The NIU women’s basketball team will find itself working harder for rebounds this year because the team will be without last year’s rebounding leader.

Angela Lockett, who collected a team-high 264 boards in 1991-92, will undergo arthroscopic surgery on her left knee Nov. 19.

“If (her knee) is bad enough we’ll go ahead and get it (surgically) reconstructed,” said Andrea Asselta, NIU assistant athletic trainer.

Asselta added that it is highly likely Lockett is out for the season.

“The rehab(ilitation) period for (Lockett) will be six months to a year,” Asselta said.

NIU head coach Jane Albright-Dieterle said the team was prepared for the bad news.

“I think a couple of players that thought they were going to be role players now know that they’re going to have to step up,” Albright-Dieterle said.

Lockett said she suffered the injury, a tear of her anterior cruciate ligament, in an exhibition game over the summer.

“I don’t really know what happened,” she said. “I went up for a rebound and came down; nobody hit me, it just happened.”

Asselta said the ACL prevents the tibia from moving anterially forward on the femur. It is the same injury which has taken years out of the careers of the NBA’s Danny Manning, Bernard King and Derek Harper, and the NFL’s Randall Cunningham.

A healthy ACL keeps a knee from shifting or bending. Even though Lockett’s ACL is torn, her knee has not shifted yet.

Asselta said Lockett’s knee has not shifted because the muscles above and below her knee are extremely strong.

“There are some fibers in (Lockett’s knee) that are holding it together,” Asselta said.

Originally, Lockett had been trying to play despite the injury. However, last year’s North Star Conference tournament MVP said she was becoming increasingly concerned about whether her knee could hold up during the season.

“I was very limited in practice,” Lockett said. “Because I was scared (the knee) was going to go out on me, there’s been a lot of pain.”

“The decision to have surgery was totally (Lockett’s) decision,” said Asselta.