A LIVING LESSON IN DETERMINATION
Girls can learn from coach who kept playing basketball after leg amputation
Tracy Johnson, 45, is a marvel at the Canadian under-15 basketball championships.
Johnson, an assistant coach with Saskatchewan’s girls team, did not allow a prosthetic lower right leg to deter her from playing Canadian university basketball.
In fact, she returned to the court in September of 1993 only three months after undergoing an amputation.
“When I was faced with whether to keep my leg or to amputate, it came down to whether I was going to play basketball,” Johnson recalls at the University of Regina during a break in the under-15 boys and girls tournament.
“I didn’t want anything to take basketball away from me, so I had to try.”
Johnson injured her right leg while playing for the Brandon University Bobcats in January of 1993. While going for a layup, she was tripped and fell awkwardly — snapping both the tibia and fibula. The severity of the injury was such that the circulation in her lower right leg was affected, along with the strength in her calf muscle. Nine surgeries were required within the first few months following the injury.
“The alternative (to amputation) was to spend the rest of my life having surgeries, wearing orthotics and experiencing pain,” Johnson says. “I wouldn’t have been able to do the things I wanted to do every day. It would have been a tougher life and it would have taken basketball out of my world.
“Basketball being out of my world was not an option.”
Johnson, whose right leg was amputated eight inches below the knee, spent her 21st birthday in hospital in her birthplace of Vancouver. She had extensive rehabilitation while learning how to deal with a prosthetic — and, at times, the doubters.
“I think my doctors were the skeptics,” she recalls. “I asked if I could play basketball again, but they didn’t think I would get to that level. I guess it was kind of rude, but I said to them, ‘I’ll send you the article.’ ”
One of the articles appeared in Sports Illustrated a few months after Johnson became the first Canadian university athlete to compete while wearing a prosthetic. The magazine told Johnson’s story and chronicled her return to the court.
“My coach said, ‘SI is coming to interview you tomorrow,’ ” says Johnson, who at the time was known as Tracy MacLeod.
“Then I went into a drill at practice, took a pass and busted a knuckle.
“There’s a picture in SI of me sitting on the bench with my finger in a Gatorade cup.”
That injury was an inconvenience, but one that paled in comparison to what she endured.
“For my first game back, I just got out there and it was, ‘Oh yeah, I’m doing it. I can play,’” she says. “My first basket was a total fluke. I ran into another player and the ball flipped out of my hands and went in the basket. Nothing but net! It was comical. Nobody would believe me when I said it was a fluke.”
In that game, she played 11 minutes, registering 11 points and five rebounds.
“I went from playing 38, 39 or 40 minutes to 10 to 12,” she says. “My role changed a little bit, but I actually think I was OK with that.”
The six-footer’s style also changed.
Her jumping ability was affected and she had to place more of an emphasis on her left side.
But those were minor details when the big picture was considered.
After all, she was playing again, and people took notice.
In 1997, U Sports presented the Tracy MacLeod Award — recognizing determination, perseverance and unwavering spirit — for the first time.
She moved to Saskatchewan the following year and now resides in Warman with her husband, Marty Johnson, and four children — Bailey, 19, Zachary, 17, Ethan, 15, and Gabrielle, 11.
A teacher, Tracy Johnson is also able to teach lessons outside of the classroom, simply by telling her remarkable story.
“I just love going back to the girls (she coaches) and helping them in any way I can,” she says.
“I try to teach kids that they have the ability to overcome adversity and that they should never count themselves out and that they should be resilient.
“What your mind believes, your body achieves.”
I think my doctors were the skeptics. I asked if I could play basketball again, but they didn’t think I would get to that level.