During the Spring 2024 lacrosse season, Ithaca College graduate student midfielder Kyle Savery transitioned from a player to a coach for a year, but not by choice. Savery suffered a devastating ACL injury during a captain’s practice in August 2023, moving him to the sidelines. For Spring 2025, Savery has returned to the field, and it is like he never left.
In Savery’s junior year campaign in 2023, he led all Bombers midfielders in goals with 14, and he was third on the team in assists that year with 10. Ultimately, Savery’s combined 24 points was fourth on the team, showing that he was a proven star for Bombers lacrosse.
What began as a routine captain’s practice in summer 2023 took a devastating turn for Savery, who said he immediately knew upon falling that he had torn his ACL.
“We were just going through a scrimmage, and I took a dodge and then planted the wrong way,” Savery said. “It just blew up my knee, and I knew I [tore] it right away. It was something I’d never felt before.”
Savery’s brother, William Savery, a first-year attacker at Salve Regina University, said he recognized his older brother’s determination to return to the field one last time.
“He was obviously upset,” William Savery said. “But he also knew that he was gonna come back from it and train really hard to be able to play again.”
Graduate student attacker Charlie Niebuhr, who has also been Savery’s roommate for all five years at Ithaca, said his injury affected the team in a drastic manner.
“At the time, it was just a huge blow for the team,” Niebuhr said. “It crushed us, knowing that our best midfielder was out for the year, and there was nothing we could do about it.”
Savery had to undergo complete ACL reconstruction surgery and also had work done on his torn meniscus. The Bombers finished the Spring 2024 season with an 8-8 record and were 1-6 in conference play.
“I decided that I didn’t want to miss any school that semester,” Savery said. “So, I waited until December over winter break to get the surgery.”
Even though Savery was injured, his longtime roommate was by his side the whole way through.
“I helped him as much as I could, in terms of driving him to class or helping him carry things into the house,” Niebuhr said. “Little things like that, just to make sure he was OK. I was very closely around him and experiencing the injury as much as he was.”
The road to recovery was long for Savery because it can take eight months to a year to get back to original form after an ACL tear. For Savery, it took him seven months to get back on the field. Within the first month post-op, he said he was simply trying to extend his leg fully. A few months after that, he started to do weight-bearing exercises and getting cardio back into his daily routine. After seven months of recovery, Savery said he was sprinting at full capacity. Savery said the recovery process was not always easy and there were bumps in the road to returning to full strength.
“It’s really hard to stay consistent with all the recovery and treatment and doing the physical therapy workouts when you’re physically in pain,” Savery said. “That was a very tough thing to keep on top of when I know it hurts me now, but I’ll thank myself later.”
Since Savery could not help the team on the field, he did what he could on the sidelines. Head coach Tommy Pearce said Savery ran the substitution box, which allows clean substitutions during live play. He also helped the coaching staff during practices, so his impact was still there for the 2024 South Hill squad.
Though sidelined by injury, Savery’s dedication remained strong because he found new ways to be involved with the team and support them through the season.
“I think that [in Spring 2024], he still wanted to be a part of the team, and he was at all of our practices,” Pearce said. “He assumed a little bit of an undergraduate assistant coach role in practices and in games. … He was able to do what he could as he could, wanting to help out in any way.”
Pearce made his debut as the Bombers’ head coach last year so Savery’s relationship with Pearce was built from the sidelines, instead of how he played on the field.
“Being injured helped me grow my relationship with [Pearce] because I was on the field next to him a lot during practices,” Savery said. “We would be able to talk to each other and have some good conversations.”
Savery’s recovery was a long road, and his brother said it was not an easy process for him but is happy to see him back on the field.
“[Kyle’s recovery] really inspires me to keep pushing,” William Savery said. “No matter how hard it gets, no matter what life throws at you, just keep grinding.”
Now that Savery has returned to the field, he is third on the team in points and is currently leading all Bombers midfielders in goals. Savery said he is committed to maximizing his impact on the team, determined to make the most out of every opportunity on the field. The Bombers have had a renaissance of a year: a 7-3 record so far.
“I’m doing everything I can to try and make this team the best it can be,” Savery said. “It’s my last time out here, so I’m gonna try to give it my all and do my best.”
