Outside Looking In

Southwest Minnesota Christian's Ana Veldkamp and Madyson Fey attended the State Girls' Basketball Tournament this past week after being involved in a frightening moment during the Section 3A championship game against Minneota on Saturday, March 11.
Because they were trailing late in the game and valuable seconds were ticking off, the Eagles had been intentionally fouling over the final minute of the game in order to give themselves their best chance at a comeback.
With 9.3 seconds left in the game, Veldkamp and Fey both rushed toward Minneota's Dakoda Hennen just in front of the Minneota bench. As they went to foul Hennen, the two SW Christian players collided. Fey ended up on her stomach and stayed down for several seconds. Veldkamp, closer to the sideline, landed on her back as a medical team from Southwest Minneota State University rushed to her side.
The Minneota bench players got off their chairs and moved several feet away. An eerie hush fell over the packed gymnasium as the two girls were lying on the court.
Fey soon got up and walked over to her bench area holding her hand to her mouth. After being attended to, she was seemingly okay and was seen smiling at her teammates.
"I smiled because some of them were crying and they looked so concerned, so I wanted them to know I was okay," said Fey, a sophomore forward. "I really wasn't bleeding to much, but my mouth hurt."
Veldkamp remained on her back for nearly 10 minutes before sitting up as fans politely applauded. When she was finally helped to her feet and walked to the bench under her own power, fans on all four sides stood and applauded loudly in a touching moment.
"Really?" Veldkamp responded when told that everyone stood and applauded. "I really didn't realize that."
The Mascot got a hold of Fey and Veldkamp at the state tournament. They took a break from swimming in the motel pool to tell me about the ordeal.
When the two players collided, Fey's mouth hit Veldkamp's forehead with her two front teeth cutting a 1 1/2-inch gash. As Fey laid on her back, blood poured down the side of her face and into her hair as she laid on her back.
"I grabbed my forehead right away and when I pulled my hand back, it was full of blood," said Veldkamp, a junior guard. "I thought I had broken my nose so I touched my nose to see if it was still straight and it was okay."
Veldkamp said she wasn't knocked out momentarily and didn't end up with a headache.
Fey chipped a corner out of both of her front teeth.
"My right tooth had the nerve exposed," she said. "I had to have a partial root canal."
Both girls admittedly were embarrassed by all the attention and that they had caused a stoppage in play.
"I didn't want to face the crowd, so that's why I went over the bench right away," laughed Fey.
One piece of Fey's chipped tooth was seen lodged in Veldkamp's forehead.
"I never found the other piece," Fey said. "Someone thought I probably swallowed it."
The girls were able to participate in the awards ceremony after the game. Veldkamp was still holding a cloth to her forehead and the runner-up medal had to be carefully maneuvered around her neck by her coach Luke Drooger.
The girls and were seen joking and smiling together afterwards.
"We're good friends," they both said.
"When we were standing by each other, I said 'Ana, how are you?'," Fey recalled.
And Veldkamp, able to find humor in a potential tragedy, came up with the perfect response.
"I told her if she wanted a snack that bad, she should have just asked me," she said with a laugh.