Jenna Lang practices dribble skills at Maximum Velocity Performance in Columbus on Wednesday, July 13.
Jenna Lang left her mark at Columbus North as one of the best soccer players to ever don a uniform for the Bull Dogs, perhaps the city of Columbus.
The recent grad has been gearing up to be 100% healthy when she heads to Michigan at the end of the month to begin training and practice for the Wolverines.
While Lang is humbled to be returning to the pitch and back to competition, there was a chance this day wouldn’t come.
Back on Sept. 20 during her senior campaign last year against Bloomington South, Lang was going for a 50-50 ball and was injured on the play. Teammates, coaches and fans feared the worst. Fortunately for Lang, she didn’t have any tears in her ligaments, but sprains in her MCL and PCL. The recovery time for the injury was a couple of months, thus prematurely ending her season and career as a Bull Dog.
“I’m definitely thankful that it was nothing more than a sprain on my major ligaments and that I didn’t have to have surgery,” Lang said. “It was definitely a bummer missing the end of the season, but I also had other things to look forward to and prepare for.”
Lang went up to Methodist Sports Clinic in Indianapolis after her injury to get looked at by Dr. Thomas Klootwyk, who is the orthopedic surgeon for the Indianapolis Colts. Lang said they did an MRI and manual adjustments to make sure her ligaments were still intact.
Lang was given an early indication that late November was the expected recovery time with the injury, but she had a slight setback in her recovery process because her ligaments weren’t healing as quickly as initially thought. She went to see Klootwyk for rehab until early November.
Following her rehab at Methodist, Lang trained with Dr. Nate Frasier at his Maximum Velocity Performance (MVP) center in Columbus to work on strength and conditioning until mid-January. Lang also said she rehabbed with North athletic trainers Ashley Martin and Kate Cockerham.
With her knee healed, she began training and drills to return to the pitch. Lang worked out with her club soccer team, Indy Premier, after the high school season was over. She missed the entire first half of club season while she was rehabbing her return to play.
Lang also worked out and trained at 5 Star Training Center with Pedro Anderson in Indianapolis at the beginning of the year. She said that she started doing noncontact drills and a lot of individual drills. She mentioned that she could feel some pain in her knee when she was doing cuts and putting more pressure on it. So in the meantime, Lang did more cycling to get her knee back into shape.
Lang began doing more contact drills and practicing with Indy Premier in March but said she didn’t go 100% at first because the risk of reinjuring her knee. Lang was eventually ready to be back on the pitch in late spring. She got some live game-time action for her club team toward the end of the season in June.
“It’s definitely a good feeling knowing that I’m going in as ready or prepared that I can be and that I’m as healthy as I can be,” Lang said. “It’s reassuring and kind of uplifting knowing that I’m fully healed from something that could have been a lot worse than it was.”
With the injury now in the past, Lang is looking forward to her time in Ann Arbor. She’ll arrive on Tuesday and begin training and practicing with the team. With the dorms not ready for the time being, she’ll be staying in a hotel near campus for about a month until the dorms are ready for all incoming freshmen.
Lang starts the season with an exhibition game against Bowling Green on Aug. 6. The regular season begins August 18th at home against Washington State.
During her time at North, Lang set school records for goals scored in a season with 44 and career goals scored with 116. She received All-Conference, All-State and All-American honors during her time with the Bull Dogs.
Lang is eager to continue the next stage of her career, a dream of hers since playing soccer with Parks and Rec at 3 years old.
“I’m definitely super excited for that,” Lang said. “It’s something that I’ve prepared for my whole entire life, ever since I started playing soccer when I was little. All the time I put in and all that my coaches have put in with me and trainers, it’s kind of coming full circle whenever I can compete at one of the highest levels.”
