What really happened with Lamonte Turner? He explains
Lamonte Turner did not want to shoot the ball.
The Tennessee guard stood alone at the free-throw line during a game at Barclays Center in Nov. 2018 for a pair of technical attempts at Grant Williams’ behest. He dribbled, spun the ball and exhaled.
“I used to be praying at the free-throw line,” Turner told Knox News. “I was praying not to air ball it. I didn’t care about making it. It was just making it look good.”
Turner’s shot barely brushed the bottom of the net.
In the middle of 18 months filled with shoulder surgeries and doctor appointments yielding no solutions, Turner wasn’t his all-confident, ball-wanting self. He began to question everything as his shooting ability sharply declined.
He was almost convinced he was crazy when he flew to St. Louis to see a specialist a year after that free-throw attempt. He finally got the answer to his long-term injuries, but it had consequences.
Turner ended his Tennessee career in the middle of his senior season.
“When I didn’t know what was wrong with me, it was easier for me to play because I had to find a way,” Turner said. “When I found out what was wrong with me, it made everything harder. I thought it would make it easier.”
‘Why are you shooting like that?’
Turner arrived at Thompson-boling Arena on a Dec. 21 with a little-known plan. That Saturday he would play his final game for the Vols against Jacksonville State.
He was diagnosed on Nov. 27 with thoracic outlet syndrome, a nerve issue that causes pain and numbness in the shoulder and neck.
He spent two years battling injuries quietly, playing through the difficulty and dealing with the mental toll of a lost identity. He was an ultimate competitor working without his best weapon, but he finally knew why.
“A lot of people feel like I should have been sad,” Turner said. “But I hadn’t been happy in the previous two years. I was really depressed. I didn’t answer my phone. I didn’t want to talk. I would just sit in my room.”
It started with a question from Vols coach Rick Barnes in the summer of 2018.
“Why are you shooting like that?”
Barnes asked.
The smooth shot that carried Turner to sophomore year heroics had changed without him noticing. Barnes recorded his motion and showed Turner, who was returning from left shoulder surgery in July 2018.
The ball moved right as he progressed toward his release. His neck and left shoulder moved left. He couldn’t bring his left hand high and across his body to shoot like he did when he hit 39.5 percent of his 3pointers and won the SEC Co-sixth Man of the Year.
“I was noticing it was getting harder to make shots,” Turner said. “I kept trying to fix it and get people to record me. I couldn’t stop it. It was uncontrollable.”
Turner grew insecure about shooting in front of people. He disliked shooting in practice let alone in a packed arena and preferred to shoot off his natural confidence.
The Florence, Alabama, native focused on playing hard defensively for one of the best teams in Tennessee history, but his shooting percentages dropped and he felt helpless.
“It was really killing me,” Turner said. “I was wondering if I am the crazy one. Why didn’t a doctor know how to fix me?”
Changing hands
Turner had another left shoulder surgery in April 2019, but felt worse as his senior year approached.
He still could not bring the ball across his body. He lived mostly without feeling in his left hand for months. It was going numb and felt cold when he could feel it.
Without time to have another surgery before the season, Turner was desperate but not hopeless. He broke his right wrist as a sophomore in high school and practiced left-handed. He decided to work on his left-handed shot for a week in August and found it didn’t stress his shoulder as much as shooting right-handed.
“I got obsessed with doing it,” Turner said. “Being in the gym, getting better at something made me feel so good.”
He worked out with assistant coach Kim English as many as four times a day to make up for lost time — and he started to see results. He played a pick-up game and dominated with his off-hand.
Turner felt he could be effective and wanted to prove it, but Barnes was opposed and had good reasoning.
“He had asked NBA teams what they would think if a prospect switched hands in his senior season,” Turner said. “They would red flag it. That made me change my decision.”
Turner, a preseason ALL-SEC selection and career 35.2 percent 3-point shooter at the time, reinvented his game again. He became a dominant passer with three double-digit assist games in 11 outings, while shooting 23.4 percent on 3-pointers and 31 percent from the field.
He knew the Vols needed him as a leader and player, but he was missing shots badly and visits with shoulder specialists hadn’t resulted in progress. He could hide his bad games with wins, but he struggled with feeling responsible as the Vols lost a few games.
“It was messing up my mental health,” Turner said. “For a guy like me who really loves the game, if I have a game where I don’t play well, it kills me. To be hurt and not have a chance, I promise you I couldn’t score 30 points if they left me open.”
The decision
Turner made a signature game-winner against VCU at the Emerald Coast Classic on Nov. 30. He’s in awe of the shot now, believing he just willed the corner 3-pointer to go in.
Four days earlier, Turner was tired and frustrated in St. Louis. He visited Dr. Robert Thompson, who recognized his symptoms and diagnosed him with TOS — the same injury Orlando Magic guard Markelle Fultz battled.
“I felt like an alien to the rest of the doctors,” Turner said. “I felt so good for someone to know what I was actually talking about.”
Turner returned to St. Louis on Dec. 11 and had a shot in his chest to attempt to fix the injury. He hoped it would help avoid another surgery, but it didn’t.
He called a team meeting on Dec. 17 in Cincinnati . Turner bared his pain and wept. Turner told his teammates he needed them to step up because he could not shoot. He told them how hard it was to see them shoot and work out when he couldn’t.
“He gave everything he had,” Barnes said.
Turner picked the following game as his last. He accepted his injury was not going to get better and he could finally address it with his long-standing questions and injuries answered. He gathered his teammates in a huddle after he was the dunker in UT’S “One Fly, We All Fly” pregame tradition.
“This is my last one, y’all,” Turner said. Turner scored eight points and dished out 11 assists in his final act with the Vols. He “wanted to do it my own way” and didn’t want pomp or formality about the end of his career.
He gave away his shoes after the game, then announced his decision to a handful of Tennessee media members.
Turner walked across the court with his family to inform Barnes. His phone buzzed with ESPN notifications about his decision before he got to the coaches’ lounge, where the news flashed across all six televisions as he entered.
“I don’t know if there has been a more difficult, sad ending than what he did because that was a year — in his mind and all of our minds — that this was going to be his year,” Barnes said.
‘A better man’
Turner will be honored on senior day when Tennessee (17-13, 9-8 SEC) faces No. 15 Auburn (24-6, 11-6) on Saturday (Noon ET, ESPN2).
He was the first player Barnes and his staff recruited to Knoxville and won games for some of the best Tennessee teams. But he feels best about walking out of the program as “a better man.”
“He should be recognized here as much as any player we’ve had for what he has given to our program,” Barnes said.
Turner had his fourth shoulder surgery on Dec. 30, when Thompson removed part of his top rib to release the stress on his nerves. He had terrible pain in his left arm in the weeks after the surgery, but he could deal with it. He finally had feeling again.
Turner has been rehabbing with UT trainer Chad Newman and is slowly starting to shoot. He has pro aspirations and believes he will play in the NBA, but knows his health history is a question mark.
Turner chooses to see it as a positive. He calls himself a “basketball player” now.
“I feel like my road will be so much brighter down the line because of this,” Turner said. “There is no doubt in my mind I am going to be successful because the stuff I had to deal with was way harder.”
Turner only regrets that he could not give Tennessee a full final season with the clutch moments that defined him at his best. But he’s hopeful for more of those in the future.
Turner wants to shoot the ball again. “I think I can do everything,” Turner said. “I really do. If you think I had confidence then, wait until you see me again.”