Inside Memphis basketball’s long road to recovery
When Deandre Williams emerged from the Memphis basketball team's locker room at Fedexforum, hours before tip-off against UCF last Saturday, his smile lit up the arena.
During pregame warmups, there was singing, dancing and laughing. Once the game began, there was hand-clapping, floor-slapping and smack-talking. In his two-season career at Memphis, Tigers fans have come to expect such things from the 25-year-old senior forward.
But on this day Williams – the team's co-leading scorer and second-leading rebounder – could hardly contain himself. It was his first time on the floor with a healthy back in more than a month.
And few people were happier to see it than Darrell Turner, the basketball team's interim athletics trainer, who also is the Tigers' head football athletics trainer and their senior associate athletics director for sports medicine.
“Watching Deandre's energy and passion, I just had to laugh,” he said. “Seeing how excited he was, little things like that are victories to me.”
The win over UCF last week marked his return from an injury that sidelined him for six-plus games. It was also the first game back for several others, including Jalen Duren (missed two games with a cut on his finger) and Landers Nolley II (sat out four games with knee tendinitis).
It was also potentially the end of a maddening, nearly two months-long rash of injuries the Tigers battled for much of this season. It was the first time since Dec. 10 that Memphis, winners of its past four games, played with fewer than two players sidelined due to injury or Covid-related health and safety protocols. Only three players on Penny Hardaway's
Memphis team (13-8, 7-4 AAC) have not missed a game this season (Lester Quinones, Tyler Harris and Josh Minott). The only other player who has not sat out multiple games is Malcolm Dandridge, who did not play in the loss to Georgia on Dec. 1.
Turner, whose 10-year anniversary at Memphis is Feb. 25, has been in the middle of almost all of it. When former head athletics trainer Chris Simmons resigned the day before the season opener, Turner had to scramble since it was still football season. Dylan Paracka,
an athletics training fellow over the men's soccer and men's tennis programs, held the fort down until Turner got back from the Hawaii Bowl on Christmas Day.
First order of business: help expedite the basketball team out of a COVID-19 pause in December. Second order of business: get the injured players back on the court. Easier said than done, especially when it goes from bad to worse as quickly as it did.
“It was tough,” Turner said. “It was a strain. When you have a higher number of injuries, you want to give everyone equal attention and a thorough plan.”
But the Florida native, who had experience working with basketball for four years at Winston-salem State, stuck to his principles and a strict regimen of load management – even when outside pressure began to mount.
“I listen. I see what's out there and what's being said,” said Turner. “When you hear some of the fans who are very discouraged by the number of injuries and they start asking, ‘Do we even have a trainer? Do we have medical care?' It was challenging, but at the same time, we have to be confident.
“We have to watch these guys and know when to back them off. Most of these guys just want to play basketball. When they come back from significant injury, when you go from none to all basically, and you have them running the floor the whole time – balancing, jumping, landing – then they come in the next day and can't even move, then we've failed them as medical professionals. Certain things are just out of our control, unfortunately.”
Another part of what helped Turner manage the chatter was Hardaway.
“He understands the nature of injuries,” Turner said. “We all know his documented history, so he allowed us to do our jobs. He's never gotten all over me about why a guys' not playing. That's where communication comes into play. He trusts us to do our jobs. He also listens to his athletes. When they feel like they can go, we all get on the same page and go.”
Turner will remain with Hardaway and Co. through the end of the season, which continues Saturday at No. 6 Houston (2:30 p.m., ABC). After that, he will work quickly to fill the basketball athletics trainer position and an open baseball athletics trainer position before evaluating the structure of his department.
Reach sports writer Jason Munz at jason.munz@commercialappeal.com or on Twitter @munzly.