ZaKiyah Johnson, left, with Sacred Heart teammates Regan Bender and Angelina Pelayo during a visit to Louisville with coach Jeff Walz. (Twitter Photo)
Anderson County coach Clay Birdwhistle thought ZaKiyah Johnson was the best rebounder in the state during the 2020-21 season when she was only an eighth-grader at Shelby County and averaged 21.8 points (10th in the state) and 12.8 rebounds per game.
Bowling Green coach Calvin Head believes she is the best player in the state this season after she averaged 17.8 points and 7.8 rebounds per game, both team highs, for Sacred Heart going into tonight’s state tournament matchup with Anderson County.
The 6-foot forward was named to the ESPN 2025 top 25 watch list before this season started. She had scholarship offers from Kentucky, Louisville, LSU, Mississippi State, Miami, Florida, Arizona, Auburn, Michigan, Penn State, Oklahoma State, UCLA, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Florida State, Minnesota, Georgia Tech, Northern Kentucky and Ohio State before she played her first game this season.
“She was in our district for two years (at Shelby County) and I got to watch that kid develop,” Birdwhistle said. “I remember the first time we played against her in the seventh grade and at worst I thought she was first-team all-state and had the potential to be one of the best players ever to come out of the state.
“She’s also a great kid. Always has a smile on her face. You can see on tape that she is a great teammate. But she is a handful and is going to be a force to be reckoned with for a long time. For my money she is a top five player in the state right now regardless of class.
Johnson has already scored 1,403 career points in three seasons and certainly has basketball genes — her father played at Western Kentucky and her mother played at Morehead State.
Sacred Heart coach Donna Moir doesn’t want to add any pressure to Johnson.
“We’ll see what happens in the next four years,” Moir said. “Obviously she is a special player. I think she can do a lot of things. She doesn’t draw double or triple teams on our team because somebody else can beat you. On a given night anybody can score for us and that takes pressure off her and just allows her to play.”
Johnson had 31 points and nine rebounds in the 7th Region championship game win over Manual. Moir said she was “pretty nervous” in that game but older teammates helped “calm” her nerves and she expects the same in Johnson’s first state tourney game.
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Pikeville and Cooper play this afternoon at the state tourney and Cooper coach Justin Holthaus knows how important sophomore point guard Trinity Rowe is to Pikeville (31-2).
Rowe averages 16.2 points and 2.2 rebounds per game. She is a deadly 3-point shooter (90 of 185, 48.6 percent) and a 77 percent shooter at the foul line.
“She is a real big piece of what they try to do,” Holthaus said. “She is a very talented player, maybe one of the best point guards we have faced. She is able to score, handles the ball well left- and right-handed, gets to the rim, plays well off the bounce and can hit jump shots.
“She’s not just a scoring point guard but also looks to dish and pass. She has a lot of trust with teammates that she will give the ball up. They are really good in transition offense.
“As she goes, they go. She is one of the points we have to focus on.”
