Liberty offseason news: Michaela Onyenwere undergoes left knee surgery

On Wednesday afternoon, the New York Liberty announced that 2021 WNBA Rookie of the Year, Michaela Onyenwere, underwent successful knee surgery at the Hospital of Special Surgery. The team’s orthopedic surgeons, Dr. Gabriella Ode and Dr. Riley Williams, performed a left knee arthroscopy and partial lateral meniscectomy on her and she is currently recovering. The Liberty performance staff will help get Onyenwere back to speed before she heads to Turkey and plays for Beşiktaş J.K in the KSBL.

At exit interview day, Onyenwere was asked about a lesson she learned from her sophomore season in the WNBA as compared to 2021:

“There’s a lot of ebbs and flows in season, and this year was not last year. I always tell myself “You can’t let the first drop of adversity make you step back.” I just wanted to take it head on and really stay the course. There was a lot of growth points this year where it was like, I had a hard time understanding exactly what my role was. I had a hard time understanding what the system was. It was new for me. New coaching staff, different than last year where I was mainly a shooter, open the floor kind of thing. Here, you had to really learn the game, know the game, know the reads, setting ball screens, which is something I wasn’t doing last year. It was tough for me for sure, but just staying the course is something I really learned. And I think it’s gonna make me better in my career. Learning this so young, I think it’s really, really good that not everything is gonna be peaches and cream like maybe it was my rookie. I’m gonna continue to get better and face it head on, and I’ll be OK.”

Mic dealt with a nagging left knee injury throughout the year, but fought through it and had her fair share of great moments throughout 2022.

A fully healthy offseason and another year in Sandy Brondello’s system will do wonders for Onyenwere’s game.

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Photo by Evan Yu/NBAE via Getty Images

Currently, Stefanie Dolson is in Las Vegas training with USA Basketball in preparation for the FIBA World Championships later this month in Australia. She’s got familiar company with her as Betnijah Laney, Sabrina Ionescu, and Natasha Howard are there as well. On Tuesday, Sports Illustrated released the latest episode of their Hoops Passport. Chloe Pavlech and Chris Matthews (aka Lethal Shooter) made a visit to our neck of the woods and highlighted the great culture of women’s basketball in New York City. Stef spoke about her basketball journey and how NYC was instrumental to her finding success in the game.

As Dolson said in the video, “When you get knocked down, you get right back up.” Shouts to Hoop York City.