Injury Ends Sales’ Career

Nykesha Sales’ career on the Connecticut women’s basketball team ended when tests confirmed that the senior ruptured her Achilles’ tendon Saturday in the second half of the No. 2 Huskies’ victory over Notre Dame.

Sales is expected to have surgery on her right foot sometime next week. Team doctors said normal recovery time lasts from four to six months.

Connecticut Coach Geno Auriemma said Sales, who was only two points shy of becoming the school’s all-time scoring leader, took the news hard.

“Fate has been unkind to her,” he said. “You gear up to play in March and March is right around the corner. Now that opportunity has been taken away from her. It couldn’t come at a worse time.”

In what turned out to be her final game, Sales nearly broke the school scoring record set by Kerry Bascom (2,177) from 1988-91. Sales, who needed 29 points to eclipse the mark, came down hard on her right heel after scoring 27 points. She left with 9:48 remaining and the Huskies on their way to clinching their fifth consecutive Big East regular-season title.

Auriemma, whose team plays its last regular-season game Tuesday at Villanova, said: “This one hurts a little bit more.”

“For Nykesha, what makes it hard is: This it it,” he said.

As a freshman, Sales played on the team that finished 35-0 and won the national championship with a 70-64 win over Tennessee.

In every season since, the Huskies have been Big East regular-season champions and played in the NCAA tournament, reaching the Final Four again her sophomore season and losing last season in the regional finals.