Archibald works through ACL tears

The three-letter acronym synonymous with sport that causes athletes and coaches to cringe is the dreaded “ACL.”

Short for anterior cruciate ligament, it is part of the network of sinews and bands that holds a knee joint together and helps make the legs function.

“It’s everybody’s nightmare to blow an ACL,” said University senior basketball player Leah Archibald, who has undergone tears in both knees.

When Nick Gaebe, the subject of my Tuesday Greater Spokane League boys basketball preview, tore his ACL and medial collateral ligament during football camp last summer, his dad, Tim, was told it was a rare occurrence.

ACL tears, however, are common among female athletes. The litany of such knee injuries among Greater Spokane League athletes over the years has been significant and in many cases has come in non-contact situations.Archibald wound up doubly cursed. She first tore the ACL in her right knee as a freshman. A summer later she tore the left ACL after hobbling through her sophomore year.

One of two freshmen to make U-Hi’s varsity in 2004, joining with Angie Bjorklund, Archibald had gained significant playing time and showed loads of promise.

“At that point I was realistically told I would start the next year,” Archibald said. “My major goal was to play college basketball, so playing time during my sophomore and junior year was pretty crucial.”

Like Nick Gaebe, those dreams were dashed.

Her hope now is to remain injury free as a senior.

She scored 10 points Tuesday in her season debut.

“I want to make up for all the time I’ve been out and the effort coaches invested in me,” she said. “I feel I have a responsibility to my teammates to have a good season.”

Archibald remembers vividly each injury. Both, by the way, came during summer basketball. The first happened in a tournament before school’s end.

“My leg went numb,” she said. “It was quite a heartbreaker. It didn’t seem fair at all.”

Six months of rehabilitation seemed too long to comprehend. She discovered it became a race against time and never truly got in shape. She did, however, get a handful of minutes in roughly half of U-Hi’s games.

The second occurred near the conclusion of a successful summer season.

“That was probably the worst feeling I’ve ever experienced,” she said. “It was like déjÀ vu with the coaches standing at my sides and (teammate) Dara (Zack’s) mom, a nurse, coming up (to help).”

The lateness of the injury reduced playing time even more as a junior. Archibald also had to deal with tendinitis.

This year has started favorably. She played soccer for the first time in high school, though people warned against it. As a precaution, the defender wore braces on both knees.

That lends an interesting twist to this story.

Archibald had played volleyball as a freshman, figuring she would switch the next fall to soccer, a sport which she preferred.

“This was my thought process,” she said. “I would play volleyball, then soccer the rest of the years. I told myself, ‘I have a lot of time,’ but I didn’t have very much time at all.”

That can happen to you when the term “ACL tear” beckons.