“I remember falling and rolling, and I knew in the back of my head that I usually get back up from little injuries, but I couldn’t get back up from that one,” Powell said. “Our old trainer sat me down … and told me that it was an MCL, ACL and a meniscus injury. I just remember crying.”

The path between Powell’s junior and senior seasons has been filled with adversity. Between the partial tear in her MCL that sidelined her for two months, the graduation of former star shooting guard Sugar Rodgers, the infusion of youth into a team with only two seniors, and perhaps most shockingly, the controversial resignation of former head coach Keith Brown, Powell has had more than her fair share of challenges as the team’s starting point guard and one of two senior co-captains. Despite it all, Powell expects this to be the season in which Georgetown regains its place as an elite Big East squad and NCAA Tournament participant.

In February, the outlook was far from rosy. Powell’s partial tear of her MCL sparked a slump that saw the Blue and Gray lost seven of their final eight regular season games and crashed out of NCAA tournament contention for the first time since 2009.

“Samisha was our starting point guard,” senior power forward and co-captain Andrea White said. “When she got injured, we had to have young point guards come in and play a role that they weren’t used to, so we didn’t have that experience on the court.”

While her team sputtered, Powell languished on the bench, even though team doctors cleared her to play at the end of the season. Brown, concerned with Powell’s long-term health, decided that she would undergo rehab instead of putting her knee at further risk.

“It was a frustrating process. I hate rehab, and it took so long. I was in the training room for hours just trying to get better,” Powell said, rubbing her knee.

Although Powell is nearly fully recovered from her injury, she still feels soreness at times. But the injury didn’t prevent her from using the offseason to improve her game and to embrace her new role as a team leader. For the past four years, Georgetown’s offense has been dominated by the talismanic Sugar Rodgers, now a WNBA champion with the Minnesota Lynx. With Rodgers’ graduation, Georgetown has a chance to build a more balanced offense, and one of the players who figures to play a more integral role is Powell, the team’s fourth-leading scorer, with 6.2 points per game last season.

“The point position is traditionally a position of leadership,” interim Head Coach Jim Lewis said. “You have the ball in your hands. She is the extension of the coach, if you will. She is a really dedicated, hard-nosed basketball player who sounds, looks and acts like a senior at Georgetown.”

Powell maintains that her main role on the team is that of floor general, and she hopes to build on her 3.1 assists per game last season by providing scoring opportunities for White, sophomore shooting guard Katie McCormick and freshman center Natalie Butler, among others.

“My job is to distribute the ball and to create shots for other people,” Powell said. “I’ve worked hard on my three-point shot. If my shot’s open then my shot’s open, but as a point guard, I think my role is just distributing the ball, the same as last year.”

In addition to her normal on-court duties, Powell, along with White, has assumed the responsibility of integrating five freshmen into the team. After graduating three seniors last year, this year’s Hoyas have just two seniors and no juniors.

This challenge was only amplified by the unexpected resignation of former coach Brown and the appointment of interim Head Coach Jim Lewis.

“It was a rough period for us, because we had new players coming in who were recruited under this specific coach, so it was hard when he left,” Powell said. “Because Andrea and I are seniors, throughout the whole process, we just tried to keep the team together, doing a lot of team-oriented activities.”

Despite the negative attention and uncertainty as a result of the coaching change, the Hoyas have appeared to turn the corner thanks to the seniors’ leadership and the new coach.

“[Lewis] is not coming in here trying to change everything that we’ve been working on,” Powell said. “And with our assistant coaches still here, they can tell him what they’ve been doing.”

If Powell’s handling of the obstacles that she has faced this offseason is any indication, it appears that the Hoyas will have no trouble adjusting to Lewis’ coaching. After watching from the sidelines at the end of last season and maintaining cohesiveness within a young team in the midst of a coaching controversy in the offseason, Powell is primed to lead the Hoyas to its third NCAA Tournament in her four seasons.

“As the [healing] process continues and we’re practicing more … I feel like I’m getting better at a lot of things,” Powell said.

In addition to reaching the tournament, the Hoyas’ lofty goals include winning the Big East regular season title. With Powell at the helm as point guard, leader, captain and senior on this team, such a goal seems within reach.