She’s finally back – and ready to become an NLB champion
Just in time for the Final Four tournament, Vivienne Maceck is back in BC Winterthur’s NLB team. The young woman tells how she experienced her long injury break and what is different now.
The watching is over. Now Vivienne Maceck is back on the field as part of the BCW team.
Photo: Stefan Kleiser
“She will soon be an important support,” says Cinzia Tomezzoli about her teammate Vivienne Maceck. “She’s a very good player.” The two basketball players are at opposite points in their careers. Tomezzoli (35), a former national player, leads the Winterthur NLB team onto the field as captain. Maceck (18) is one of the basketball players destined to lead BCW into the future – and back into the NLA.
Vivienne Maceck has already gained experience in the top division – in the penultimate season, when the Winterthur team were still playing in the National League A and advanced to the playoff final. Maccheck is “a bonus” for him, explains coach Aner Levron. “I didn’t expect her this season.” The young woman only played her third game in the current championship against Blonay on Saturday.
Throw on the edge but part of the team
“I’m glad that the trainer is only gradually using me again,” says Vivienne Maceck and smiles: “My condition is still nowhere.” The build-up player had been absent for a long time injured. It happened a year ago. The Winterthur native moved to the USA to live with her great-aunt after Napoleon and attended high school in the village of 9,000 people. “I wanted to see where I stand in basketball,” she says. The Wildcats had become Ohio champions a season earlier.
“I can keep up,” Viviennne Maceck now knows. Only: Then she was bent inwards when she pushed under the basket with her right knee. “Fortunately, I only had a cruciate ligament tear and not a broken meniscus as well,” she says. At first she didn’t realize that she would be out for so long – “only when I couldn’t play basketball anymore”. Back in Winterthur, she threw on the basket on the side during practice. “So I could still be part of the team.”
“I’m still hectic on the ball”
Vivienne Maccheck has been available to the coach again for the matches for three weeks. “I was very nervous in the first game,” she admits. “And I’m still hectic with the ball.” And she noticed something else: «I am now more motivated than before. Because if you can only watch for a year, it hurts.” Why was she still watching? To learn something. “You make mistakes in the game. You don’t always see the open spaces. From the outside, when nobody is hassling you, it’s easier.”
The break wasn’t easy, “basketball is my life,” says Maceck. “But basketball wasn’t taken away from me, it was just a break.” While waiting, she had time for other things. “Otherwise I can’t have any more hobbies apart from basketball.” So there was space for colleagues and for looking for the right apprenticeship. From the summer, the sports student will work in the office at Keller AG Brickworks in Pfungen for two years as part of her commercial training at the United School of Sports in Winterthur.
The dream of the national team
The return to basketball competition has been successful so far: three games in National League B, three wins, plus victory in the final of the regional U-22 championship. “I have more confidence with the ball again,” analyzes Vivienne Maceck. “I no longer think I have to be careful not to lose the ball.” Personal goals remain high. Attending a college in the USA also remains an issue. Her older brother is studying in the USA.
“And I would like to play in the national team one day,” says Vivienne Maceck. In August 2021 she took part in a European Championship with the Swiss U-16. “It was great to play internationally, to travel with the team and to be with players you don’t know.” At the moment there are no international matches for Maceck, because Swiss Basketball does not have a U-18 team. Instead, the woman from Winterthur was called up for trial training for the 3×3 youth selection last Sunday. And next Sunday she could become National League B champion with the BCW.
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2023-05-17 22:06:21
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