Ankle sprains are so common in basketball that we have almost stopped treating them as injuries. A player rolls it, sits for a minute, tapes it up, and limps back on. Everyone has seen it. Most of us have done it.

The ankle sprain is the most common injury in the game. It is also the one we rehab the least. Some reviews put the reinjury rate in junior basketball as high as one in two. A lot of ankle sprains never make it in front of a physio or a health professional at all. The player waits for the swelling to go down and gets back on the court.

I understand why. A sprain does not feel serious. It is not a break. There is no cast, no surgery, no dramatic story to tell at training. But the body keeps score. Each sprain that heals without proper rehab leaves the ankle a little less sure of itself. Ligaments become more lax, the function diminishes, and the next ‘roll’ comes easier than the last. This is how a teenager ends up with an ankle that has never quite felt like their own.

What good rehab asks for is not overly complicated. Balance work. Strength reps. Some attention to detail with the return of ankle range, and the stiffness that shows up in jumping. Then a planned return to basketball movements before returning to play. None of it is beyond a young player. It just asks to be done, and done properly, rather than abandoned the moment walking feels normal again.

I think about the players I see with ankle sprains. It is rarely their first. And when they walk me through it, the earlier ones are almost always shrugged off. Yeah, I do that ankle all the time, as if a body that keeps rolling is just something to live with. I do not think it is.

If you have rolled an ankle and it still does not feel like yours, go and see a physio. Not because it is serious, but because it is worth getting right.

In coming weeks we will dive further into ankle rehab and prevention. In the meantime, keep an eye out for our flagship workshop, Tape Yo’Self, where we teach you how to tape an ankle properly. If you would like to bring it to your team, club or academy, get in touch at hello@healthyhooper.com.au.