Jim Mashek

LADY HORNETS COACH HEIDI COLEMAN: ‘SHE’s GOING TO COME BACK EVEN STRONGER’

Blame it on the Eurostep.

That fateful move near the basket inside the cozy Glasgow High School gymnasium.

The step that sent Metcalfe County girls basketball standout Jozie Allen to the floor. Writhing in pain. Maybe not a state of shock, but close.

The Lady Hornets’ 17-year-old force on the frontcourt wasn’t sure what to make of it.

Metcalfe County had already established itself as a contender on the KHSAA’s 4th Region scene, sporting a 17-5 record when the Lady Hornets took the floor against Glasgow on January 28.

But it looked as though they’d have to get through February, at least, without the 5-foot-10 sophomore forward, the team’s leading rebounder, and an effective scorer near the basket.

We’ll let Allen herself explain.

“I was driving for a layup, and I tried to do a ‘Eurostep,'” Allen said. “And I went down, under the basket. I did get fouled. By (Glasgow’s) Kayla Kirkpatrick, who’s actually a good friend of mine …

“I had never felt that kind of pain. There was a ‘pop’ in the (left) knee. I decided to stay in the game. My teammates said I’d be OK … We went and had an MRI done after the game. Kayla texted me after the game, too.”

(Metcalfe took the game, knocking off the Lady Scotties, 56-50.)

Before long, Jozie Allen, her family, and charismatic but driven Metcalfe County coach Heidi Coleman got the news.

Bad news.

A partially torn ACL, and two tears in the meniscus.

Coleman remembers it this way:

“Frankly, we weren’t playing very well. We were lethargic,” she said. “We’d made a point, to try to drive to the basket. Jozie puts her head down, she drives through some traffic, and lands funny … She gets up, limping, and goes to the free-throw line to shoot her free throws …

“She comes back to the bench. She tells us, “I think I’ve done something to my leg. I’m still going to play the game, but I have to get this checked out.”

Afterward.

The Lady Hornets still had a game to play.

John Allen, the Metcalfe County Schools athletic director, the basketball teams’ bus driver and Jozie’s father, just wanted what was best for his daughter. He consulted with doctors treating Jozie and learned that all things considered, the knee was still somewhat stable. With a brace, well, maybe …

“We had a kid at Metcalfe, Peyton Dial, who played an entire year with a torn ACL a few years ago,” John Allen said. “She had a special brace. We talked to the doctors, and they told us it wasn’t going to get any worse … We were in a time crunch.

“We had a young team, but Jozie knew what kind of potential we had. She was going to play. It was just amazing, to me, not only that she could play, but that she could play at a high level.”

The Lady Hornets had championships in their sights.

Metcalfe County is one of the smallest schools in the KHSAA’s 4th Region. Located in Edmonton, about an hour’s drive east of Bowling Green, the school has approximately 450 students. Its football team competes at the Class 2A level. Plenty of teenagers work after school there, but Metcalfe County athletics is something that always brought the community together.

Heidi Coleman’s 2024-25 Lady Hornets squad was about to take that to another level.

“There was a will to win, with this team,” Coleman said. “That’s something Jozie’s always had, but not all kids have it. She can play the ‘long game.’ When your best players are your hardest workers, it can rub off on the other kids.

“A lot of times this year, if we just had to ‘tough it out,’ it was like we did it because Jozie was doing it.”

John Allen, who played basketball at Cumberland County High School and Eastern Kentucky University, puts it this way:

“We knew this team would have potential when they were little girls,” he said.

So Jozie Allen consulted with her doctors, Heidi Coleman, and the team trainer, Samantha Coomer, about the path in front of her.

Stabilize the left knee, and then go from there.

“Honestly, I really don’t have a high pain tolerance,” Jozie Allen said. “I’m not sure how I did it …”

The winning certainly helped.

And the Lady Hornets started winning a lotta games.

“I did it for my team, mostly,” she said.

After Allen’s injury, Metcalfe County won two hard-fought KHSAA 16th District games, against Russell County and Cumberland County. Both of them by three points. After a 61-36 rout of Campbellsville High School, the Lady Hornets squared off against tradition-rich Barren County, on the Trojanettes’ home court.

In Glasgow.

Maybe two or three miles, as the crow flies, from Glasgow High School.

Jozie Allen just kept playing.

She had a game-high 15 points and 10 rebounds, playing for a team with limited bench strength, as the Lady Hornets clipped Barren coach Piper Lindsey’s talented squad, 47-38.

No time to slow down now.

Metcalfe’s next three games wouldn’t be all that competitive, as Hart County, Somerset and Russell County were cast aside as the Lady Hornets reached the 16th District championship game.

Cumberland County was playing at home, and both teams were on their way to the 4th Region tournament, but Metcalfe used senior forward Kassady London’s game-high 24 points to stop the Lady Panthers, 55-47. Jozie Allen had 13 points and five rebounds as the Lady Hornets extended their winning streak to nine games.

A few days later, Metcalfe tangled with Warren East in the 4th Region quarterfinals. Warren East scrapped with the Lady Hornets, tooth and nail, before a lane violation with less than a second remaining cost the Lady Raiders a chance to force an overtime. Allen had 12 points and 12 rebounds, both team highs, as the Lady Hornets prevailed, 45-44.

The next night, Metcalfe County squared off with Bowling Green High School, which was playing for its fifth consecutive 4th Region title. John Allen remembers consulting with his daughter, before she even got off the bus, when the team arrived at Diddle Arena.

“My wife and I had some doubts about Jozie playing in that game,” John Allen said. “I told her, Jozie, ‘you don’t have to play, you’ve done all you can do.’ I was wavering, a little … Jozie gave me a puzzled look.

“At a school like ours, you don’t get many opportunities like this.”

So Metcalfe took the floor against the Lady Purples, who’d had some injury misfortune of their own. Senior point guard NaTaya Wardlow sustained a torn ACL in the first two weeks of the season. Katy Smiley, a 6-foot senior wing, moved to the point. Bowling Green had an up-and-down season, but the Lady Purples were two wins from going back to Lexington for the KHSAA Sweet 16.

Metcalfe County was just too tough. The Lady Hornets won, 40-30, but four days later, on a Saturday night at Diddle Arena, LaReesha Cawthorn, Kloie Smith and Franklin-Simpson finally broke through for its own 4th Region championship, claiming a 72-45 victory.

Jozie Allen was getting noticed, and she’d managed to play through the pain. A couple weeks later, she underwent surgery. Shortly after that, it was time for her rehab. Heidi Coleman might have to keep an eye on her, because Allen is gonna want to get back on the court when she can.

It’s going to be an arduous process.

“The rehab is going good. I’m able to walk now,” Jozie Allen said. “Hopefully, in a few weeks, I’ll be able to get my brace off.”

Coleman may have to establish some ground rules.

“We’re going to have to be 100 percent (certain she’s healthy),” she said. “I want the best for Jozie, not just for this (2025-26) season, but her entire basketball career. Mentally, there are a lot of hoops you have to jump through before you come back and play.

“Once we let the bull out of the gate …”

Coleman has an extensive basketball background, from her playing days at Metcalfe County and Wake Forest University, to her front-office experience with the WNBA and the NBA. She’s had reconstructive knee surgery herself, and she’s aware that teenage girls are considerably more susceptible to torn ACLs than their male counterparts.

(I have a niece, Emily Mashek, who had one torn ACL while playing high school soccer, and then another while on the lacrosse field in Maryland.)

But Kassady London is the only senior on the 2024-25 Metcalfe roster, so Jozie Allen, Bree Jolly, Aubrey Glass and the other Lady Hornets players will be facing high expectations when they’re back on the court, together, in six months or so.

“It consumed my life, for a couple years, coming back from that injury,” Heidi Coleman said. “I feel like Jozie has some phenomenal people around her. There’s no substitute for having the right mindset.

“There’s no doubt, in my mind. She’s going to come back even stronger.”

I certainly wouldn’t bet against her.

Good luck, Jozie.