It’s just days until the Pan Am Games, and Michelle Plouffe is sprinting up and down the Saville Community Sports Centre court.

The Edmonton native keeps pace with her teammates, who have had a massive head start — not in the drills, but in preparing for this summer.

While the Canadian women’s basketball team was overseas playing a series of exhibition games several weeks ago, Plouffe stayed in North America to rehab from an injury that has kept her out of action for five months.

The six-foot-three forward is finally poised to make her 2015 national team debut when Canada takes on Venezuela in Toronto next Thursday, and was already in game mode during training camp this week.

“I’m going 100% right now,” Plouffe said. “When I’m in, I’m not holding back anything, definitely not.”

In February, while playing in France, Plouffe suffered what was later determined to be a severe ankle sprain with torn ligaments and bone bruising. The injury brought an early end to an excellent rookie pro season with Arras in one of the world’s top basketball leagues for women.

It took weeks for Plouffe to be properly diagnosed and she was facing an uncertain recovery time when Team Canada opened training camp in Edmonton in May. She spent much of practice time on the sideline riding the stationary bike, not entirely sure when she could join her teammates on the court.

“It kind of sucked just because I didn’t know how long it was going to take but I’m just going with the flow,” Plouffe said.

During the team’s European tour, Plouffe continued rehab in Edmonton and also in Utah, where she attended university. She hit the ground running once the national team reconvened in the Saville at the beginning of July.

“I felt good coming into training camp, probably the best that I had in a month, so that was good timing,” said Plouffe. “I was just working back into it the first couple days and it felt good so I just went with it.”

Plouffe is still not pain-free and likely won’t be during Pan-Ams, but is hopeful she’ll be feeling 100% once the FIBA Americas Olympic qualifying tournament tips off at the Saville on Aug. 9.

“It’s kind of day-to-day dealing with it, and then if worst comes to worst, we have a backup (treatment) plan,” The Harry Ainlay grad said. “But so far it hasn’t been too bad, so I’m just kind of rolling with it.”

This will be the first Pan-Am Games for Plouffe, who has previously competed in the 2012 Olympics and 2014 World Championships. Women’s basketball runs July 16 to 21 and Canada is a strong medal contender.

“It’s going to be a great experience just to be in the village and in Toronto, but I’m most looking forward to playing some of the teams we’re going to play later (at Americas),” said Plouffe. “So that will be a good test for us to see how we handle things.”

MONITORING BULGAK

In between getting her team ready for the Pan-Am Games, Canadian women’s basketball coach Lisa Thomaidis has been keeping a close eye on the Summer University Games in South Korea, where the Canadian women’s hoops team plays Russia in a semi-final Saturday.

Canada has won its first four games at Universiade thanks in no small part to Edmontonian Adut Bulgak, who is averaging 18 points and just under 11 rebounds.

“She’s one of those players that just has a nose for the ball and has a real knack for scoring,” Thomaidis said of the 22-year-old centre, an Archbishop O’Leary alumnus. “She’s a world-class rebounder and she gets a lot of stuff off the glass. She’s a really good athlete and (because) she can get out and stretch the defence, knock down those threes, she’s a very difficult player to guard.”

The success of Canada’s entry at the University Games is particularly encouraging, given it features several players that were early cuts from national team training camp at the Saville Community Sports Centre in May and are expected to challenge for a spot on the senior team in the very near future.

Among those is the six-foot-four Bulgak, who exploded onto the scene as a junior at Florida State last season, when she was named to the All-ACC First Team and took the Seminoles on a deep NCAA tournament run. She’s carried that momentum forward right from the beginning of the summer with several impressive outings in Canada’s tune-up games prior to Universiade.

“We’re certainly very interested in following her if she continues to have great success,” Thomaidis added.

@SunBrianSwane

brian.swane@sunmedia.ca