Soccer, Basketball
Favorite athlete: Tyrese Maxey
Favorite team: 76ers
Favorite memory competing in sports: Beating New Hope Solebury my freshmen year in basketball to clinch playoffs for the first time in years
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: This season during a game my teammate was running down the court and lost her balance and completely wiped out with no one around her
Music on playlist: Rod Wave and A-Boogie
Future plans: Attend an undecided university and major in media communications
Words to live by: “You only live once, but if you live it right, once is enough.”
One goal before turning 30: Travel to Europe
One thing people don’t know about me: I was 4’11” till freshmen year
By Mary Jane Souder
There are moments – if we’re paying attention - that capture emotions words never could.
Maddie MacDougall had one of those moments on the basketball court at North Penn High School this winter. Most undoubtedly missed it, and the Bensalem senior might not even remember it.
The senior captain had just hit nothing but net on a 3-pointer in front of her team’s bench to give the Owls a lead they would not lose in the come-from-behind win. Coach Steve Johnson leaped in the air in celebration and MacDougall – wearing a radiant smile – exchanged a high five with her coach as she headed back on defense in the tightly contested battle.
A forgettable moment to most, and the smile, the sparkle in MacDougall’s eye when she’s on the basketball court is sometimes the result of a clutch play. More often than not, it’s simply because the Bensalem senior has a profound appreciation for just being on the court playing a sport she loves.
“As a kid and as a basketball player, she definitely lights up a room,” Johnson said. “She has an awesome personality, and she never really gets too down. When our team is struggling in a stretch, you can’t really see it on her face. She has a real positive outlook. It makes sense coming from a girl who persevered through an accident like she did.”
The accident.
It colors every single area in MacDougall’s life but none more profoundly than when she’s competing in sports. It happened on May 23, 2019, when MacDougall and her soccer team were at Chick-fil-A.
“It was raining outside, me and my friend Sam (Daut) had to go out to the car to grab something,” MacDougall said. “We were running through the parking lot, and it was pouring. I actually slipped and a car didn’t see me. When I was laying down, they ran over my torso basically. They went completely over me.”
With both the back and front wheels. And not a compact car but a minivan.
“They continued to go a bit and then stopped, and my friend started banging on their window to get their attention,” MacDougall said. “They got out of the car and my friend ran inside because the whole soccer team was inside. They all ran out, and someone’s mom was in the parking lot and called 911.”
Conscious but in shock, MacDougall – who also plays soccer - had only one thought.
“I was worried about my legs because I’m an athlete,” she said. “When everyone ran out, there were about 30 people standing around me. I was so overwhelmed with everything, but the first thing I wanted to know was would I be able to walk.
“I didn’t know what had happened, but I just wanted to get up and walk this off. Obviously, you can’t, but it was definitely a thought – I just want to be able to play sports.”
MacDougall was transported by ambulance to Jefferson Hospital, but her stay there was brief.
“They assessed me and realized I was in too critical a condition, so I was put on a helicopter to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia because they didn’t have the equipment, and I was so severe of a case they couldn’t deal with me,” she said. “I remember them pulling my parents aside and explaining to them, and I could see by the look on my mom’s face that it was bad, so I knew.”
So began a long journey for the then Bensalem freshman.
“They had to repair a laceration in an artery in my kidney immediately because I was bleeding,” MacDougall said. “My liver was swelling, and they had to take care of that, and then I had internal bleeding and they had to take care of.”
Two days later, MacDougall underwent another surgery.
“They put in an internal rod to hold my pelvis together because my pelvis was completely shattered, so they put a rod in that is still in my back today,” she said. “They also put in an internal fixator – I had two poles sticking out of me in my hips. It was basically like a handlebar right in front of me. That stayed in until July 23. I was non-weightbearing, I was in a wheel chair.”
“I went to see her in the hospital – I don’t even think it was even a week after the accident,” Bensalem soccer coach Bob Crawford said. “You could tell she was out of it, but she was still a happy kid.”
The road back
MacDougall remained in the hospital until late June.
“I had lots of friends that spent their summer coming to visit me and staying with me,” she said. “When they were with me, I had a smile on my face, I was fine, but once they left, I was lonely because I knew they could go out and do whatever they wanted.
“They could walk, they could ride bikes, go to the beach, swim, and I just had to sit in the hospital room.”
The extended hospital stay gave MacDougall a whole lot of time to think.
“I had so many thoughts of ‘Oh my god, I can’t play sports anymore,’” she said. “I was distraught. That was the only thing I worried about.
“I asked my doctor every single time, and they could never give me a straight answer because they really didn’t know. I was always told, ‘Just take it day by day, we’ll worry about that later.’ Nobody wanted to tell me there was a chance I wouldn’t be able to.”
When MacDougall returned home, the family’s living room had a hospital bed, and it was her home until July 23 when her internal fixator was removed.
“When my internal fixator came off, I had to relearn to walk,” she said. “The only thing going through my head was ‘I’m going to play sports.’ When anybody would tell me, ‘I wouldn’t get your hopes up, there might be a chance you won’t play sports,’ I would tell them, ‘I’m playing sports. It’s going to happen.’”
And it did happen.
MacDougall was in physical therapy from the end of July until the end of November. She missed her sophomore soccer season but was cleared to resume normal activities the end of November so she could return to basketball.
“I was the happiest person,” MacDougall said. “I didn’t care about any of the running the coaches asked us to do. I didn’t care about anything. All I could think about was – I get to play again.”
“My coaches didn’t want me to go full contact because they didn’t want me to get hurt because nobody knew if I still had the effects from it. I played the first game of the season. They put me back in full contact, full tilt.”
A new perspective
The accident – which could have had far more tragic implications - has left MacDougall with a deeper appreciation for everything.
“I could have been killed – that was a thought going through my mind,” MacDougall said. “I’ve always been more on the positive side of things, but now when I miss opportunities and things, I just think – it could be worse. I could be in that situation again. I could be missing out on things, I could have never been able to play sports again, so I put more of a positive outlook on everything because I know it could be worse.”
MacDougall – who played soccer, basketball and softball growing up - returned to the soccer team as a junior.
“I was surprised how fast she recovered – I just couldn’t believe it,” Crawford said. “The summer before her junior year – the COVID year – she was thinking of not coming back. I talked to her mother and just kept encouraging her to come back, come back, come back.
“She came back, and she slowly started getting her confidence back. Once she got around her friends – she lights up a room is a good way to describe it. You’d never know this kid was hurt. She’s just a tough kid.
“For the team, she is a pure joy, a coachable kid, a character kid. She doesn’t shy away from her mistakes, she doesn’t shy away from anything. She owns it. Her teammates love her so much, and in a couple of games this year, she scored, and the whole bench just jumped up and cheered and cheered. They rooted for her.
“She didn’t get a ton of playing time, but when she went in, she made the most of her time. She never complained about her playing time. She was there for the team. If I told her to do something, she would do her best. She didn’t play soccer all year, and her club team folded so she never had a chance to fully rebound from it, but she never blamed her injury. She never blamed anyone or anything. She just always came out and did her best.”
MacDougall has not made a college choice but plans to major in media communications with the goal of finding a career associated with sports. She is actively involved with Owls Television Network and the school’s yearbook.
And for now, playing basketball – a sport MacDougall’s been playing since she was five or six – has never felt so good.
“I’m very thankful every time I step on the court,” she said. “Sometimes when I go for a loose ball on the ground, I have a fear of – what if somebody falls on my back, what if…but I just go for it and just hope I’m going to hop back up as good as could be.
“Basketball was always my favorite. It was always a sport I more excelled in other than softball and soccer. My dad played soccer growing up, but I had a basketball net outside my house my whole life. I was always outside. I didn’t care what the weather was. It could be freezing outside, hot outside, I was out there shooting.”
A two-year captain, MacDougall is a positive role model to the underclassmen.
“She’s a leader, especially being a senior,” Johnson said. “A lot of the girls look up to her. As Maddie goes, so the underclassmen go. Maddie and Delaney (Bell) do a nice job of leading the team. Together, they set up bonding activities.
“Maddie makes big plays, she’s a shooter, and she buys into her role.”
The Owls’ coach can’t talk about MacDougall without acknowledging her sense of humor.
“Maddie and I have a pretty good relationship,” Johnson said. “She always makes fun of my outfits – if they’re not matching, she’s the first person to call me out.”
“She makes her teammates laugh,” Crawford said. “She’s the type of kid you wish you had a full roster of. She’s willing to take on a challenge. She’s a kid that will stick with me for a very long time.
“The injury was bad, they were worried if she’d walk again. It just shows her resilience. If she would come to me and need anything from me, I’d be there for her and would give her a glowing recommendation any time. I can’t say enough nice things about her and the remarkable thing that she did (coming back from the injuries) – although I don’t think she sees it as remarkable. I think you’re put in these challenges for a reason, and hopefully, she realizes if she overcame that, she can overcome any problems in her life in the future.”
And MacDougall’s game-winning basket at North Penn this season would have been reason to celebrate for anyone, but for the senior captain and her coach, it meant a little bit more.
“It was just pure joy,” Johnson said. “First off it gave us the lead. Secondly, that’s her role. Everyone on our team knows Maddie is our sniper. Each girl has a role and Maddie’s is to shoot the ball. Whenever she shoots the ball - make or miss, our entire bench stands up thinking it’s already going in.
“She’s hit a few big shots for us this year and last year in the fourth quarter. We call her ‘Maddie Ice.’ Her shot might not be on the first or second quarter, but she just has that mentality – ‘All right, it’s not going my way, I don’t care. On to the next play.’ It goes back to lighting up a room and having a positive approach. She never gets down on herself. She’s an awesome captain. I’m definitely going to miss her next year.”
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