When Francesca Loiseau began college at Marymount (Virginia), she had one goal.
"I didn't want to be where I was when I started," she said.
Yet within weeks of Loiseau's freshman year, a life-threatening health scare turned her world upside down, forcing her to start from square one.
Now, Loiseau's starting point has shifted, but her journey has pushed her in a way she never could have imagined, inspiring others along the way.
TheNCAA named Loiseau its 2026 Inspiration Award honoree. Theawardis presented to an NCAA member who used perseverance, dedication and determination to overcome a life-altering situation and become a role model, giving hope and inspiration to others.
The Lumberton, New Jersey, native began playing tennis competitively in seventh grade.
"I always played, but not competitively and not very well. I started taking some lessons and automatically fell in love with it because it was more of an individual sport," she said. "I was like, 'This is it. This is what I want to do.'"
Loiseau didn't necessarily want to play college tennis, yet Marymount coaches had different plans.
"I talked to the coach at Marymount, and I (thought) the coaches actually want to help you, not just want you to win."
Loiseau began her freshman season with a goal to win just one match.
Within the first month, she earned Atlantic East Conference Player of the Week honors.
"I was so excited. I thought I had one of the best matches I've ever played," she recalled. "I was ready to keep going and hopefully get some other awards along the way."
Yet a week later during team weightlifting session in October 2022, the left side of Loiseau's body started tingling.
As she stood to alert her trainer, she collapsed. Her teammates surrounded her, and she heard someone in the distance say she was having a stroke. Before she could comprehend what it meant, she lost consciousness.
Doctors placed Loiseau on life support with intubation before she underwent an emergency operation involving a craniotomy and evacuation of the blood in her brain. The work of the paramedics, emergency department staff and neurosurgery team saved her life and brain.
Loiseau awoke from a coma three days later.
"It was terrifying," Loiseau recalled. "I couldn't move myself, couldn't move my arm, couldn't move my leg. It's strange because I couldn't tell you the feelings because it was just heavy … like dead weight."
Marymount team physician Landon Mueller described the severity of the injury.
"Doctors found that Frankie had a large spontaneous head bleed due to an underlying cerebral arteriovenous malformation. AVMs are a developmental anomaly of the brain's vascular system which can occur anywhere in the body but are especially dangerous in the brain because they carry a high risk of spontaneous bleeding. AVMs are rare, occurring in 1 in 100,000 people," Mueller said.
"In the case of brain AVMs that bleed, however, 10%-15% of patients die, and 30%-50% experience significant disability. The bleeding can result in neurological symptoms, including loss of consciousness, severe headache, nausea, seizures and unilateral weakness — symptoms from which Frankie suffered."
The Marymount tennis team visited Loiseau multiple times during her three-week stay in the hospital.
"I knew them for maybe a month, and they were all there in the hospital that night, sitting there and waiting for me. And my coach was there for so long," she said. "They'd come to the hospital. A lot of them brought ice cream for me and just little gifts."
Ryan Wildenhain, associate athletics director at Marymount and Loiseau's nominator for the Inspiration Award, added, "When she was in the hospital, her teammates visited daily and she made a point to say, 'I'll see you again on the court.'"
Doctors discharged Loiseau to a rehab facility in Pennsylvania. Every day for weeks the 18-year-old worked through physical, occupational and speech therapy. She continued to relearn basic functions, strengthening her arm and leg in physical therapy.
As a result of her deep sadness about missing tennis, her therapists even incorporated a racket into her daily therapy routine.
"Just to hopefully, maybe, get a cane or a crutch, something that I could use," she said. "(I was) never thinking, 'Hey, maybe I'll never need one again.'"
Yet by Christmas, she walked out of rehab with a cane. She had recaptured all her cognitive and speech functions, too.
Still, she decided to take the semester away from school.
"It was hard to fully accept what had happened," she said. "I didn't want to face people."
Loiseau worried people would talk about her, knowing her only as the girl who collapsed. Her head was completely shaved from brain surgery, and she struggled to go to the grocery store for fear of seeing others.
Yet Loiseau craved the normalcy of her old life. By the fall of 2023, Loiseau decided to go back to campus. Quickly, any fears of feeling "othered" melted away.
Her athletic trainers drove her to her physical therapy appointments. Her teammates would ask her for advice during practices. Athletics department administrators stopped her around campus to say hi and ask how everything was going.
"The school has just been great with keeping me well cared for," she said. "They've just been there. … I think it just made me feel normal even when I could feel some of the people staring at me."
Loiseau said she continues to struggle with life after her AVM rupture. After one practice, Loiseau recalls a conversation with head coach David Carroll.
"I just didn't feel like I was enough. He talked me out of it … and it helped me get back to a smile after that feeling," she recalled. "Sometimes I'll go to my coach, and he'll help me talk it out and be like, 'It did happen, but look at where you are.'"
Loiseau also spends time speaking to traumatic brain injury survivors. While she spoke on a panel at a local hospital, one question from the crowd changed her entire perspective.
"How do you manage going to doctor's appointments if you don't have anyone to go with you?" a woman asked.
The moment struck Loiseau. Her mother attended every single doctor's appointment with her. Her hometown best friend contemplated dropping out of nursing school to help. Her coaches, teammates and Marymount community supported and empowered her daily.
"I don't think I'm inspirational. I think it's the people around me, the support system I have, they're the ones that inspired me," she said. "They inspire me to try to keep pushing and be the best person I can be."
But Loiseau also cites her student-athlete mindset for motivating her recovery.
"The competitiveness in me that I've always had made me want to be better and kept pushing me through it all," she said. "I don't think I fully would have pushed myself to the limits, and beyond the limits, I had if I didn't have that in me."
On March 1, 2025, Loiseau played in a collegiate tennis match for Marymount for the first time since Oct. 8, 2022.
"It was surreal," she said. "It was also terrifying because I was like, 'Oh no, what if I do bad?' I had so many family and friends that came out."
Yet her doubles partner, Lily Plotkin, told her something that changed everything.
"Who cares if we don't win?" she told Loiseau. "It doesn't really matter. This isn't for anybody else. This is for you."
Mueller, Marymount's team physician, recalls the moment Loiseau first stepped back on the court.
"Witnessing Frankie back on the tennis court is definitively the most rewarding and amazing experience I've had as a sports medicine physician at any level and serves as a testament to her grit and perseverance, inspiring all," he said.
In the award nomination form, Wildenhain weighed in on the significance of Loiseau's returning to the tennis court.
"It has taken 2½ years, but Francesca has accomplished these goals. She is once again thriving in the classroom and is back on the tennis court," he wrote.
"Francesca has not only climbed the mountain, but she has brought others with her as well. It has been a joy to watch Francesca use her platform to inspire others near and far from Marymount University. Francesca 'Frankie' Loiseau is without a doubt worthy of the NCAA Inspiration Award."
Now, Loiseau plans to finish out her tennis career and graduate with a degree in accounting in May. Although her path took a turn she never would have imagined, Loiseau is proud of where she is today.
"The biggest thing I tell myself is look at where I was with my injury — paralyzed in a wheelchair — and look how far I've come," she said. "to even just step on a tennis court when no one really thought that was ever going to happen again."