Natalie Spooner is entering her fifth month of recovery following a season ending knee injury that required surgery. This week she made an important stride forward, returning to skating.
Natalie Spooner is entering her fifth month of recovery following a season ending knee injury that required surgery. This week she made an important stride forward, returning to skating.
Natalie Spooner is back on the ice, which is good news for the PWHL's Toronto Sceptres. Spooner suffered a knee injury, requiring surgery, in the PWHL's Walter Cup semi-finals.
It came after a spectacular season where Spooner led the PWHL in goals and points, and was named league MVP. Toronto bulked up offensively this summer perhaps preparing for a start to the 2024-2025 season without their power forward. As general manager Gina Kingsbury said in June, the team understands the length recovery that faced Spooner.
"As you can imagine every time you have surgery the timelines are a little longer than non-surgical injuries for the most part," said general manager Gina Kingsbury.
This week however, that timeline hit a major milestone as Spooner returned to the ice. Spooner posted video of herself on the ice training.
Spooner herself understood what was ahead following her injury, but was optimistic due to the advances sport medicine has made in dealing with ACL injuries.
“There’s definitely a much better rehab protocol; people understand it a lot better so in that sense, I’m very optimistic and staying really positive because obviously coming back from childbirth, everything was so unknown, there were a lot of things that people hadn’t seen before that were going on with my body,” Spooner said.
“So now at least it’s a pretty standard injury that a lot of people unluckily suffer and I’ll come back strong, so in that sense, I think I’m just going to do the rehab, put the work in, and be ready to go next season.”
That optimism appears to be paying off. Spooner remains months away from a return, but has made an important stride forward in her recovery.