She’s Coming Back Slowly--but Surely

HUNTINGTON BEACH — She remembers looking into the stands every time she fell to the floor, only to see her parents with their hands over their eyes.

They were scared, she says. And so was she.

Jennifer Tuiolosega didn’t know what the future held for her after she tore the anterior cruciate ligament in her right knee and returned to basketball after surgery and a 6 1/2-month rehabilitation period.

Tuiolosega, the Ocean View point guard, once cut a dashing figure on the court. As a sophomore, she was one of the county’s top 25 players.

Then came the injury.

When her father, Nelson, recalls the incident (“Her body went one way, her knee went the other”), he cries even today.

Jennifer still can’t touch her heel to the back of her thigh, but at least she’s not in pain and she seems to be nearly back to her old self. She is averaging 19.3 points and shooting 56% from the field--including 49% on three-pointers.

She measures her success by knowledge rather than points: “Knowing that my strength is coming back slowly,” she says, “knowing that my speed and quickness is getting better game by game.”

Which is good news for Ocean View, ranked sixth in Orange County and the favorite to win a second consecutive Golden West League title.

“She brings a real leadership role to our team,” first-year Coach Bill Seibert said. “When she plays hard, it picks everyone else up. When she doesn’t give up, it means we do have a chance. That was evident [Monday against Mater Dei]; she got after it, played hard, and the rest of the team believed in her. Her actions speak more than her words.”

In that game against fourth-ranked Mater Dei, Ocean View trailed by 12 with 5 1/2 minutes left in the fourth quarter, only to lose by one, 38-37. Tuiolosega scored nearly half of her team’s points, 18.

Two games earlier, the Seahawks trailed Anchorage (Alaska) East--ranked third in that state--by nine at halftime, but won, 56-54.

Playing hard these days isn’t a problem for Tuiolosega, who sees her effort as a commitment to repay her father for sparing no expense in her rehabilitation.

Her scholarship to the University of San Diego? Payback.

“My dad knew how bad I wanted to come back and play,” Tuiolosega said. “I think I’m really satisfied with the way I’m playing now, and it’s like I’m giving something back to my parents by showing him how hard I’m working. By getting a scholarship, it kind of met my dad’s dream; that’s what he always wanted for me.”

But when Jennifer began playing in sixth grade, no one in the family realized that girls’ basketball could possibly lead to all this. Nelson Tuiolosega had tried to push track and field on his daughters. “I didn’t know anything about basketball--it was the one sport I didn’t like at all,” he said. But, he admits, “I pushed them hard.”

Jennifer and her sister, Andrea, played in the South East Youth Organization--a basketball league for Asian players--and the fundamentals their dad tried to teach in the driveway were brought out more fully by Ken Kosaka when the girls were in junior high.

After a sophomore season in which she averaged 17.8 points, Jennifer injured herself in an SEYO game in May, 1994. Coincidentally, she decided to play in the game instead of attending a banquet for making the All-Southern Section team. A ball was rolling out of bounds, she went after it and stopped abruptly. Her body went one way, her knee the other.

A week later, Clippers’ surgeon Anthony Daly performed the operation at the expense of Tuiolosega’s father. They didn’t wait the two weeks for the family’s insurance to have it done.

“I want to get it over as soon as possible because I want to come back and play,” Jennifer told her father.

An intense rehabilitation followed so she could play her junior year. Jennifer Tuiolosega admitted she had taken her skills and her effort for granted--and told her father she wouldn’t do it anymore. Her father advised her to not play at all.

She played seven months later, at the La Quinta tournament, against Esperanza while wearing a brace. That’s when she could see her parents with their hands over their eyes every time she dived for a ball. Her dad yelled at her after the game for not being more careful.

She had one answer: “Dad, I can’t help it. It’s just out of instinct. You have to let me play my game. If I start thinking like that, I’m just going to get hurt again.”

Tuiolosega wasn’t as quick or mobile, played with pain at times and had to be rested. And she was more timid in the beginning than usual, Seibert said. Still, she averaged 14.6 points as a junior and helped Ocean View reach the section Division II-A championship game. She was a Times all-county second-team selection.

However, she was scared, just like her parents. “But I had to show people I was just as strong and coming back even better,” she said.