Partridge fuelled by ‘burning desire’
McMath senior back on the court five months after suffering ‘devastating’ broken leg
Adversity can bring with it the weight of potential failure. And if you got the diagnosis Hannah Partridge did late last August, just days before the start of her senior year at Richmond’s R.A. McMath Secondary, you could be excused for thinking it was heavy enough to crush her will.
“It was pretty devastating,” said Partridge, a three-sport standout who suffered a broken right fibula and torn ligaments during a slide-tackling drill with her club soccer team.
“I ended up landing on my right leg really wrong and the bone broke and shifted and got pulled all around.”
Cast with plates and surgical pins and later in the role of comeback kid, there was Partridge Tuesday in a city tournament contest against the McNair Marlins, flush with determination in the stretch drive of a swan-song Grade 12 basketball season with the McMath Wildcats that so many had fated as a lost cause.
“But she has a work ethic that is profound,” veteran McMath coach Anne Gillrie-Carre said of Partridge, who returned to the court in January, just five months after the accident.
“I call it her burning desire. She works not just past the point of fatigue, but through pain. It’s been pretty inspirational. And when we had our seniors night last week, there were a lot of tears.”
With the post-season now upon us and the Wildcats ranked No. 2 in the latest B.C. triple-A rankings, both Gillrie-Carre and co-coach Paul Jones have one of the most deep and talented teams to come off Lulu Island in recent memory, one with a chance to win it all.
Senior guard/forward Jessica Jones, set to play at SFU next season, is one of the most talented players to come out of Richmond in a generation.
Fellow seniors Jessica Zawada, Bobbi-Jo Colburn and Justine McCaskill are the kind of poised starters every contender covets.
And Grade 10 phenoms Lyric Custodio and Abby Zawada are the youth of tomorrow delivered a few seasons early.
So then what’s the big deal about a 5-foot-9 forward, clearly undersized in the post, who gives her team 15 to 20 hard minutes a night by taking on every assignment handed to her without complaint, despite the fact she might have to spend the rest of the evening tending to some post-game leg swelling? Just that. Period. “She is a huge part of our puzzle,” said Gillrie-Carre. “I can see that our players have such a high respect for her. She goes in there barely able to jump and she is coming up with the ball. On defence, she takes charges knowing full well it could be catastrophic.
“I don’t think she understands how important she is. It’s nothing that has been spoken, but it is certainly obvious to me. She thinks her role will diminish as the games get tougher, but both Paul and I only believe it will increase.”
And that’s why this sport, in the weeks leading up to March Madness, is so very special.
Character is revealed. Grit and tenacity are celebrated.
Partridge’s soccer career will continue and she has plans to play that sport at Langara College next season. When lengthy rehabilitation stripped her of her senior volleyball season, she managed the team instead. She is a peer tutor to younger Wildcats. And these days, with the chance to win a provincial basketball title within her grasp, she soldiers on.
“She is the first one in our group who will try and resolve any kinds of problems,” said Gillrie-Carre.
“And she usually does it through personal sacrifice by giving up something of herself to others.”
Ask Partridge how much of a heavy load it has been to carry the weight of her injury and she’ll likely tell you the surgically pinned plates that have helped steady her course really don’t weigh a whole lot.
Humility and perseverance are, by their very nature, silent traits.
Yet their example can’t help but be heard.