Patrick McCaw:
Guard “thankful to be able to stand” after scary fall.
As Warriors guard Patrick McCaw was strapped to a stretcher March 31 after taking a scary fall in Sacramento, he couldn’t feel his legs. Questions raced through his mind: Was his basketball career over? Would he ever walk again?
“I just remember lying on that ground and praying to God that I’d be all right,” McCaw said Sunday in his first comments since sustaining a lumbar-spine contusion in that game against the Kings. “Things could be a lot worse than what they are right now. I’m just thankful to be able to stand on my own two feet.”
McCaw will be re-evaluated by a specialist May 3, putting his earliest possible return to the court at Game 1 of the Western Conference semifinals. Basketball is not his concern, however, as Golden State prepares for Game 2 of the first round Monday against San Antonio without him.
To walk, McCaw slowly places one foot in front of the other with the labored effort of someone much older. Severe lower-back pain has made sleep a struggle. Outside of daily trips to the practice facility for rehab, McCaw is confined to his apartment in Jack London Square.
“I’d rather have him in uniform, but it’s good to see him,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said. “More than anything, I’m just glad that he’s OK.”
McCaw caught a pass from Jordan Bell late in the third quarter, made a layup and was inadvertently undercut by Sacramento guard Vince Carter. McCaw landed hard on his back, screaming as he writhed on the floor.
A team trainer rushed to McCaw’s side as a hush fell over the crowd. Over the next 10 minutes, as the trainer tended to a motionless McCaw, coaches and players from both teams filtered toward him. After McCaw was placed on a stretcher and wheeled off the floor, the Kings and Warriors huddled for a brief prayer.
“So many thoughts just went racing through my head,” McCaw said. “I was really just lost. All I could do was really cry, and continue to pray, and just hope that I was going to be all right.”
McCaw was taken in an ambulance six miles to UC Davis Medical Center, where he was put through a battery of tests. Late that night, when some of his coaches and teammates visited him in the hospital, McCaw barely could speak.
Early the next morning, he learned that an MRI exam, an X-ray and a CT scan had returned clean. By the time his parents, Jeff and Teresa McCaw, arrived from St. Louis at roughly 11 a.m., Patrick had regained feeling in his legs and was beginning to walk. Around 4 p.m. that day, after being diagnosed with a lumbar-spine contusion, he was released from the hospital.
During that first week after the fall, McCaw’s movement was limited to trips to the bathroom. Teresa made him all of his favorite meals — spaghetti, fettuccine Alfredo, catfish, chicken — and loaded the fridge with leftovers before she and Jeff flew back to St. Louis.
McCaw’s pain medication doesn’t seem to work. Most of his nights are spent wide awake, hoping for a long enough respite from his lowerback pain to finally fall asleep.
Kerr, who has dealt with chronic back pain for three years, can relate. Almost daily, he has texted or called McCaw to offer support and answer any questions.
Not once have they discussed when McCaw will return to the court.
“That’s the last thing on my mind,” McCaw said. “It’s just still about being able to move around. … The biggest thing right now is just being positive and making strides.”