The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
Larrier must get past ACL tear
Price says it took him a year to get back to old self on court
STORRS — As Terry Larrier lay crumpled on the Lahaina Civic Center floor in pain about eight minutes into UConn’s Maui Invitational battle with Oklahoma State last November, it was obvious his season was over.
It was also a rare yet familiar scene for Husky fans.
About midway through the first half of a March, 2008 NCAA tournament first-round game against San Diego at the St. Pete Times Forum, UConn point guard A.J. Price fell to the floor in pain and had to be carried off the court. Like Larrier, he had torn the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee.
“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Price said by phone on Thursday. “It’s so traumatic, it’s something that’s gonna stick with you, no matter what.”
The Huskies’ season was soon over, as San Diego pulled off the upset — to that point, the only firstround NCAA tourney loss of Jim Calhoun’s UConn tenure. Similarly, UConn’s 2016-17 season was all but over after Larrier’s injury, even though the Huskies still had four months of basketball to play.
Larrier, the talented 6-foot-8 swingman, is now back after a lengthy rehab regimen and ready to help lead the Huskies as they try to bounce back from last season’s injury-riddled 16-17 mess.
“It’s going really well,” Larrier said a couple of weeks ago. “I’m continuing to get my leg stronger. Everything’s coming along really well so far.”
ACL injuries are becoming more common in basketball, and players are usually able to come back just fine. Juwan Durham, who played for the Huskies last season before transferring to Notre Dame last spring, had ACL surgery on both of his knees in high school.
Larrier’s knee should be as good as new after surgery. It’s the mental hurdle of having confidence in planting, cutting and jumping that is typically the toughest thing for basketball players to get over after an ACL tear.
Just ask Price. “That’s the biggest hurdle, getting over that,” Price said. “Physically, your body will be fine before your mind will. The hardest thing with the ACL is trusting your body. You put in the work in rehab to strengthen your leg where it needs to be, then you have to rely on all that work you put in and understand the knee’s gonna hold up and you’re not gonna hurt it again.”
Price spent the whole ensuing summer at UConn, rehabbing his knee. He was back in uniform for the Huskies’ season-opener against Western Carolina on Nov. 14, about eight months after the injury. Price looked a bit tentative in that game, seemingly favoring his right leg.
Although Price wound up a second team all-Big East selection, poured in a career-high 36 points in a win over Marquette and helped lead the Huskies to the 2009 Final Four, he never really got over the mental hurdle of that ACL tear.
“I didn’t feel great all year, to be honest with you,” he said. “My junior year I had a big year (first team all-Big East), but my senior year, there wasn’t
one point I felt as good as I did in my junior year. It wasn’t until the following year when I was drafted and had a lot more time to work on my leg strength that I felt back to myself.”
It wasn’t the knee itself, Price said.
“My knee was fine, there was no pain or anything like that. It was just the mental hurdle of not wanting to feel that pain again. Some guys with ACLs, the tear is different, they don’t feel anything, don’t even know they have an ACL tear. In my situation, I felt everything. The pain was crippling.”
Larrier, of course, has had a longer time to rehab. It will be nearly a year since his injury when the Huskies open their regular season on Nov. 10 against Colgate at Gampel Pavilion. He said he is over the mental barrier.
“In the beginning stages of rehab, when I started doing a lot of running, cutting, agility stuff, I was a little cautious,” said Larrier, who was averaging 16.7 points per game at the time of his injury. “But now, I’m not thinking about it at all. I’m definitely over that hurdle now.”
He said he reached out to friends who had also suffered ACL injuries — Briante Weber, his former VCU teammate, and fellow former New York City high school star Chris McCullough — during his rehab.
“They pretty much told me that the process was gonna be long, just keep working through it,” Larrier recalled. “Keep working hard and stay confident. That really helped out a lot.”
UConn coach Kevin Ollie said that Larrier has looked “OK” in early practices, adding “nobody’s looking great right now.” He figures the more Larrier plays and gets back in the grind against top competition, he’ll be back to his old self.
Really, Ollie added, the biggest concern for Larrier might be rust. Larrier had to sit out the entire 2015-16 season after transferring from VCU, then played just 3 1⁄2 games last season before the injury.
“He hasn’t played in pretty much two years, so it’s gonna take time,” Ollie said. “We’re not just gonna have him come back and be an All-American. He’s gonna take his time. I want thim to fight through the struggles, fight through the times where he felt like giving up. That’s the time where I think he’s gonna separate himself.”
Price, who spent parts of six seasons in the NBA and the last two years in China (he’s hoping to land a contract to return to China this season), has never met or spoken to Larrier. But he’s confident his fellow New York native and UConn product will rebound.
“A lot of guys bounce back from an ACL,” he noted. “It’s definitely not a death sentence like it was in the 70’s or 80s. I think he’s gonna be able to bounce back just fine.”
RIM RATTLINGS: Larrier, along with junior guard Jalen Adams and redshirt freshman point guard Alterique Gilbert, will accompany Ollie to the American Athletic Conference’s media day on Monday morning at the Philadelphia Airport Marriot.