Mackenzie Holmes getting ‘more confident’ with knee ahead of Indiana women’s basketball NCAA Tournament opener

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — The Indiana women’s basketball program now knows what its region looks like in the NCAA Tournament as the reveal took place on Sunday. But for the second-straight season, the biggest question wasn’t who they were playing, rather the health of its best player.

Center Mackenzie Holmes went down with a knee injury during the regular-season finale and was questionable heading into the Big Ten Tournament, expected to be used on an ‘as need’ basis.

With 6:28 left in the fourth quarter, Holmes saw the floor for the first time as the Indiana women’s basketball program was looking to stop the bleeding. A 14-point halftime lead and 17-point lead midway through the third quarter had turned into a four-point deficit.

While it was an early exit for Indiana with the loss to Michigan, it gave Holmes, and others, ample time for rest before this weekend.

Following the bracket reveal on Sunday, Mackenzie Holmes was asked about her knee and the progress she’s made over the last few days.

“I’m feeling a lot better,” Holmes said. “I think this past week I’ve been able to get some much needed rest for my knee and I’ve been able to get back out on the floor, I’ve been practicing. So each day I think I’m feeling more and more confident on it, feeling better on it, so this week has been great for that — the aspect of the recovery of my knee.”

Holmes is obviously the center-point for Indiana averaging 20.0 points and 6.9 rebounds per game this season. She is the program’s all-time winningest player and all-time leading scorer.

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Indiana, who plays 13-seeded Fairfield on Saturday, has dealt with these types of late-season injuries with Holmes in the past. Her knee injury is to the same knee that caused her fits near the end of last season as well as the one she had surgery on two years ago.

This year, however, she’s feeling much better and more confident in it than a season ago at this time.

“I’m feeling much different than I was last March versus this March,” Holmes added. “I think I practiced once or twice leading up to the Miami game (in the Round of 32) after the Big Ten Tournament. I’m now in practices, doing pretty much everything. So I’m feeling a lot better this March than last March, which is a great thing for me.”

As a whole, an early exit in the Big Ten Tournament was a blessing in disguise for Indiana. After dealing with Holmes’ injury in addition to an ankle injury for backup center Lilly Meister and then an ankle injury to Sydney Parrish in the conference tournament, rest was needed in order for a deep NCAA Tournament run.

For Teri Moren, that’s all she can ask for. And heading into this weekend, Indiana is in store to have a healthy roster for the first time in quite some time.

“This was a good week for all of us. For Mackenzie and Syd. We’ve had some other kids that were a little dinged up. But this has been a great week for us to rest a lot, although we did practice,” Moren said. “But we really shortened it. But it’s been a good week.

“Yesterday (Saturday) was the first day we had everybody on the floor, so it was quite nice to see. But now, it’s go time for us. So we’re going to take tomorrow (Monday) off, get acclimated with Fairfield, and when the guys get back here on Tuesday, we’ll be ready to go.”

Indiana takes on Fairfield at Assembly Hall on Saturday at 1:30 pm ET.

SEE ALSO: NCAA Tournament Reveal Q&A — Teri Moren, Mackenzie Holmes, Chloe Moore-McNeil talk Indiana women’s basketball tournament seeding

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