Jackson using off-season to recover from injury

Arkansas' Jessica Jackson dishes the ball off as Vanderbilt's Rachel Bell defends on Monday, Feb. 8, 2016, at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville.

FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas Coach Jimmy Dykes said All-SEC forward Jessica Jackson is continuing to recover from a broken bone in her right wrist.

Jackson, who is right-handed, suffered the injury late last season according to Dykes.

"We don't talk about injuries while we're playing, but she played the last two weeks with a broken bone in her wrist," Dykes said Wednesday. "She's been in a cast since two or three days after our last game."

Arkansas ended its season at 12-18 with a 68-51 loss to Tennessee in the SEC Tournament in which Jackson shot 5 of 18 from the field and had 12 points and 7 rebounds in 35 minutes.

The Razorbacks, who went 7-9 in SEC play, were eligible to play in the WNIT as the conference team with the best record not to make the NCAA Tournament, but Dykes said it was best to end the season and focus on Jackson's health.

"As soon as that Tennessee game was over, we knew it was best for our program and for her to get her in that cast and get her healed up," Dykes said. "She's making great, great progress in that area.

"We're just being very cautious with her for obvious reasons. We want her full speed in August and September, not so much right now."

Dykes said surgery for Jackson was an option, but that it was decided the best course of action was for her to wear a cast.

"The injury she had is in the part of the wrist where the blood flow isn't great, and if you mess around with that, it can then spiral into surgery and things can last maybe four or five or six months," Dykes said. "There was no way we were going to do that.

"We avoided the surgery by quickly putting her into that cast. … The doctor felt like if we put her in a cast and stabilized the wrist, we could avoid surgery and speed up her healing process."

Dykes said Jackson, a 6-3 senior from Little Rock who averaged 16.4 points and 6.3 rebounds last season, is expected to have the cast removed in about two weeks.

While wearing the cast, Jackson has been going through conditioning workouts, including running the mile and sprints.

"Jess is probably in better shape now than she was at the end of the season," Dykes said. "That's her next progression as an athlete.

"She wants to play in the WNBA. A year from now, she wants to be on somebody's roster.

"I think right now the light has come on for Jessica Jackson more than it ever has. She realizes she's counting down to the end of her career. So the one thing she's been able to do with that broken wrist is work on her physical conditioning."