COMPARISON BETWEEN ACL INJURY RISK FACTORS IN COMPETITIVE VOLLEYBALL PLAYERS EVALUATED FROM SINGLE AND DOUBLE LEG LANDING TASKS AND VOLLEYBALL SPECIFIC GAME LIKE SITUATIONS

ABSTRACTEmily Zinger: Comparison Between ACL Injury Risk Factors in Competitive Volleyball Players Evaluated from Single and Double Leg Landing Tasks and Volleyball Specific Game Like Situations(Under the Direction of Claudio Battaglini) Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) injuries have been extremely prevalent in athletics, and often require long extensive rehabilitation to return to athletics, if even the option. The discrepancy between prevalence of injury across sports, and between sexes has been deliberated throughout the literature. Current research often groups multiple sports together while evaluating injury incidences between sexes, and groups participants of different sexes, ages, and skill level to identify which sports pose more ACL injury risk factors. However, a highly specific, biomechanical, evaluation of single and double leg sport specific movements in female collegiate volleyball players has not been seen in the literature. In this current study, we used a new markerless software to evaluate different kinematic variables in female collegiate volleyball players during single leg and double leg sports specific jump landing task. A two-way ANOVA was used to compare ACL injury risk factors between both tasks and post hoc testing was conducted due to significant findings. When comparing single leg and double leg jump landing tasks, a statistically significant difference was found where double leg landings showed less injury risk factors when compared to single leg landings. A sports performance aspect of transition off the net time was also evaluated and no significant difference was found when comparing single and double leg landing tasks.Master of Art