After much anticipation, Trent Rickard made his collegiate debut in the opening game of the 2023 season for The Master’s University men’s soccer team, fulfilling a lifelong dream to play for his dad.
A three-time Foothill League Player of the Year and an all-CIF Southern Section selection in 2023 as a senior at Hart High School, Rickard recorded two assists in the Mustangs’ 4-0 win over Fresno Pacific University.
It was a dream debut for the local kid, with the only downside being a dead leg he suffered near the end of the game. He said he felt his left leg swelling up after the game, but he didn’t think much of it as it wasn’t too painful.
On his way to chapel the next day, Rickard, whose left thigh had hardened overnight, said he felt a little light-headed, and so he went to go to the restroom. Before he could get there, he passed out and was taken to the hospital.
Unbeknownst to Rickard, what he thought was a dead leg was actually an injury so severe that doctors told him he was mere hours away from losing his leg.
“I had like over 25 nurses come in just to feel my leg,” Rickard said in a recent phone interview. “It was hilarious.”
Doctors told him there were two options: It was either a hematoma, which is akin to a blood clot, or compartment syndrome. But they wouldn’t know until they cut his leg open.
“It turned out being the worst of the two,” Rickard said.
Compartment syndrome is a painful condition that occurs when pressure within the muscles builds to dangerous levels, leading to decreased blood flow and preventing nourishment and oxygen from reaching nerve and muscle cells, according to the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons.
Doctors tending to Rickard told him that it’s typically a condition that affects lower leg muscles, and that it’s extremely rare to find in a thigh muscle.
The muscle was cut open to allow it to drain, a process that took six days. That came after his dad, Jim, tried contacting specialists who could possibly help, but he said he had no luck due to the rarity of the injury.
“We just wanted to know, like, could he come back to normal,” Jim said.
Once the muscle had been relieved of enough pressure, it was small enough to be repaired. A skin graft was required to close the wound due to it being too puffy.
Even once that happened, Trent said the plastic surgeon told him that there were no guarantees that he’d ever get back to his normal self.
“Before, they were saying, ‘You’ll make a full recovery,’ all this stuff,” Trent said. “And he came in right after, was saying stuff, like ‘I’ll never be the same,’ ‘I won’t be able to push off my left leg,’ ‘I’ll never be nowhere near as fast.’ He was like, ‘I hope you’re not a lefty, because your left leg is going to be useless when you play,’ stuff like that. That wasn’t awesome to hear.”
Six months later, the skin graft was removed once it became too weak. After that, the rehab process continued.
Trent stayed positive throughout, though he said there were days that were frustrating, both for him and his parents.
“But it was also motivation, like I obviously wanted to prove them wrong,” Trent said. “There are days where you feel like you make big jumps, and then there’s other days where you feel like you took steps back, which is the absolute worst because you just want to progress every day. But I think what helped is just looking more ‘big picture,’ so thinking day by day and month by month, or week by week, was helpful.”
After going through the summer and preseason, Trent was cleared to return to game action just a week before the 2024 season. He played a couple of scrimmages and six regular-season games before bagging his first goal.
Once he finally hit the back of the net, the goals started to flow.
Helped by a couple of hat tricks, Trent recorded 17 goals and three assists as the main forward for his dad, who was still worrying that things could take a turn for the worse.
“We were definitely on edge for a long time,” Jim said. “But, you know, once he was scoring and seemed normal and, you know, was telling us he was feeling good — he even got kicked there once, and a couple times, he’s like, ‘Well, it hurt a little more than normal, but it went away.’ So, that was helpful. So, you know, really just rewarding in the sense of, he worked so hard.”
The Mustangs made it all the way to the Great Southwest Athletics Conference championship game after going 8-4-2 in conference play in the regular season.
But the magical run ended there as Hope International University came away with 4-2 victory.
“That was like a gut punch,” Trent said. “I still think about that every day. Actually, my dad and I talk about it literally every day. It was terrible.”
While the ultimate team goal wasn’t achieved, the Mustangs got four players on the all-conference, including Trent being named Player of the Year and Freshman of the Year.
It was the cherry on top after not being sure what the future would hold for him.
“That was a surreal moment for sure,” Trent said. “I had heard people talking about it before, just because it was fun year, obviously, but I didn’t have any expectations, just because it’s never good to have expectations at times like that. If I were to get something, it’d be cool, but I had no expectations. I’m just kind of here to win trophies and stuff for my dad. That’s the main reason I’m here. Definitely hearing that was awesome and very, very cool after last year for sure, to be able to bounce back like that.”
Jim said it was an easy choice for the other coaches to pick Trent after leading the conference in goals, points, shots and shots on goal. He was second in game-winning goals with three.
“I think when the votes came out,” Jim said, “I think there might have been one (for someone else), but I mean, it was basically — it didn’t really even matter, because enough people spoke up that it was in their mind. It was, ‘Well, there we have it, Trent’s the Player of the Year.’”
Also picking up all-conference honors for the Mustangs were senior Prince Chingancheke for the third year in a row, senior Theo Kudlo for his third all-GSAC honor and senior Tyrik Trotman for his second.
Chingancheke also went through a bit of an injury crisis early in his career at TMU. Jim said he broke his tibia and fibia his freshman year, and it took about three years for him to get back to his normal self.
Jim said it’ll be hard to replace those three seniors as they all move on from TMU.
“It’s sad to lose those three, you know, but great that they were honored,” Jim said. “Tyrik was an incredible leader in the back and Prince has been a leader, you know, and how he plays and just his journey. And then Theo, just kind of my fiery leader, you know. You need the quiet ones like Prince and the solid ones like Tyrique and the fiery ones like Theo.”
The good news just kept on coming for the Rickards after that.
Following the end of the college soccer season, it was announced that Trent had been named a National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics third-team All-American, becoming the first player under Jim to be recognized nationally since 2018.
He was the only player from the GSAC to get a spot on one of the teams.
Trent said he appreciates all the personal accolades, but what he’s really after are trophies.
“What matters most is winning games, winning trophies,” Trent said. “Playing for my dad is like — I’m here to pay him back for everything he’s done for me in my life. And the best way for me to do that is to win him a conference title and then go to nationals, make a good run. And the end goal is to win nationals.”
