December 27, 2025
How stepping away helped Columbia’s Fliss Henderson come back from a stress fracture
Henderson didn’t play her sophomore year, but she’s been indispensable as a junior
When Fliss Henderson got to Columbia for her freshman year in late summer 2023, she shrugged off the fact that her back was hurting. After all, she’d flown all the way from her home in Australia — a long enough journey to make anyone sore. “It’ll go away,” she thought to herself.
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But a few weeks into preseason workouts, Henderson’s back was sore enough that she decided she needed to get it checked out. After the tests came back, head coach Megan Griffith called Henderson.
“‘You know you have scoliosis, right?’” Henderson remembers Griffith asking. “And I was like, ‘Nope, did not know that.’”
But that was only the first medical surprise Henderson would have during her first year in the United States. She played in all 30 games as a first-year, but in an end-of-season check-up, doctors discovered a stress fracture in her back. It would be nearly 600 days before Henderson played another game for the Lions.
Now a junior, Henderson is thriving, despite missing an entire season and shifting from the frontcourt to the perimeter. Her versatility is making her — and Columbia as a whole — a matchup nightmare for opponents.
“Talk about getting, like, an all-conference transfer. That’s how good she is,” Griffith told The IX Basketball in October about the impact of Henderson’s return. “… She will prove to be extremely indispensable and valuable. … There’s players that the temperature changes when they walk in a room, and she’s one of those.”
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When Henderson was diagnosed with scoliosis, she was told she could still play, but she needed to do exercises to strengthen the muscles around her spine. Scoliosis is a condition where the spine curves to one side rather than extending straight up and down, and because of that uneven alignment, some back muscles tend to be weaker than others.
It was sometimes difficult to find time to strengthen her back during the season, though, and she played through persistent pain. Still, she started 27 of 30 games and averaged 4.4 points, 4.6 rebounds and 2.6 assists in 23.3 minutes per game. She ranked fourth on the team in minutes and third in rebounds per game, despite being an undersized forward at 5’11.
Until the season ended, no one knew that Henderson’s back pain had developed into a stress fracture. No game stands out to her where she got hit or her pain noticeably worsened.
“It was literally just, I think, a build-up of trying to play at such a high intensity that my body’s not been used to,” Henderson told The IX Basketball on Dec. 18.
When doctors found the fracture, they instructed Henderson to wear a back brace for three months. After that, it would take three or four months for her to ramp back up, putting her on track to return partway through her sophomore season.
Henderson went home to Australia when school let out. She wasn’t allowed to do any activity except walking, which was difficult for her knowing that all her teammates — and her opponents — were using the offseason to make big gains. She was also at a loss for what to do in her free time because basketball had always filled those hours.
Henderson’s fracture healed well in the brace, but once she was free of it, the muscles surrounding her spine were still weak. In the fall, she spent a lot of time relearning how to walk, stand, sit and shoot in order to reduce her pain and build strength.
“[With] something you’ve grown up doing your entire life, it’s weird to try to change,” Henderson said. “It’s such a habit thing, and you don’t even think about it until you have to change it. I know I didn’t even realize I shot that way.”
As Henderson took small steps forward, though, she was struggling mentally. It was the first injury she’d ever had that she couldn’t play through, for the sake of her long-term health. She longed to get back to playing, and she was pushing herself too hard to get there. Then she started to talk negatively to herself about the fact that she wasn’t going to be ready for opening night.
“I probably struggled with [the mental side of being injured] more than the actual injury,” Henderson said.
While she was sidelined, Henderson loved being around her teammates and learning the game from more of a coach’s perspective. But by December of her sophomore season, she realized that pushing herself to make it back during the season was doing more harm than good.
“I had to take a step back just to focus on myself,” Henderson said, “… which is weird for me to say because basketball is what brings me joy. But I think at that time, I wanted something so badly that it wasn’t bringing me joy anymore.”
So Henderson stepped away from the team, focusing on her own health and watching games from the Levien Gymnasium stands rather than the bench. Griffith started planning for the worst-case scenario and didn’t count on her rejoining the team this year. But Henderson always knew she was working toward that.
“Probably what helped me be OK with [stepping away] is I kind of, deep down, always knew I would come back or try to come back,” she said. “That was my goal by taking a step back. It was like, I’m trying to get better so that I can come back, instead of just, I’m taking a step back and for good.”
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Henderson stayed in touch with Griffith during the spring, and they started talking in earnest about Henderson’s return after the season ended. Those conversations were when Griffith knew she didn’t need to prepare for the worst anymore.
“Fliss is a woman of her word,” Griffith told reporters on Dec. 11. “So if she’s gonna tell me something, she’s gonna do it. So when she came to me and said, ‘Hey, Coach, I want to come back,’ we had a very long conversation about that, many conversations, and I knew she was going to come back.”
Henderson rejoined the team for some offseason workouts before the spring semester ended, and she spent the summer training in New York. She said she felt stronger mentally, which allowed her to focus on getting stronger physically.
When she got back on the court, her skills didn’t feel too rusty. Instead, playing felt natural, minus the occasional turnover that showed it had been a while. And mostly, it felt joyful.
“I just remember being so happy and smiling so much,” Henderson said, thinking back on those early workouts. “That’s kind of all I remember, honestly.”
For both Henderson and her teammates, the joy carried through to Columbia’s media day in late October. Henderson couldn’t stop smiling as she talked over Zoom about being around the team again and experiencing all the little moments of camaraderie, like celebrating after a great play in practice.
“Having Fliss back is great,” senior forward Susie Rafiu told reporters that day. “On and off the court, she’s a great presence. Leadership-wise, she’s always speaking, holding people to the standards, [so] having that is great as well, as well as her play style. She’s aggressive, she works hard, so all around, she’s just lifting up the whole program.”
One result of Griffith’s contingency planning is evident just from looking at the roster. The Lions had no player taller than 6’1 when Henderson was a first-year, but now there are three.
“I remember our [team picture] day, I was standing in height order, and I looked down the line,” Henderson told The IX Basketball on media day. “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m down at the bottom.’”
With so much size on the roster, Griffith didn’t necessarily need Henderson at forward. But after graduating Kitty Henderson, Fliss’ sister and the program’s all-time leader in assists, Griffith was looking for more depth at point guard. So Fliss Henderson shifted back to the perimeter, sharing point guard duties with junior Marija Avlijas.
Henderson had played every position except center growing up, so she wasn’t brand-new to running the point. But playing it in college is different, she said, because the point guard has to lead and communicate so much more. So in the preseason, she sat down with her sister for a crash course in Columbia point guard play.
“How are you such a good point guard? What do I need to do?” Henderson asked.
Kitty talked about building a “two-way connection” with teammates — not just directing them on the court, but also them feeling a bond with her, so they respond more to what she’s saying and want to make plays for her. Henderson has taken that to heart, and she feels especially in tune with what the forwards need from playing that position herself.
“If I’m playing point and need my bigs to do something … I know exactly the way to communicate to them and get their attention, but also give them confidence,” she said on Dec. 18. “… I also just naturally feel so much more connected to them because it’s like, I’m part of their group.”
Now, Henderson is playing fluidly anywhere Griffith needs her to — and in much less pain than she had been early in her career. “Freshman year, [I] was in pain every day, and I’m not in pain now, at all, nearly,” she said. “I mean, nowhere near as much pain as I was, which is nice.”
Correcting her shooting posture is still a work in progress, she admitted. But she can self-diagnose the issue when she starts to feel sore, and Griffith knows what to look for, too.
With Henderson back, the Lions are 8-4 with marquee wins against Butler, Seton Hall and South Dakota State. They rank 70th nationally in the NET and in the top 50 in assists and steals per game. Henderson is quietly crucial to making them go on both ends as someone who can lead and plug holes at any position.
“I equate it to [Ivy League Player of the Year candidate] Madison St. Rose comes back for Princeton,” Griffith told The IX Basketball in October. “… Fliss means equally as much to us.”
Henderson has started 10 of 12 games and is averaging 7.2 points, 6.1 rebounds, 3.0 assists and 1.6 steals in 28.3 minutes per game. All of those averages are career highs.
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Henderson has already scored in double figures three times this season after doing so only once as a first-year. In a win over Wagner on Dec. 6, she had a career-high 15 points on 6-for-10 shooting, eight rebounds and six assists in just 25 minutes.
“It’s really difficult for any player to take a year away from basketball and come back and acclimate to the speed, the tempo, playing a really big-time schedule,” Griffith told reporters on Dec. 4. “And I’ve been proud of her because I feel like she’s really locked in to wanting to be the best that she can be. …
“She looks comfortable. She feels comfortable. … It’s been great to see. She’s a force.”
On Dec. 20, Henderson had 9 points and a career-high 11 rebounds in a 70-65 win over UTSA. With less than six seconds left, she drove from the perimeter to the block and split two defenders for the game-winning layup.
“That’s my favorite play,” she told ESPN+’s Lance Medow postgame with a laugh. “… You read the defense and you know, ‘I’m going downhill.’ And I honestly didn’t even think about it.”
Henderson has also flourished playing alongside Avlijas and sharing point guard duties. About 61% of Henderson’s offensive possessions this season have been with Avlijas also on the floor, according to data from Synergy Sports. When they’re together, whoever has the ball on a given possession is the point guard, and the other is still a playmaker off the ball.
“They have a fun dynamic because they’re really smart kids,” Griffith said. “They’re very, very cerebral … [and] pretty in lockstep with how they see the game. … So it’s like, if somebody’s getting hounded, the other kid can get us in motion. So to me, that is so valuable.”
That dynamic isn’t new for Columbia; in fact, Griffith’s best teams have generally had two high-usage playmakers. Last season, it was Kitty Henderson and guard Cecelia Collins. Before that, forwards Kaitlyn Davis and Hannah Pratt could pair with Kitty to facilitate the offense from multiple spots on the court.
So the hope is that Fliss Henderson and Avlijas can complete the equation: Two facilitators equal success in March. But to even get this far, Henderson first had to make some smart calculations of her own. She had to see a doctor when her back pain became too tough to ignore, and she had to prioritize herself when she was stuck in the darkness so she could eventually find the lightness in the sport again.
Written by Jenn Hatfield
Jenn Hatfield is The IX Basketball's managing editor, Washington Mystics beat reporter and Ivy League beat reporter. She has been a contributor to The IX Basketball since December 2018. Her work has also appeared at FiveThirtyEight, Her Hoop Stats, FanSided, Power Plays, The Equalizer and Princeton Alumni Weekly.
