This day began like any other. Zoe Erb, Garfield junior, awoke to the sun streaming through her bedroom window and the smell of bacon cooking from downstairs. She, being a morning person, jumped out of bed and ran down the stairs into the kitchen. Glancing over the calendar littered with plans for the four members of her family, Erb remembered that she had soccer practice that day. Little did she know that a mere four hours later, her athletic career as she knew it could possibly be over.

The ACL, Anterior Cruciate Ligament, is one of four crucial ligaments in the knee. It, along with the Posterior Cruciate Ligament (PCL), connect the shin bone, or tibia, to the thigh bone, the femur. And tearing the ACL is quite possibly the most infamous sports injury around.

Erb recently tore not only her ACL but also the meniscus which forms a protective layer between the tibia and femur. She was not wrestling anyone or going for a slide tackle or anything hardcore like that. No, Erb simply jumped up and landed funny, causing her knee to buckle.

“It was weird because I was trying to run on it and it just felt like my knee was out of the socket,” she said. “It was just going back and forth so I thought it was just dislocated,”

But, according to Erb, it was not the ACL tear that hurt the most but the surgery and recovery.

“It didn’t actually hurt that bad when if first happened, it just felt a little weird. It was really sore,” said Erb. “But then when I woke up [from surgery] I was in so much pain the nurse was putting all of these pain killers in the IV but then finally she just gave me a Vicodin”

Missing nine days of school, like Erb, because of an injury sounds pretty nice right about now especially with finals coming up soon. However, tearing your ACL is not the most ideal situation. Interestingly, humans don’t actually need an ACL for every-day activity. Erb could have easily opted out of the surgery but with one major consequence: she could never set foot on the soccer field again.

Women in particular are more susceptible to this particular injury. According to studies done across the nation, women basketball players are five times more likely than males who play and female soccer players are three times as likely. There are a total of 80,000 ACL tears in the United States per year, 56,000 of which are a result of a sport. The other 24,000 can come from car accidents, repeated use which causes small fissures in the ligament eventually tearing it, or reported cases of inebriated or just plain clumsy women falling in their high heels (I am not joking).

Don’t worry though, boys, this can easily happen to you too. Just ask Conor Bronsdon. During the third football game of the season against Roosevelt, Bronsdon was caught in a pile of tacklers and ended up tearing his PCL and meniscus.

“I heard the crack and saw my knee and just kind of went ‘oh [shiza],’” Bronsdon said. “It hurt pretty bad for about a second but then after that it was just really sore. It was a duller pain than breaking a bone.”

Although the injury does not seem to cause grueling pain, the road to recovery is a long one. Besides up to six weeks on crutches, doctors recommend physical therapy for nine to twelve months before even attempting to play a “lateral cutting sport” which includes almost everything except for running and swimming.

ACL tears can happen to anyone. Whether you have a basketball scholarship to UNC or if you are the worst player on your bronze-league soccer team. Or even, if you have never played sports in your life and happen to be walking down the street in your spanking new stilettos and take a wrong step. It is easy and does not take any talent, or lack thereof. So whatever you do, watch your step!