Never far from the memories
Despite move, Hsu still recalls tragic shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas
Abbey Hsu, then the injured star of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas girls basketball team, was sitting in class, like thousands of other students in the Parkland school on Feb. 14, 2018.
Hsu was in Building 3. On her side of campus, it was a normal day until the fire alarm went off.
“We all thought it was a fire said.
Before Hsu knew what was happening, the news of what was unfolding in Building 12 was spreading around the community and around the world. Hsu’s brother, drill,” Hsu who attends the University of Central Florida in Orlando, called their mother, Terry Hsu, and told her there was a shooting happening at Stoneman Douglas.
Hsu’s parents tried to reach her, but they didn’t hear from her for 45 agonizing minutes. “I was just sick to my stomach for while,” Terry said.
Hsu escaped the campus and sought refuge at a friend’s nearby house, where she got in touch with her parents.
The details of what happened that day at Stoneman Douglas are well-known now. Seventeen people died in the shooting, 14 of whom were students, and sev-
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enteen more were injured, including Hsu’s teammate, Maddy Wilford.
What followed has also inspired people across the nation, as some Stoneman Douglas students turned their grief into action and organized marches, walkouts and lobbying campaigns.
Hsu has been an observer and supporter of those campaigns, but has, in some ways, become an outsider. She transferred from Douglas to St. Thomas Aquinas before this school year.
“It was tough on all of us,” Hsu said. “But it brought our community closer, I feel like, in ways. People were just more aware of not only their actions, but things they said, and made people want to be there for others and work hard at anything they did for those people that aren’t able to walk today or aren’t able to live today.”
An ‘agonizing’ decision and a long recovery
Hsu struggled to flee from her campus that Valentine’s Day. She had torn the anterior cruciate ligament in her right knee about two weeks prior. While trying to escape, she even paused for an elevator before a teacher urged her to use the stairs.
“Luckily, she [didn’t] encounter any of the actual shooting,” Hsu’s father, Alex, said.
Hsu said she wasn’t friends with any of the students who were killed in the shooting, but she knew some of them casually, and she knew Aaron Feis and athletic director Chris Hixon, who were both killed in the shooting.
“You see those people every day, just walking around smiling,” Hsu said. “And then, obviously, they’re not there anymore.”
While she and her community tried to begin healing, Hsu and her classmates were kept out of school for two weeks. Hsu threw herself into her recovery and underwent surgery on March 7.
“She learned a lot,” Alex said. “She learned the adversity, falling down and … the loneliness of having to fight back on your own.”
The injury put her future in doubt. Although ACL tears no longer mean a definite end to a career, the recovery is grueling, and until Hsu returned to the court, some doubt lingered.
“When she was injured,” Alex said, “she [went] through some fear and insecurity: ‘Am I going to lose that scholarship, and am I going to play again?’ I’m sure it had gone through her mind.”
But Hsu largely stayed positive, and she credits her family and friends for helping her stay upbeat.
While injured, Hsu made the transfer from Stoneman Douglas to St. Thomas Aquinas, joining a team that was looking to make a deep playoff run. But it wasn’t an easy choice.
“We had gone through some agonizing moments because we don’t want people think that we’re abandoning the ship,” Alex said, adding, “we just needed to get a new start.”
St. Thomas coach Oliver Berens knew that once Hsu was ready to play, he’d be getting one of the top players in South Florida.
“I had heard a bunch of great things about Abbey, so I was really excited to have the opportunity to coach her and to help her get better and recover from the ACL injury she had,” Berens said. “Obviously, I was really excited because I knew our team got a lot better, having a dynamic player like Abbey, who can really do it all.”
Hsu, a Fab Five pick, was cleared to play before the season began, and she was thrilled to get back on the court.
“It felt awesome, even just being able to practice and run full speed with the team felt amazing,” Hsu said. “Staying still for what, seven, eight months, drove me a little crazy.”
The decision to transfer has paid off. Hsu is having a strong senior year, averaging 16.0 points, 8.5 rebounds and 3.5 assists per game. Hsu, who signed with Columbia, helped lead St. Thomas to a district title, and the Raiders play their first regional playoff game on Thursday.
“She’s been everything a coach could ask for and more,” Berens said. “She’s a tremendous person. I mean, [a] really, really a special kid. You don’t find a lot of people like Abbey coming around.”
But that hasn’t changed Hsu’s feelings toward her old school. Her father says if not for the lack of practicality, Hsu would likely try to transfer back to Stoneman Douglas after the basketball season ended so she could graduate there.
“I wonder whether that’s her way of saying: ‘OK, I need to go back to my roots,’ ” Alex said. “‘That’s where I went to school, that’s where I grew up with all my friends and things like that. … When it’s all done and finished, I need to go back to my roots.’ ”
Moving forward
While Hsu was rehabbing her injury, some her classmates were organizing marches and national guncontrol movements. Hsu supported those students, tweeting and retweeting messages of support for them.
“I don’t think a lot of schools would be able to stand up that quick and fight back like we did,” Hsu said. “And I’m proud to say that I was part of a school that did that.”
But being witness to something so horrific leaves its mark, and it’s starting to crop up again as the anniversary nears.
Hsu’s Raiders will play their first playoff game Thursday night against West Boca Raton. Terry didn’t notice the significance of the date until her daughter mentioned it.
“I probably wouldn’t have connected that,” Terry said, “but she did.”
But as Hsu finishes her high school career, she’s trying to draw inspiration from what she has been through.
“I’ve been trying not to think about it as a negative and use it as a source of motivation,” Hsu said. “It’s been really tough this week, though. It always randomly pops in my mind.
“But no matter how much it’s weighing on me, I can’t let it affect the way me or my team plays.”