Photo by: Mary Grace Grabill/Northwestern Athletics
‘Nothing Could Shake Me’: Jason Gajadhar’s Return Electrifies Northwestern Midfield
8/27/2025 10:00:00 AM | Men's Soccer
By: Jake Epstein, NUSports.com
Jason Gajadhar often ponders whether he's putting in enough effort on the training ground.
It's a puzzling thought for the redshirt junior midfielder who seemingly possesses a tireless motor on the pitch. A stabilizer in the spine of Northwestern Medicine Field at Martin Stadium, Gajadhar has long served as an integral contributor to head coach Russell Payne's system.
"He's got the highest level of work rate you could ask for of any player," Payne said. "I'd be hard pressed to think of a player that's worked harder than him that I've ever coached. I've never questioned that guy's effort — not once."
But the midfield maestro's doubt isn't a contradiction of his coach's acclaim. Instead, it's a measure of how much Gajadhar sacrificed to simply take the field during Northwestern's season opener.
On Aug. 30, 2024, Gajadhar's world took a seismic shift in the 77th minute of the Wildcats' 2-1 non-conference win against Drake. As he crashed to the turf, Gajadhar heard one of the most dreaded sounds to any athlete: a pop in his knee.
"I thought that was the year we were going to go big as a team," Gajadhar said. "My legs were feeling amazing. That was the most fit I'd ever been in my time here."
Soon after, Gajadhar received the prognosis. He tore his ACL, ending his junior campaign after just three games. Without Gajadhar in the lineup, Northwestern went on to lose five of its next seven matches, including an 0-4 start to Big Ten play.
The injury tossed Payne's preseason plans into a scramble drill.
"It was a tough moment for all of us," Payne said. "I think we took it harder than he did. When he went down and later got diagnosed, he had a stiffer upper lip than any of us did. That told all of us, 'Get on with it.' We missed him a lot, and that's why some of those results that followed were what they were."
As the Wildcats looked to push forward without Gajadhar on the field, the Toronto native set off on a near year-long journey to return to play. He spent countless hours regaining strength and rebuilding his fitness, seldom letting his spirit drop.
Now less than a year post-reconstructive surgery, Gajadhar is back in the fold, logging key midfield minutes and starting Northwestern's first two games of the 2025 season.
"All the adversity we've faced shaped us into who we are," Gajadhar said. "We're the most resilient team on the field, and we're going to show it every game."
When he was 12, Gajadhar earned a spot in the Toronto FC youth academy system. The club took him across national boundaries, including a trip to Europe, where Gajadhar competed against FC Barcelona and AFC Ajax academy squads.
At first glance, college soccer was a "backup plan". Gajadhar sought to turn professional after he completed high school and later embarked on trials with German squads Hamburger SV and Hannover 96.
Both Bundesliga outfits were impressed by Gajadhar's technical and tactical acumen, but he needed to add weight to compete at the professional level. His stature also left Toronto FC wary of offering him a first-team contract.
But those concerns didn't extend to Payne and his staff.
"When I first saw JG play, he plays like a guy who doesn't actually know how big he is," Payne said. "He plays like a guy who's 6-3, 185 pounds. He's 5-foot-10, 140 — but it doesn't matter. He's just like 'I'm going to go make plays.' He's an absolute dawg. He can back it up with skill, and he has a great soccer IQ. That stood out in 10 minutes of watching him."
On the recruiting trail, Payne sold Gajadhar on the opportunity to help build a program back to prominence. With Northwestern's academic pedigree and the chance to play Big Ten soccer, Gajadhar committed to join a star-studded 2022 Wildcat recruiting class, which Top Drawer Soccer ranked at No. 5 in the nation.
Gajadhar carved out an immediate role, earning a spot on the Big Ten All-Freshman and All-Tournament teams as a first-year. He then made 15 starts as a sophomore in 2023, finding his voice as a leader in the middle of the park. That year, Northwestern went from just three wins in 2022 to contending for a regular season title up to the conference's final match day.
"We all had a fire under us after what happened," Gajadhar said. "We thought we should have made it through the tournament, but the team kept their heads held high and continued grinding."
Gajadhar still remembers the exact sequence.
With a man at his back, he fielded a pass near the right touchline. Gajadhar felt contact and went down. The play had all the makings of a routine foul, except Gajadhar's left foot got stuck in the turf. He immediately knew something was awry.
A few days later, while moving into his new apartment, Gajadhar received the call with his MRI results. By that point, he'd already begun preparing for the worst.
"I'm not someone who thinks too much about what could've been in the future," Gajadhar said. "I'm normally focused on the present. I tried my hardest to think about 'What are the next steps?' I wanted surgery right away to come back for the season next year. I didn't have time to think about what the season could've been because I had to be there to support the guys."
As he shifted into an off-the-field role, Gajadhar undertook his own crash course in midfield play. He studied momentum shifts, how opposing teams pressed Northwestern's central midfielders.
A player who once worked in silence and seldom spoke at the early youth ranks, Gajadhar made sure nobody cheered louder from the sidelines. His father, who placed a ball at Gajadhar's feet soon after he learned to walk, had his own motivation for the midfielder.
"My dad told me 'Understand the reason why you came here. You came here to get bigger. This is the perfect opportunity to put on some weight,'" Gajadhar said. "Instead of thinking about how much time I have left until I'm able to play, I was taking every day by day, every workout by workout, just trying to get better and put on more weight than I did before."
His rehabilitation began with daily 7 a.m. workouts. Gajadhar spent the first three months, which he deemed the hardest, activating his leg. During that period, he logged five hours per day in a Continuous Passive Motion (CPM) machine. Then, his recovery shifted to lifting, building explosiveness and balance work.
By April, the training staff cleared Gajadhar for non-contact work. His progress placed him on pace to return for the start of preseason.
"The determination to come back was second to none," assistant coach Ronnie Bouemboue said. "We didn't have to worry about him coming back. It was only a matter of time. Obviously, the coaching staff wanted him back on the field as soon as possible, but nobody wanted to be back faster than he did."
Gajadhar sometimes wonders just how he reached the other side of a grueling rehabilitation process. He credits his family, girlfriend, teammates, trainers, and coaches with providing an extensive support system.
He said the past year has provided a constant reminder of his soaring aspirations.
"The injury was an eye-opener to me, just how hard I have to work for something I love," Gajadhar said. "It brought back what I'm really doing this for: to go pro. The way I go into every game, every day, is that I got through the hardest time in my life, not by myself, but with the people around me. Nothing could ever shake me from that day."
This season, Gajadhar has tasked himself with taking more players on in one-versus-one scenarios. He possesses the positional versatility to play as both a central attacking and defensive midfielder, depending on game scenarios. Bouemboue quipped that Gajadhar could play anywhere but between the sticks.
From the first day of captain's practices to the initial weeks of the regular season, teammates have seen Gajadhar swiftly pick up his fitness and return to his pre-injury form.
"The entire spring, he was grinding in the weight room, never found an excuse," senior goalkeeper Rafael Ponce de León said. "JG is the best player on this team. What he does in every scenario is just exemplary of what we should all be doing."
For Payne, Gajadhar's play will be critical to the Wildcats actualizing their potential in 2025.
Payne said his staff kept Gajadhar "on a leash" in the spring rather than push for an early return. Now, Payne has watched Gajadhar elevate the team's collective standard and help integrate a flurry of newcomers into the midfield.
"I think, as do many of my peers who tried to recruit him at the same time, that he's one of the guys in the midfield in this league that you have to keep a close eye on," Payne said. "He could be one of the best, and when you have a guy like that on your field, he makes everybody better with every action."
While he has an extra year of eligibility in his hip pocket, Gajadhar wants to gauge his professional stock after the season before making any major decisions.
In the meantime, whenever he takes the pitch, Gajadhar is playing for far more than himself.
"Going through that, taking a year off soccer — the thing that I love — a lot of people can't say that they made it back fully," Gajadhar said. "It makes me a better person. It makes me stronger. I look back at the people who've also been through it, like Brett Chrisman and Tyler Warren, who've all reached out to me. I'm doing it for them. I'm doing it for all the guys I've looked up to."
Jason Gajadhar often ponders whether he's putting in enough effort on the training ground.
It's a puzzling thought for the redshirt junior midfielder who seemingly possesses a tireless motor on the pitch. A stabilizer in the spine of Northwestern Medicine Field at Martin Stadium, Gajadhar has long served as an integral contributor to head coach Russell Payne's system.
"He's got the highest level of work rate you could ask for of any player," Payne said. "I'd be hard pressed to think of a player that's worked harder than him that I've ever coached. I've never questioned that guy's effort — not once."
But the midfield maestro's doubt isn't a contradiction of his coach's acclaim. Instead, it's a measure of how much Gajadhar sacrificed to simply take the field during Northwestern's season opener.
On Aug. 30, 2024, Gajadhar's world took a seismic shift in the 77th minute of the Wildcats' 2-1 non-conference win against Drake. As he crashed to the turf, Gajadhar heard one of the most dreaded sounds to any athlete: a pop in his knee.
"I thought that was the year we were going to go big as a team," Gajadhar said. "My legs were feeling amazing. That was the most fit I'd ever been in my time here."
Soon after, Gajadhar received the prognosis. He tore his ACL, ending his junior campaign after just three games. Without Gajadhar in the lineup, Northwestern went on to lose five of its next seven matches, including an 0-4 start to Big Ten play.
The injury tossed Payne's preseason plans into a scramble drill.
"It was a tough moment for all of us," Payne said. "I think we took it harder than he did. When he went down and later got diagnosed, he had a stiffer upper lip than any of us did. That told all of us, 'Get on with it.' We missed him a lot, and that's why some of those results that followed were what they were."
As the Wildcats looked to push forward without Gajadhar on the field, the Toronto native set off on a near year-long journey to return to play. He spent countless hours regaining strength and rebuilding his fitness, seldom letting his spirit drop.
Now less than a year post-reconstructive surgery, Gajadhar is back in the fold, logging key midfield minutes and starting Northwestern's first two games of the 2025 season.
"All the adversity we've faced shaped us into who we are," Gajadhar said. "We're the most resilient team on the field, and we're going to show it every game."
***
Gajadhar's soccer story traces its roots to Trinidad and Tobago. There, his father, Steven Gajadhar, fell in love with the game as a youth player. A midfielder in his own right, Gajadhar's father passed his passion down to his son as he grew up in Canada.When he was 12, Gajadhar earned a spot in the Toronto FC youth academy system. The club took him across national boundaries, including a trip to Europe, where Gajadhar competed against FC Barcelona and AFC Ajax academy squads.
At first glance, college soccer was a "backup plan". Gajadhar sought to turn professional after he completed high school and later embarked on trials with German squads Hamburger SV and Hannover 96.
Both Bundesliga outfits were impressed by Gajadhar's technical and tactical acumen, but he needed to add weight to compete at the professional level. His stature also left Toronto FC wary of offering him a first-team contract.
But those concerns didn't extend to Payne and his staff.
"When I first saw JG play, he plays like a guy who doesn't actually know how big he is," Payne said. "He plays like a guy who's 6-3, 185 pounds. He's 5-foot-10, 140 — but it doesn't matter. He's just like 'I'm going to go make plays.' He's an absolute dawg. He can back it up with skill, and he has a great soccer IQ. That stood out in 10 minutes of watching him."
On the recruiting trail, Payne sold Gajadhar on the opportunity to help build a program back to prominence. With Northwestern's academic pedigree and the chance to play Big Ten soccer, Gajadhar committed to join a star-studded 2022 Wildcat recruiting class, which Top Drawer Soccer ranked at No. 5 in the nation.
Gajadhar carved out an immediate role, earning a spot on the Big Ten All-Freshman and All-Tournament teams as a first-year. He then made 15 starts as a sophomore in 2023, finding his voice as a leader in the middle of the park. That year, Northwestern went from just three wins in 2022 to contending for a regular season title up to the conference's final match day.
"We all had a fire under us after what happened," Gajadhar said. "We thought we should have made it through the tournament, but the team kept their heads held high and continued grinding."
***
Gajadhar still remembers the exact sequence.
With a man at his back, he fielded a pass near the right touchline. Gajadhar felt contact and went down. The play had all the makings of a routine foul, except Gajadhar's left foot got stuck in the turf. He immediately knew something was awry.
A few days later, while moving into his new apartment, Gajadhar received the call with his MRI results. By that point, he'd already begun preparing for the worst.
"I'm not someone who thinks too much about what could've been in the future," Gajadhar said. "I'm normally focused on the present. I tried my hardest to think about 'What are the next steps?' I wanted surgery right away to come back for the season next year. I didn't have time to think about what the season could've been because I had to be there to support the guys."
As he shifted into an off-the-field role, Gajadhar undertook his own crash course in midfield play. He studied momentum shifts, how opposing teams pressed Northwestern's central midfielders.
A player who once worked in silence and seldom spoke at the early youth ranks, Gajadhar made sure nobody cheered louder from the sidelines. His father, who placed a ball at Gajadhar's feet soon after he learned to walk, had his own motivation for the midfielder.
"My dad told me 'Understand the reason why you came here. You came here to get bigger. This is the perfect opportunity to put on some weight,'" Gajadhar said. "Instead of thinking about how much time I have left until I'm able to play, I was taking every day by day, every workout by workout, just trying to get better and put on more weight than I did before."
His rehabilitation began with daily 7 a.m. workouts. Gajadhar spent the first three months, which he deemed the hardest, activating his leg. During that period, he logged five hours per day in a Continuous Passive Motion (CPM) machine. Then, his recovery shifted to lifting, building explosiveness and balance work.
By April, the training staff cleared Gajadhar for non-contact work. His progress placed him on pace to return for the start of preseason.
"The determination to come back was second to none," assistant coach Ronnie Bouemboue said. "We didn't have to worry about him coming back. It was only a matter of time. Obviously, the coaching staff wanted him back on the field as soon as possible, but nobody wanted to be back faster than he did."
***
Gajadhar sometimes wonders just how he reached the other side of a grueling rehabilitation process. He credits his family, girlfriend, teammates, trainers, and coaches with providing an extensive support system.
He said the past year has provided a constant reminder of his soaring aspirations.
"The injury was an eye-opener to me, just how hard I have to work for something I love," Gajadhar said. "It brought back what I'm really doing this for: to go pro. The way I go into every game, every day, is that I got through the hardest time in my life, not by myself, but with the people around me. Nothing could ever shake me from that day."
This season, Gajadhar has tasked himself with taking more players on in one-versus-one scenarios. He possesses the positional versatility to play as both a central attacking and defensive midfielder, depending on game scenarios. Bouemboue quipped that Gajadhar could play anywhere but between the sticks.
From the first day of captain's practices to the initial weeks of the regular season, teammates have seen Gajadhar swiftly pick up his fitness and return to his pre-injury form.
"The entire spring, he was grinding in the weight room, never found an excuse," senior goalkeeper Rafael Ponce de León said. "JG is the best player on this team. What he does in every scenario is just exemplary of what we should all be doing."
For Payne, Gajadhar's play will be critical to the Wildcats actualizing their potential in 2025.
Payne said his staff kept Gajadhar "on a leash" in the spring rather than push for an early return. Now, Payne has watched Gajadhar elevate the team's collective standard and help integrate a flurry of newcomers into the midfield.
"I think, as do many of my peers who tried to recruit him at the same time, that he's one of the guys in the midfield in this league that you have to keep a close eye on," Payne said. "He could be one of the best, and when you have a guy like that on your field, he makes everybody better with every action."
While he has an extra year of eligibility in his hip pocket, Gajadhar wants to gauge his professional stock after the season before making any major decisions.
In the meantime, whenever he takes the pitch, Gajadhar is playing for far more than himself.
"Going through that, taking a year off soccer — the thing that I love — a lot of people can't say that they made it back fully," Gajadhar said. "It makes me a better person. It makes me stronger. I look back at the people who've also been through it, like Brett Chrisman and Tyler Warren, who've all reached out to me. I'm doing it for them. I'm doing it for all the guys I've looked up to."
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