By Marcus Uhe
Her teammates call her ‘floorboards’.
Anyone who’s watched Pakenham’s A Grade netball captain Caitlin Cooke knows that she’s prone to losing her footing and hitting the deck in an act of desperation to save a lose ball or force an interception.
Rather than attempting to steady herself on the way down, countless trips and falls saw her master the art of protecting her head and rolling to relative safety to minimise the impact on the unforgiving asphalt below.
It’s a term of endearment, and she’s adopted the nickname with pride.
In winning the 2024 Jodi Chandler Medal last week as the best player in the Outer East Football Netball A-Grade netball competition, Cooke capped a remarkable recovery from perhaps her biggest tumble of them all.
When an Australian Mixed Netball squad training camp in late 2022 ended prematurely thanks to tearing her meniscus, the resulting MRI found that a partial rupture of the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) in the same knee the year before had deteriorated to a complete severance of the ligament, making for a one-two punch that only the most feared boxers could throw.
As a result, her entire 2023 season became a write-off, and the long lonely road to recovery began.
“It meant that the mental rehab for me was harder than the physical rehab, because I’d already been knocked back with an ACL…I can say that I’ve done an ACL before, but to get hit again it was like ‘oh my gosh,’” Cooke said.
“People do one knee, they don’t do two.”
In an effort to stay connected to the netball family at the Lions and at Victorian Netball League (VNL) side Southern Saints, she made the effort to get to every training session, every game-day and even followed in her father Matthew’s footsteps in taking on a coaching role with Pakenham’s D-Grade in 2023.
As she juggled gruelling strength and conditioning exercises with her physio and a similarly taxing veterinary science degree, she did everything possible to assist her Pakenham teammates, which in turn, was just as much of an assistance to her, escaping from the clouds of doubt that come with such a traumatic diagnosis.
All the while, a sense of helplessness consumed the dogged defender, unable to contribute anything more than vocal support while the A-Grade side battled through a disappointing year on the court.
“It’s something I don’t know how to describe; you’re watching from the sidelines thinking, I want to help, but knowing that I can’t even run, let alone help in any other way, was very odd.
“Going to netball still helped a lot, but it was painful more mentally than it was physically.”
As the 2024 VNL season approached, Cooke rejoined the Southern Saints’ Championship squad, but the return to her best form encountered yet another stumble.
Progress in the road back from such adversity is not always linear, and a slow start to the VNL season on the court forced Cooke to reassess where she was at as Pakenham’s season approached, where she’d been appointed A-Grade captain.
Conversations with the coaching staff at the Saints led to her stepping down from the Championship squad to the Under 23s in her final year of availability for the age bracket and pair with Pakenham Goal Defence Charlize Reid.
Not only did the duo form vital chemistry in the defensive end of the court that translated brilliantly to Toomuc Reserve and the Lions’ netball season, but it saw Cooke regain her confidence and most importantly, joy on the netball court again.
“They (Southern Saints) were really supportive and loved the idea, saying ‘we want you to get back to the best you can,’” Cooke said.
“I really had a lot of fun in 23s with the younger girls and I felt like, maybe because it was 23s and not championship, there was a little less pressure, and as a result, I started enjoying my netball more, I got a bit more confidence back.”
Come late April’s Anzac Day clash with ROC, Cooke felt vindicated in her decision, rediscovering her old self and feeling “fixed”.
Four weeks later in round seven, when she rode a hit and bounced back to her feet feeling none of the concerns or inhabitants that previously held her back, the wave of euphoria that engulfed her signalled that it was finally go-time.
“I’ve had a couple of hits where I’ve felt what my surgeon added in, work.
“I played a Mt Evelyn game, and I got a bump in a contest on my knee, and I felt everything in my knee work.
“It didn’t twist, there were no pops, it just worked.
“I got up and it didn’t hurt, and I thought ‘okay, maybe I don’t have to be so scared about my knee flying about’”.
The rest, as they say in the classics, is history.
After 10 rounds in the Chandler Medal vote count, Cooke was in second place, with 13 votes, two behind Mt Evelyn centre Montana Wallis.
From the final eight games of which the Lions won, she polled a staggering 19 votes, to storm home with the competition’s highest honour, completing her comeback in the most emphatic of fashions, and leaving her in a state of shock as Chandler herself presented the medal.
In doing so, she dethroned a player she idolises in 2023 winner Kaitlyn Black, and made for a Lions-heavy podium with teammate Jordyn Adams placing second.
She described the night as a “surreal experience”, still struggling to come to terms with her achievement and the calibre of players she defeated to scoop the prize, but undoubtedly proud of the award, and what it took to get there.
“I feel like it’s always been a goal of mine to get there, but I didn’t think that it would happen this year,” she said.
“There’s always an inkling of hope when you go to something like that, but looking around at my competition… I still don’t feel like I’ve won it.”
Undersized for her position, Cooke attributed the stunning form in the back half of the year to seeing opponents for a second time, and being able to effectively scout and outfox midcourt players in order to affect interceptions.
She led Pakenham to the competition’s third-best defence, only behind the two grand final combatants in Narre Warren and Mt Evelyn, all under the tutelage of her father, who’s long-term vision for the club is finally coming to fruition.
The two have shared countless discussions over car rides and dinners over the future of the Pakenham Netball Club, and in a season where all four senior sides made it to the finals, the future has seldom looked brighter at Toomuc Reserve, with the two Cooke’s at the helm.
Last month, Matthew told the Gazette that the A-Grade side could be a ‘powerhouse’ next year on the back of a long-term build of the club’s netball program.
The excitement is clearly permeating throughout the family.
“He will get very excited and it’s very exciting to see a lot of that stuff now click together,” Cooke said.
“To know that I’ve been a part of that too the whole time is extra special.”
