November 8, 2007

     BETHLEHEM: They were supposed to be together as the starting backcourt for the Lehigh University women's basketball team last season. They were two hustling, hard-nosed guards who had been dependable players throughout their careers.
     But Tricia Smith and Claire Sullivan wound up suffering together on the bench, battling identical ACL tears during a lost season.
     After what seemed like an eternity for them, Smith and Sullivan will return to action Saturday, with a new sense of purpose and perspective as Lehigh opens its 2007-08 season by hosting St. Joseph's at Stabler Arena.
     "I feel stronger than ever," Smith said.
     "After the (preseason) scrimmage, I couldn't go run a marathon," Sullivan said. "I get sore. It (the knee) is not where I want to be, but I'm better than I was one month ago, two weeks ago. Once I'm on the court, I feel good. Once I'm out on the floor, I don't think about it. I don't know how I got to that point, it just kind of happened."
     That the two are back to run the Mountain Hawks a season later is a tribute to their dedication, determination and dependency on one another.
     Sitting idle nearly drove them crazy.
     "It was very difficult for me," said Sullivan, a senior. "I've never had to sit out, never had an injury that I couldn't play through. To come to practice and not participate was bad."
     "I've never had to sit out like that," said Smith, a junior. "It was definitely a different challenge for me. It was the first time in my life I ever missed a game for anything. It was a challenge to stay positive, especially watching your team going through hard times."
     Smith suffered her torn ACL playing a pickup game during the summer of 2006. Smith suffered a sprained MCL along with her ACL tear on the first day of preseason practice last year, so her surgery came a little later.
     Lehigh went 11-19 and reached the Patriot League Tournament semifinals.
     "We had the same injury, same graft, same doctor," Smith said. "Having Claire there, having each other, definitely helped."
     They leaned on each other, not to make shots easier for one another anymore, but to ease their fears of the unknown.
     "She'd ask me, 'Were you going through this at this time?' " Smith said.
     "Having someone else going through similar things and having someone who could relate to what I was going through was important for me," Sullivan said.
     Still, they missed being at the heart of the action.
     "I wanted to be out there," Sullivan said. "It was kind of hard to remain relevant."
     They left holes that were too big for Lehigh to fill.
     "The difficult part," Lehigh coach Sue Troyan said, "was that we lost both Claire and Tricia's personality. They're leave everything out on the floor-type players; they'd do anything to win, lead by example. When you all of a sudden take them away from the program, that aspect was taken away from us."
     Yet, Sullivan and Smith used their time of inactivity wisely.
     "You kind of see the floor differently when you sit out," Smith said. "When the coaches yell at you for something, now you know why, because you kind of see what they're seeing."
     "Being able to watch and observe you gain a perspective you don't get as a player," Sullivan said. "You see what the coaches see. But you also gain a sense of not taking every day for granted. It magnified how important basketball is in my life."
     The big return comes 8 p.m. Saturday when Sullivan and Smith will be back as co-captains to lead a rotation of guards that runs six deep.
     "I think we're going to be great," Smith said. "We have so many talented players, so many different options we can use."
     For the first time in a long time, those options include a couple of co-captains who get to play the game with their hearts instead of in their heads.
     "That's why I'm so excited about this season," Sullivan said. "I get to be back out there."