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| Photo Credit: Christine Heeren |
All he remembers is lying on the ground, holding his knee while he was in the most pain of his life.
“I was on third base and there was a play at the plate and I went to stop short and get in a rundown when my whole knee buckled,” said the Sachem North grad.
Despite the tremendous pain, Dowling‘s second baseman was still holding out hope that it wasn’t serious.
After all, the Golden Lions could certainly use his bat in the lineup. His bat had compiled a .339 average, second only behind catcher Daniel Parisi for tops on the team. He had gotten on base at a .414 clip and scored 14 runs in 18 games.
“Later that week I couldn’t put any pressure on my knee so I went and got an MRI. Later that day I got my results back and found I recently tore my ACL and needed surgery and–most importantly–not play baseball,” he said Costanzo.
The dreaded ACL is among the most difficult injuries to return from. Costanzo knew that right away and understood the steep obstacles he would face moving forward.
“I kept saying ‘why me? why me?”, but those feelings of trepidation were quickly replaced with optimism.
“Only way of getting through an injury like this is having a strong mindset and having a great family and friends,” he added.
And it’s with that perspective that Costanzo has gone about his business with rehab this summer. He noted that he has been faced with the challenge of rebuilding his whole quad but he’s been seeing results thanks to four days per week of ice, stim, squats and the elliptical machine.
He plans on being cleared for full activity by late September/early October. With that time frame, he should be ready to go in time for the 2016 season.
“2016 is going to be a great season,” he said. “Our pitching staff will be all upperclassmen and will be leading the way and I know we will have plenty of depth in our lineup to compete everyday on the field,” he added.
