Charlotte Women’s Lacrosse Leader Isa Torres Hurts Every Day — And She Always Fights Through It
Charlotte Women’s Lacrosse needed a leading scorer for its inaugural season, and the former five-star recruit and Virginia Tech commit fit the bill. She just needed her body to do the same.
Sheila Ramos, the team’s athletic trainer, was the co-star she needed.
“I laughed and told Sheila that we were going to be best friends the first time I met her,” Torres said. “She kind of looked at me weird when I said it, but I’ve dealt with a lot of injuries since high school, and I still deal with them now. She’s the type of person who will do anything and everything to help you, and you don’t get that everywhere. I knew we’d be around each other a lot.”
“I remember it vividly,” Ramos added. “She jumped into the process wholeheartedly, since that first conversation it’s been a joy to walk beside her as she’s grown.”
Torres came to Charlotte with a history of shin and back fractures. They limited her time as a freshman with the Hokies before she transferred, and the ailments stick with her today.
The fractures began in high school when Torres’ recruiting push was on. She had the chance to go to school nationwide, and the pressure she put on herself in added training was a weight her body eventually couldn’t hold.
Injuries are now part of her story in a way they weren’t early in her lacrosse career. They’re just managed better now.
Ramos went to work, studying how to help her alleviate pain and play through the small dents in Torres’ armor. Her team-high 35 goals come because of Charlotte’s on-field camaraderie, and her ability to stay on the turf comes from a similar connection to the team’s training staff leader.
“With Isa’s complex injury history, the goal was to treat her holistically, rather than just isolating and healing her initial fractures,” Ramos said. “We broke down her movements from her feet to her head and made small adjustments in her mechanics that have helped her overall health.
“Changes like that are only possible because she’s showed up ready to get one percent better each day since August.”
The two went to work on learning maintenance techniques.
Ice, heat, and stretching are used for the everyday maintenance that keeps her going alongside the wholesale changes to her running and movement mechanics. Different tape configurations, leg sleeves, and braces have been tested to find a gameday remedy.
Weekends without games mean days without extensive movement for the sophomore, just a lot of rest, stretching, and recouping for the week ahead.
And it’s good Ramos was worried enough to do extra studying because Torres sure hasn’t been, at least outwardly. Bella Burke and Morgan Badger live with her, and you’d never know her struggles with health are so severe — to the point that teammates have had to help her off the field when her body finally shows wear and tear. Even then, she hardly voices the pain she feels.
The selflessness of her fight shines through regularly.
“Given her circumstances, she’s so positive about it,” Burke said. “It hurts her every day, and yet she always fights through it, she always stays positive. As much as she’s hurting, Isa has always been the type to still be worried about making sure others are successful. And when you have a teammate like that, you want to play through anything you’re dealing with.”
She’s been there to support others as they’ve supported her.
Brooke Alessandrini is a standout freshman with 24 goals, some in replacement of Torres when her body needs a break. Claire Schotta and Kylie Gioia help fill the gaps too as upperclassmen leaders of the team with 28 and 27 goals respectively.
“There’s never been a moment where I’ve felt alone this,” Torres said. “Against Vanderbilt, I had to run off and Brooke came right on for me without a second thought. It takes that pressure off me so I can be my best because teammates around me are their best too.”
The group is a present and future power that Charlotte hoped to build, and one that buoys the team when injuries rear their ugly head against Torres.
Head Coach Clare Short aimed for players like Torres to start Charlotte Women’s Lacrosse. Most of the players she brought in who shared the same maturity with the game were upperclassmen yet Torres breaks the mold.
“She had so much success in high school and at Virginia Tech when she was able to play,” Short said. “You can see it come from her knowledge of the game. We joke all the time about how young she is because you’d never guess that she’s just a sophomore, she has such a high-level and mature lacrosse IQ; her stick skills are unmatched, and she’s a light for this team the second she steps on the field.
“We wanted those traits, and we wanted that leadership.”
Charlotte entrusted her to lead the way in its inaugural game against Gardner-Webb. The first goal in its history came from her stick’s netting just 50 seconds into the win — the opening score of a first-game, conference-record 20 to kickstart the program’s legacy.
And just as she has all season, Gioia added four scores too to help boost the team and Torres’ efforts.
“This team is built for things like that, there’s so much love and desire for everyone to be good here,” Badger said. “When Isa has the ball, you just know something good is going to happen. When someone else needs to step up, we have talent around her too. It’s amazing to see it all come together and allow her to be herself and the team to be itself.”
The second-year standout has plenty of goals left, both figuratively and literally.
Her body may be fighting against her, but the battle is one she plans to win thanks to the best friends around her, Ramos included.
“It’s been amazing to see these accomplishments come to life,” Short said. “I know there are a lot left for her too.”