Hey she's still a kid. Some people (believe it or not) like to play a sport for fun regardless of opportunity to play in college. I woudn't dream of stopping my girls from playing if they enjoy the game. With their genes, I'm pretty sure they will always be short.
ACL issues are not specific to basketball. I saw a hot shot JV pitcher blow her ACL simply by running to first base. She hit the bag funny and that was all it took. She was actually mowing us down too. Unfortunately (for them), they had no back up pitchers and our team rallied and pulled out the win.
At any rate, I'm going with Howard on the education concept.
At a clinic when I first met Jenny Topping, she told the parents if I would have had the information Howard and Crystl just presented it may have prevented an additional ACL surgery. Laura Berg then told her story that her and Catlin Lowe where playing tag warming up as usual and she went one way and heard it snap just like it did when she had torn it before rounding first base. Crystl fought a hamstring issue and had had ACL surgery and lower back pain until she hooked up with a trainer who understood what she needed to work on and the issue went away after she learned the routine.
When I first work with a hitter I soft toss them three balls, in, middle and away. If I do not see a weight shift and the weight is going over the front leg (
some hitting coaches actually teach this) I will make a prediction she probably does not throw well either. I have never been wrong with a girl! I whispered to a mother what to look for at the Hawks Clinic and she gasped in disbelief! How could you know that as you have never seen her throw before! The sad part is she was 15 years old and no one had ever taught her how to throw correctly yet! When I ask her if her elbow hurt and shoulder after a double header, she looked at her Mom and said did you tell him that? I ask if her lower back was hurting and her hamstrings? All the time!
Using the data from the CDC study if they reduced injuries related to the ACL in basketball and ****** by 41%, then I guess you could say you have a 59% chance of it not happening to your daughter!
Google female ACL injuries and set back for a couple hours and enlighten yourself and then start asking why x five until you get an answer?
I recently did a mini clinic for a team where there was a 16 year old boy receiving pitching instruction and we were waiting for them to finish. The mechanics were incorrect in my opinion and one of my girls came over and said, "I bet I throw as hard or harder than he does!" I ask the dad how hard he throws and he said 65 to 70 MPH. She was correct and is a year younger than the boy.
I would love to see what you discover and post on this topic and then see it moved to the coaches corner for history so others may learn from it.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/phys-ed-preventing-acl-injuries-in-girls/
Second, girls sustained a greater proportion of
severe knee injuries, which was reported previously.17
The
most notable difference in the proportion of severe knee
injuries was in softball (30.7%) compared with baseball
(3.0%). (Doesn't this make you wonder why?)Third, girls sustained a greater proportion of
severe injuries from ligament sprains. As connective
tissue injuries have been previously shown to make up
the majority of knee injury diagnoses,17 the prevalence of
ligament sprains and severe knee injuries among female
high school athletes are likely related. Overall, we found
more than one quarter (28.3%) of severe injuries required
surgery, with the majority resulting from knee injuries.
This is consistent with Powell’s findings in 7 of 10 high
school sports.16
Preventive measures, such as special
conditioning programs, bracing, and rehabilitation, should
be evaluated in future studies for their effectiveness in
preventing severe knee injuries.
Thanks Howard
