6 min read
Chloe Kitts had a vision for the year 2026: She’d lead the South Carolina Gamecocks on a magical March Madness run to close out her senior year of college, become a first-round pick in the WNBA Draft, and start her professional basketball career at the top of her game.
It all changed in October 2025 when the forward tore her ACL in a scrimmage before her senior season even began. She jumped up for a rebound with no one around her and heard a pop. “Immediately, I already knew what happened,” she recounts to Women’s Health. “I was like, ‘Dang.’”
Ruled out for the season, she also knew early on that her plans for the future would have to change. Now, she’s ready to share them.
“I’m going to stay in college for another year,” she says, ending speculation about whether she’d still declare for the WNBA Draft. “I have more I need to prove.”
Road to Recovery
Chloe’s injury and subsequent knee surgery took her about a month to really accept. “I couldn’t walk. I couldn’t do anything,” she says. She was heartbroken that she wouldn’t recover in time for WNBA training camp in the spring. “It sucked. But all my teammates were here.”
They brought her a gift basket of Lego flowers, junk food, candles, and a card with handwritten messages. Her roommate, junior guard Tessa Johnson, helped her shower and drove her anywhere she needed to go. Sophomore forward Adhel Tac cleaned her apartment. “We’re really close as a team,” Chloe says.
She realized she couldn’t go back and un-injure herself, so she chose to pivot to positivity. She began celebrating smaller wins, like the first time she could walk without crutches. “Now I’m jumping a little bit,” she says. “The day I can run, that’s super exciting. I’m looking forward to all those little things.”
Her recovery process is a consistent, always-on journey. Whenever the Gamecocks are at practice, Chloe’s in the training room doing rehab or lifting.
Chloe still travels to every away game, stepping into a leadership role and pouring energy back into her teammates. She’s started to see the game from a new perspective sitting on the sidelines. “The pace of the game has slowed down in my head,” she says. “I see so much more than when I’m on the floor—maybe the open person or the next rotation. I see it differently.”
Turning the Page
Chloe found basketball through her dad, Jason, who played in an adult league. He’d bring Chloe and her younger sister Kylee, who now plays for Ohio State, to his games. “We’d run around on the sidelines, and that’s how the ball got put into my hands,” Chloe says. “I just started playing and started loving it.”
The Seattle native rooted for the Storm growing up and dreamed of playing professionally. “I used to tell people I was going to be the first woman in the NBA,” she says.
A five-star recruit in the 2023 class, Chloe received offers from top college programs like Duke, Louisville, and N.C. State. She chose the Gamecocks, foregoing her senior year of high school and enrolling early. Head Coach Dawn Staley was the difference maker; the two really connected on Chloe’s official visit.
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“She produces pros, and I want to be a pro,” Chloe says. “She’s not just my coach, she’s a mentor—not just for me, but for everybody. All of the girls, we can go to her about our personal life, we go to her for basketball. And she’s accomplished everything that I want to accomplish. There’s no better place I would rather be.”
The best advice Coach has given her? “Turn the page,” Chloe says. That’s stuck with her when she’s had to play through a rough streak of games, and now as she rehabs her knee. “I’m moving on to the next, not just staying in the past.”
Refining Her Mental Edge
Taking time off has allowed Chloe to focus more on the mental side of basketball, which she admits she struggled with in her first few years at South Carolina. Before games, her palms would sweat, the nerves would take over, and it took some time for her to settle in on the court. “I needed to relax, I just couldn’t,” she says. “I didn’t know how.”
Coach Staley recommended she see a sports psychiatrist and helped her connect with one. Chloe went once a week. She gathered helpful tools to deploy in the locker room, like writing down what’s going through her mind, counting 10 breaths, and even coloring. She also began to lean into interests outside of her sport.
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“I learned you can’t just have your life revolve around basketball,” she says. “Because if it’s just basketball, basketball, basketball, and you just think about basketball—if you don’t play good, then you’re just sad.” She discovered Pilates, started going on walks, and thought about who she is beyond an athlete.
Halfway through her junior year, her game noticeably improved. By the end of the season, she was playing her best basketball yet, setting SEC Tournament scoring records and leading team stats through March Madness.
Her mental game was especially clutch in the Elite Eight against Duke, when Coach Staley drew up a play that would result in Chloe shooting two important free throws. “I don’t know why, because I felt like [Te-Hina Paopao] and Tess were better free throw shooters than me,” she says. “But then I was at the free throw line telling myself, ‘Coach chose me for a reason. I’m good at basketball.’ And then I made both of my free throws and we won.”
Now that she’s not playing, Chloe also sees a therapist. Talking to professionals has given her a better understanding of how she’s feeling day to day. And she allows herself to lean on her team on down days. “My teammates notice that, and they’ve always been like, ‘It’s okay.’ We always talk to each other,” she says. “And if I’m feeling some type of way, then I go tell my trainer or Coach how I feel, and they help with that.”
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Shooting free throws against Duke in the Elite Eight.
Chloe is grateful for the extra time to work on this “very overlooked” part of the game. “You can be physically strong, but that [means] nothing if your mental isn’t strong,” she says. “It really takes all of you.”
Leveling Up
Chloe believes starting Pilates four times per week last summer and adding in extra strength sessions before her injury has put her on a speedy path to physical recovery. She says she’s already three months ahead of schedule and will “for sure” be ready to play at the start of next season.
Her big-picture goals get her out of bed every day. “I want to be a professional basketball player. I want to play in the WNBA. So of course that’s what motivates me,” she says. She’s never not played basketball for this long before, and it’s made her rethink the days she didn’t want to go to practice. “I want to play so bad that I know when I play again, I’m not going to take it for granted.”
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And the genuine friendships made on Coach Staley’s team make everything feel a bit lighter. “I feel like a lot of teams don’t have that much fun. We have a lot of fun. We joke around a lot,” she says. “When it’s serious, we’re serious. But it’s nice not always having to be serious.”
They’ve all known for a while that she’ll be staying at South Carolina. “I want to be at this school with my team and playing for Coach one more year. I love being here,” she says. “I know staying another year will just get me better.”
Chloe’s vision for the end of her college career still includes South Carolina making it to the National Championship and winning it all, but it’s also growing into the best teammate and leader she can be. “I’m more than a basketball player,” she says. “I’m Chloe.”
Amanda Lucci is the director of special projects at Women’s Health, where she works on multi-platform brand initiatives and social media strategy. She also leads the sports and athletes vertical, traveling to cover the Paris Olympics, Women’s World Cup, WNBA Finals, and NCAA Final Four for WH. She has nearly 15 years of experience writing, editing, and managing social media for national and international publications and is also a NASM-certified personal trainer. A proud native of Pittsburgh, PA, she is a graduate of Ohio University’s E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. Follow her on Instagram @alucci.