Tristan Clark’s journey is about love as much as it is about basketball.
Inherently introverted, he found comfort in the sport at a young age, spending hours shooting on the basket outside his home while his mother was at work. As he grew — he was 6-6 in eighth grade — so did his relationship with the game. By the time he was a 6-10 sophomore at Baylor, he was one of the best college basketball players in the country.
True love, like Clark had with basketball, can fill the heart, but love lost can break it. And for Clark, it nearly did.
In 2019 — almost exactly three years ago — Clark suffered a torn meniscus in his left knee. At the time, he was leading the nation in field goal percentage. A meniscus injury, he figured, would take about a month to recover. He figured he’d be back to his normal, all-conference-caliber self in no time. But the knee kept swelling, and the pain kept coming. Unable to become the basketball player he once was, he retired from the game.
“Even though I love the game of basketball, I feel like it had become toxic for me,” Clark said.
This year, as a senior at SMU, Clark has rediscovered a love for basketball. He came out of retirement and is averaging nearly six points in almost 18 minutes per game. He’s contributing to the success of a team that’s 13-4 heading into a showdown with a talented Memphis team on Thursday.
His knee, thanks to stem cell treatment and hours of daily management, is feeling good again. His mind, after undergoing perhaps its biggest challenge, is stronger than ever. And though his love story has had its challenges, he’s thankful for all of it.
“That was a metamorphosis phase for me,” said Clark, who’s a unique combination of quiet and candid. “I feel like all of that happened for a reason.”
Career low point
It was a cold, February evening in Austin. Perfect pool weather, at least for someone hell-bent on doing whatever they could to get healthy.
It was hours before Baylor was set to play against Texas, just two nights after Baylor hosted Oklahoma State at home. The quick turnaround and the cold weather created a painful combination for Clark. His knee, the one with the previously torn meniscus, was already swollen before the game, and it wasn’t going down. So he went outside to the hotel pool, in the cold, with the hopes of loosening up his leg and lowering the swelling.
“I’m just doing everything I can,” Clark recalled.
Clark came off the bench and played seven minutes in Baylor’s win over Texas that night. He had three rebounds and no points before he fouled out. It was the lowest point of his career, he said.
“He doesn’t have it anymore,” he remembers seeing someone write on Twitter. It pained him to think the same thing.
At the time, Baylor was amid a 23-game winning streak. The team was special, and Clark thought everyone was playing well, except himself. Mentally, he felt isolated.
That season eventually was cut short because of the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic. Before the next season started, Clark announced he was medically retiring.
“I called him and talked to him,” said Rodney Clark, who coached Tristan at San Antonio’s Wagner High School. “And you could hear it in his voice. He was emotionally, just like, devastated.”
Basketball was Tristan’s life. When he retired in November 2020, he was forced to confront what life would look like without it.
The idea, for anyone, would be understandably terrifying. For Clark, it was a mental challenge.
But it was also an opportunity. For the first time, Clark wasn’t chasing the player he used to be. Instead, he could focus on being the best version of himself. He was able to rest. He was able to focus on his studies and graduate from Baylor. He got a black lab and started going on long walks and hikes around San Antonio with her. For the first time in a long time, he had a life without basketball.
And that drew him back.
‘Wow, I’m back’
Tim Jankovich was curious.
The SMU men’s basketball coach had known of Clark since high school. He saw Clark excel at Baylor, becoming one of the nation’s best frontcourt players by year two. And Jankovich had followed what appeared to be the end of Clark’s basketball journey: a knee injury that just wouldn’t heal, and an early retirement for a 6-10 forward who showed so much potential.
That was the story everyone, including Jankovich, knew, but Jankovich had heard whispers of a potential new development. He heard Clark wanted another shot.
To fulfill his curiosity, Jankovich needed to find the answers to two questions: was it even possible for Clark to play Division I basketball again, and, more importantly, why would Clark want to?
“I needed both of those,” Jankovich recalled, “and I got both of those.”
Jankovich needed both because he knew it wouldn’t be easy for any player to go through hours of daily treatment just to play, like Clark does. Or for a former star player to play a role bigger than himself on this SMU team, like Jankovich hoped.
“I told [Jankovich] if, mentally, Tristan wanted to go through it and persevere, we knew, physically and skill-wise and intelligence-wise, he was going to be a great asset to the program,” Baylor coach Scott Drew recalled. “He’s a great teammate, he’s winner, he’s used to winning, and he’s helped SMU to this point.”
Simply being on the court again has helped Clark, as well.
On Nov. 9, Clark played in his first college basketball game in more than 600 days. He came off the bench against McNeese State and scored 12 points in 17 minutes in his SMU debut.
The point total — like it hasn’t all season — didn’t matter. All Clark wanted to do that night is be on the court, doing what he could to help SMU win.
During the game Clark was too focused for the significance of the moment to hit him. It was after the game when he could feel it. When he hugged his mom and saw her smile.
“That’s when it really kicked in,” Clark said. “When I’m like, ‘Wow, I’m back.’”
It took a lot for Clark to get back to college basketball. He had to overcome physical limitations and heartache. He had to confront mental obstacles that weren’t easy. But in the end, it was worth it. Because love is always worth it.
