended by lengthy travel there. Inspired by her grandfather, who has ministered in South America and Asia, the 6-foot-1 forward said her group from Countryside Church of the Nazarene will construct the first such facility in the area.

“It’s somwhere where they really need a church,” she said. “We want to show them love and compassion — reach out to them and know this church will be available to them.”

Mostly, Brackemyre plans to work with area children, who attend a half day of school and will then open up their days to the Countryside Church group. That’s where the 500 or so pairs of shoes come in. Brackemyre and other ministers will wash kids’ feet and gift what, for some, my be their first pieces of proper footwear.

She also has planned games and activities, one in which the former five-star recruit may get to show off a bit.

“My goal is to do a sort of basketball camp,” Brackemyre said. “We’re going to take a ball and see if there’s a rim or court around there. I’d love to show the kids and teach them. I know resources are slim, but that’s something I’d love to do.”

Brackemyre still has an eye on the upcoming season. She passed a number of clearance tests the last two weeks toward a return to full playing strength back from a torn ACL and meniscus in her left knee.

“My trainers have done a really good job making sure I’m equipped to go and won’t be losing anything while I’m over there,” she said. “When I come back, I should be ready to go.”

Syd Likely to Red Shirt with ACL Surgery

While we are still waiting for a second opinion on whether Sydney will undergo surgery, it appears that her freshmen season at U of L will be interrupted. She has been having some soreness in the repaired knee and experienced some pain while landing in practice a couple of weeks ago. She had a scan done and it seems that surgery is in her near future.

Coach Walz made mention of it on his radio show last week and the news took to Twitter and other social media. I was a little surprised that our local newspaper, the Wilmington News-Journal, picked up on it. They talked about Syd in an article which featured another Clinton County athlete who is looking to take the next step of playing football after college.

Mark Huber’s article was well-written and pointed to Syd’s faith as she moves toward potential surgery and rehab. Here is a portion of the article that appeared in the November 14, 2014, edition of the News-Journal.

I also ran across a nugget from the Louisville Courier Journal, via Google-alert, that reported Sydney Brackemyre will miss the upcoming college basketball season because of a knee injury.

The LCJ story reported Louisville head coach Jeff Walz said during his radio show that Brackemyre may not have had a major impact on the Lady Cardinals season in 2014-15 but the knee injury and subsequent surgery puts an end to her season before the first official game.

Brackemyre, a 6-1 forward, is a 2014 graduate of Clinton-Massie High School.

Both of these athletes have a strong faith in God and even though their news is on opposite ends of the spectrum, you can be certain both will take the news in stride — the good for Rollins who will not take anything for granted and keep working just as hard and the bad for Brackemyre who will likely work harder to return to form — and continue on the path they believe God has set for them.

Coming Back From Injury

In the past I’ve re-posted some information from Jim Dabbelt’s blog. He does a great job promoting girls high school basketball in the state of Ohio.

On October 25 he had a post about some of the girls in our area coming back from injury. It included Syd and one of her Angel teammates, Olivia Philpot. He did a nice job with the article and is a great voice for the girls in our area. Stop by his blog to keep up with what’s happening this season.

Everyone knows that Christmas is set for December 25 as it is every year, when the small children run downstairs to rip open their presents before the crack of dawn.

For several young ladies around Ohio, it will seem like Christmas morning as they wake today, because they know that all of their hard work they put into the game of basketball all summer long is about to pay off. Today is the day a lot of us have been waiting for.

Today…. is the start of basketball season.

Girls’ basketball teams can begin practice today across Ohio, and while several girls look at this as the beginning of a new season, a few area girls are chomping at the bit even more, as they prepare to prove to everyone that they are back.

It has been a rough year for injuries, as several girls around Ohio are out to make a statement to everyone that they are back… and better than ever.

Seniors Sydney Brackemyre, Olivia Philpot, and Amy Bullimore are all recovering from knee injuries, while sophomore Sydney Bates had shoulder surgery in the fall and is ready to return to the court soon.

Brackemyre, a 6-1 senior at Clinton Massie who verballed to the University of Louisville, suffered a season-ending ACL tear on December 29 of last year, and while she has suffered through the long road to recovery, she knows the extra time she has been away will ultimately be worth it.

“My recovery seemed like it was never going to end, but now I’m back and playing,” Brackemyre said yesterday. “It feels good to know I had the extra couple of months to recover. Most people come back from an ACL team in about 6-7 months, but in my case it was a full nine months.”

The Massie senior was frustrated waiting to get back, but she understands it will help her prepare better for a return.

“My doctor was very cautious with the things he would allow me to do, which was entirely frustrating at the time, but I know it will pay off,” she said. “I have had so much support from family and friends that told me the waiting would be worth it.”

Brackemyre has been working on her physical part of the game while she has been out of action. She stated she is stronger than she has ever been, and worked on the things she was allowed to. The future Cardinal will be wearing a brace until December.

Philpot had her ACL surgery on July 5, as the Middletown Madison senior will miss most if not all of her senior season. Her goal to return in January will be based on a functional assessment next month by Dr. James Klosterman, and that will determine if a return mid-season is even going to be reasonable.

Philpot, who opened up her recruiting back up after choosing not to attend Youngstown State as earlier planned, has been doing physical therapy and training at Ignition for the past several months, making solid progress each week. Philpot understands the risk of returning too soon, and knows there is a bitter prize down the road, playing basketball in college.

Bullimore also hopes for a strong senior year after suffering the same injury last season. The 6-1 senior, who has yet to choose a college, was recently cleared to begin playing again, and knows it has been a long road back.

“I did rehab at least three times per week with my therapist, but everyday by myself,” Bullimore said, very much looking forward to the season to begin. “Sometimes it was so painful or hard I didn’t think it would ever get easier.”

“I’m not sure there was a day that I didn’t find a hoop to shoot on, and continued to improve my shot daily,” she added, who credited Dr. Shaw, therapist Shaun Tubbs and trainer Tammy Pollack with a huge role in her recovery. “I had the right support from my coach and others to get my mind off the setback and look to the bigger picture.”

She also learned a lot about herself while she was on the sidelines watching her team last season.

“Recovery played a big role with my personality,” she said. “It helped me to learn what it’s really like to be a teammate. I sat on the sideline cheering on my teammates, with a sense of pride and urgency to get back on the court.”

Bates, one of Ohio’s top sophomores, also looks for a successful return after suffering a shoulder injury this summer that hampered her play through her summer season. After battling the pain for the month of July, she finished the summer with shoulder surgery on July 31. She had the ligaments and cartilage of her shoulder stabilized was told that recovery would take her 12-16 weeks.

For the first six weeks of rehab, Bates would be forced to wear an immobilizer the majority of each day, but even though she couldn’t do much to work on her game, Bates would keep her stamina up by walking 6-8 miles each evening. She also spent time ball handling and shooting with her non-surgical arm.

Bates was cleared to run at eight weeks, and for the next four weeks, she would cardio at least 90 minutes per day, and work on therapy. This past Tuesday, Bates was cleared to do all aspects of basketball except for contact. During the last three months, Bates has learned a lot about motivation, commitment, and effort and never to take your health for granted.

Also, Alter’s Emma Bockrath, one of Ohio’s top players in her class, looks to put her ACL injury behind her and come out strong and leave her mark on the new basketball season.

For these five, plus others recovering from injuries, today is the beginning of new hope and new dreams.

ACL Recovery Update

Several have asked how Syd is getting along with her recovery from surgery. She had a follow-up at her surgeon’s office today. They removed the stitches and checked on her progress. Overall everything looks good. He was pleased with the surgery itself and her progress to this point. Physical therapy has been going well and the team at Drayer are great.

She received one small piece of bad news today – she has to stay in the brace and on crutches for three more weeks. She was ready to be off the crutches, but Doc wants to protect the MCL as it heals. There was some damage to it when she tore the ACL, but nothing that required surgery.

Her surgeon is a pretty straight shooter and said that her knee looks good. She just needs to make sure she doesn’t screw it up (those were his words). He even gave her a shirt that says Beacon Orthopaedic on the front and this quote on the back: “Don’t be stupid.” Her job is to follow the therapy they have for her. I’m sure she will, but she was definitely ready to lose the crutches.

While at her appointment today, we ran into another young lady who plays high school ball and had ACL repair surgery yesterday. A Clinton-Massie boys player tore his ACL this weekend playing ball. Hate to see anyone go through that, but seems to be a pretty common injury anymore. Grateful for a good surgeon and therapy team to help them get better and back on the court.

Torn ACL

Syd’s high school season came to an abrupt end Saturday night, Dec. 29 during the County Tournament. Early in the 1st quarter she came up a little gimpy and went out of the game. She came back in and a few minutes later, went down again trying to get a rebound. She grabbed her left knee and was in obvious pain.

The trainers were right on top of things, checked things out, started treatment and had an appointment for her for an MRI before we left the training room. On Monday, we found out the damage – a torn ACL. She also has a strained MCL and a tear in her meniscus. Fortunately she was able to get into a well-known physician who works with a lot of the Cincinnati Reds players. Surgery is scheduled for January 8.

I know that she will work hard on her rehab and in a matter of time, she will be back. She is surrounded by good friends, good coaches and great resources for both surgery and rehab. I think most players and parents have that thought of an injury happening at some point. You hope it doesn’t happen, but we’ve seen many female athletes come back from similar injuries. If anything, Adrian Peterson is a great example of an athlete coming back from a huge injury.

I’m grateful for those who have surrounded Syd already and will be a source of encouragement and advice to her and to us. Looking forward to seeing her back on the court down the road.