Jessica Honkonen Lost To Knee Injury Training For NCAA Championships

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Colo. – Senior Jessica Honkonen saw her career come to an abrupt end Saturday after she injured her knee in a training accident here at Howelsen Hill. The University of Colorado Ski Team arrived in Steamboat Springs earlier in the day in preparation for the 2016 NCAA Championships, which CU hosts starting Wednesday.

“She is smiling but her heart is crying,” CU coach Richard Rokos said. “It's kind of a typical injury for skiing. She came from the flat part of the course down to the steep section and she was a bit in the back seat. The edge of her ski caught, it popped off before she crashed, she was on her feet when her knee went. She knew what the feeling felt like so she knew right away something was wrong.”

Honkonen, a fourth-year senior from Espoo, Finland, has skied for the Buffs at the NCAA Championships each of her first three seasons in Boulder, and was instrumental in helping the Buffs win the NCAA Championship in both 2013 and 2015. She was the 2015 RMISA Individual Slalom Champion and in 2014, she was the top seeded slalom skier in the RMISA.

A four-time All-RMISA selection and three-time All-American, she established herself as one of the top slalom skiers in the nation. In 51 career races, she finished 48 and had 33 top 10 finishes, seven podium appearances and two race victories. In 27 career slalom races, she finished 23 and hiked twice, and in the other 21 races she compiled 18 top 10 finishes, 13 top five, seven podiums and two race wins.

Since the injury happened before the deadline of Monday at 4 p.m., the Buffs are able to replace Honkonen with freshman Nora Christensen for the championships. Christensen will join the team in Steamboat Springs on Saturday evening.

“Nora is on her way here, she will join the team tonight and start training tomorrow,” Rokos said. “She is coming in with zero NCAA experience and Jessica was in her fourth year, but such is life. Nora will have to step in and do her best. I have all the confidence in the world in her, and the rest of the team does, too. She will be able to demonstrate the depth of our team.”

Christensen finished 10 of 12 races in the regular season for the Buffs and had nine top 20 finishes. She finished four of the six slalom races and had a pair of 11th and pair of 12th place finishes. In GS action, she was between 13th and 18th in five of the six races.

The Buffs alpine squad has been bit by the injury bug quite a bit in the last few weeks. Three weeks ago at New Mexico, the Buffs lost junior Roger Carry for the season with a knee injury. Just before the RMISA Championships, freshman Ola Johansen crashed and injured his leg and as freshman Max Luukko was crossing the finish line in winning the slalom race at the RMISA Championships, he injured his hand.

Johansen remained in Boulder on Saturday for further rehabilitation. He will join the team on Sunday and get on snow for the first time since his crash. He bruised the side of his leg at the point that the boot ends.

“Ola took an extra day off, and all indications are that he will be able to go,” Rokos said. “His bruise is right at his boot line, right at the point where you put a lot of pressure when racing. We made all kinds of devices to help him, some things to help distribute the pressure over a larger portion of his leg, but until he gets in a boot and tries to go fast, it's hard to predict how much pain he will be in. We are hoping to have Ola and full strength, but if something happens, we still have Adam (Zika), Kasper (Hietanen) and Cam (Smith). All guys are capable of skiing fast and getting results.”

“Let's hope this is the last injury,” Rokos continued. “I was very proud of the fact that we didn't have any knee injuries since Katie Hartman (in 2011). Suddenly we have two in the span of a few weeks. It just shows how unpredictable skiing is and things can happen without any control of the situation.”

The Buffs have three more days of preparation ahead of the championships, which begin on Wednesday with giant slalom races on Mt. Werner. Action shifts to Howelsen Hill Thursday with the Nordic freestyle races. The slalom races will take place under the lights on Friday night and the championship concludes Saturday morning with classic races.

The Buffs are the defending National Champions and have won two of the last three and three championships this decade. Rokos has eight national championships in his 25 years at the helm of the Buffaloes and the program has captured 20 national championships.