Austin Peay State University Athletics

By: Brad Kirtley, Former Sports Information Director

"Our student athletes don't care how much you know until they how much they know you care." 

Has there been anyone who has lived by her (athletic trainer) organization's motto more than retired Austin Peay athletic trainer Joni Johnson, who now works for Hendricks Regional Health in Indianapolis, Ind.  

For 30 years she served first as assistant Austin Peay athletic trainer from 1992-2006 and then head athletic trainer from 2007-2022.  Bottom line she always put the student athlete first, sometimes to her own detriment. 

"It was nothing for her to put in an 18-hour day," said longtime friend and team orthopedist Dr. Cooper Beazley. "Even though I might initially have been against it, the best thing she did for herself was leave (retire). So many times she would go (to a game) as a back-up (trainer) and then the trainer for that certain sport, like baseball, would go to the hospital with a player and then Joni would take over for that trainer at an event and finish that game and other duties that trainers had.  

"Since her retirement I have talked to her many times and she is so much more relaxed – seems so much happier – than she was at Austin Peay and that is because she goes home at a reasonable hour and is not working herself to death." 

For her former boss and basketball coach Dave Loos it was the respect the student-athletes had for Joni. As for Loos, it literally started with the handling of the Bubba Wells tibial nail surgery (performed by Dr. Beazley) situation.  

"I just trusted her knowledge," Loos said. "And when she left it up to Bubba to tell her when he might be able to return, that just sealed it for me because she was not going to bow to any outside pressures for him to return any quicker. The decision to elevate her was the right one.  

"The key to Joni, right or wrong, was her availability. She was the first one there and the last one to leave. She took phone calls over the weekend and helped you with anything, which was great. And Joni also had the greatest respect from the student-athletes." 

In fact, Johnson is proud of the fact, she received the support staff person of the year in 2018 because it was voted by the student-athletes. 

Johnson was elevated to the University's first female athletic trainer in 2007, succeeding Chuck Kimmel, only the second full-time athletic the University ever had. It wasn't frowned upon because Johnson was female but because she wasn't a football first athletic trainer. In fact, Loos hired her because he knew her so well from working with her from her days as solely the Governors basketball trainer. 

"I trusted her and just stayed out of her way," Loos said. "When you work with people that long, you know they care and you know they have the student-athletes first in mind."   

Johnson respected and liked Loos and she felt the same way about Cooper Beazley, who knows Johnson extremely well and is excited to see her join him as members of the Austin Peay Hall of Fame.   

"I can't be more tickled for her," Beazley said. "She is just really good people and one of my best friends."  

"He knew what we were doing because we knew what we could and couldn't do," Johnson said. "Dr. Beazley would back us but at the same time he knew what we were doing. He was like family and when you are working with family you know what to expect. 

"One thing (mentor and former APSU Athletic trainer) Chuck Kimmel once said and said it multiple times and it makes sense: Don't do anything immoral, illegal or unethical and you will be all right because if you answer yes to any of those you know you shouldn't be doing it."   

Johnson at times wondered if she was doing the right things for Austin Peay during COVID but she gained campus-wide notoriety during the pandemic. In fact, if you look at her resume', a section is totally devoted to COVID-19. Student-athletes were lucky to have Joni on their respective sides because she was not going to put any of them in harm's way because Johnson knew how COVID could play with the respective student-athletes minds.  

"COVID was a different bird," Johnson said. "That wore me out from the start. If you didn't understand what was going on you didn't understand how to protect the kids." 

Johnson lists former Austin Peay graduate assistants and students Shawn Hendi, formerly of Georgetown University in Washington D.C., Jennifer Brodeur, of UMass, and John Dunham, of Emory University in Atlanta where he is now director of sports medicine, as being on the National Athletic Trainers Association Collegiate Athletic Trainers Committee in 2018 and they kept her informed. She wrote the COVID policy not just for APSU athletics but the entire University of as well. Places like Evansville, where Johnson did her undergraduate work, copied their policies from Johnson.  

No matter what or when Johnson always put the student-athlete first, sometimes to the coaches chagrin. 

"The relationship with the coach was/is so important," Johnson said. "But it always was about being respectful of the student-athletes. And you have to care about the student-athletes. I wanted to win as bad as the next person but you can't put that student-athlete in harm's way, you just can't."