Junior guard Caroline Doty will undergo surgery to repair a torn ACL in her left knee for the third time since Oct. 23, 2007 in the next few weeks.
It was expected that she would start at point guard for the two-time defending national champion Huskies this season. Now, as they have successfully done many times in the past, they will have to move on without one of their key components.
Auriemma took some time during his USA Basketball teleconference Wednesday to speak about the loss of Doty and moving forward.
“Caroline has had this issue for a while,’’ Auriemma said. “It’s kept her from playing in the past and now it’s going to keep her from playing this season. It’s unfortunate that it happened. It’s unfortunate, the timing. It’s something you wouldn’t wish on any player once, much less three times. So Caroline’s going to put on a happy face and she’s going to put up a good front. But deep down inside you know that she’s really struggling with this and as soon as we start practice she’s going to struggle more and as soon we start playing the struggle’s going to get even more difficult. But that’s the hand she’s dealt right now and I’m not worried about us. I’m not one of these guys that’s going to keep reminding everybody, `Hey, if we had Caroline we’d be really good.’ As we go through the season Caroline’s not playing for us this year. And we’re going to have to figure out a way to do what we want to do with who we have. Caroline’s got her own issues. Her issue is to get healthy and our issue is to try to do whatever we set out to do but do it without a real important part of our team. So it’s going to be difficult. But it’s not supposed to be easy. We did it two years ago and now we’re going to have to do it again.’’
Doty, then a freshman, missed the final 22 games during the national championship season of 2008-09.
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