By Steve Flairty
NKyTribune Columnist
It’s basketball state tournament time in Kentucky. Translated, that’s high school hoops with excitement and fun. Players, cheerleaders, and throngs of supporters sometimes travel hundreds of miles to Lexington for participation. The girls’ edition of Sweet Sixteen happened last week, with the boys’ set for this week.
For Kentuckians, it’s a show and a time-worn aspect of the state’s culture, with new stars appearing every year.
But perhaps the biggest star in the tourney’s history glittered with royalty back in 1956, judging by his name, “King” Kelly Coleman. His story is aptly told in Gary West’s biography, King Kelly Coleman: Kentucky’s Greatest Basketball Legend (New Expanded version), published in 2023 by Acclaim Press.
In 1956, Kelly led his team to the tournament at Memorial Coliseum from a tiny community in southeastern Kentucky. The Wayland Wasps played Car Creek in the semifinals, losing 68-67. Still, King Kelly set several unbroken records: most points in a game (68), field goals (27), field goals in a half (14), field goals in a tournament (69), and free throws in a tournament. He also set the all-time Kentucky point record for a season (1734) and career (4337). He became Kentucky’s first official “Mr. Basketball.”
Later, he overcame obstacles and played college ball and briefly, professional basketball.
I asked West, who previously did color commentary for the Western Kentucky Hilltopper Basketball network, if he thinks the single game record will be broken. “Even with the three-point shot now, his 68 points in a single state tourney game has stood for 70 years,” he said. “No one has really come close. It may be unreachable.”
For many fans of the era and beyond, he was, and is, an icon. Witness the resounding, “one for the ages” standing ovation at Rupp Arena given him in 2005, almost 50 years after the records were set.
In West’s updated 232-page book, he shares a lot more than the acclaim Kelly Coleman garnered. We learn about Kelly’s background, including his struggles. Kelly, indeed, felt a great deal of pressure for being anointed “King.” And what teenager wouldn’t be under those circumstances?
Fame was thrust early upon an unprepared, teenaged boy from an eastern Kentucky mining town. It wasn’t something he sought, and when it came, he often handled it awkwardly. When the 1956 state all-tournament team was announced, Kelly was nowhere to be found, and his 15-year-old sister, Linda, walked to midcourt to receive it for her brother. Alcohol was sometimes an issue for him even while in high school. He often was undisciplined in his playing approach, not taking coaching well. It would eventually hurt him after moving on from high school.
The author describes Kelly’s college recruiting experiences extensively, and the West Virginia Mountaineers got a pretty bad grade for violations and were banned from having Kelly attend. Ironically, the UK Wildcats, or at least someone in their orbit, angered King Kelly, pushing him away from going there.
He spent a short time at a West Virginia military prep school, but the disciplined life wasn’t for him. He headed to Eastern Kentucky College, in Richmond, with the plan to play under tough-nosed Paul McBrayer. Kelly left after the coach tried to change his shot. Kelly told Gary West that he “had scored over 4,000 points with that shot and I wasn’t about to change it now. I was outta there.”
Kelly finally landed in Owensboro at Kentucky Wesleyan College, where he produced big scoring numbers and became was a two-time All-American. He had the highest career scoring average at Wesleyan and finished third in all-time points. He also was second in rebounding average.
His career as a professional basketball player was short-lived, with some of his old demons reappearing. This, according to West, “gave him a reputation very few coaches wanted to take on. By burning bridges, he gave up chances to be great. He later realized it.”
With basketball playing behind him, he did well in some business ventures, and he even taught school for a while. He moved around quite a bit, but the last part of his life saw him living at home in Wayland.
A touching part of the book is the interest that former Kentucky Mr. Basketball J.R. Van Hoose and his wife, Kayla, took in Kelly’s life. Their friendship appeared real, and the couple gained his trust and remained close to Kelly to the end.
West praised Kelly’s wife, Ann. The couple divorced, but years later, Kelly told the author how much Ann meant to him. She, along with their children, was there for him as he was dying. According to the author, “Their (Ann and Kelly’s) love for each other had withstood a sometimes dysfunctional life.”
King Kelly Coleman died in the Noreen and Greg Wells Hospice Center in Hazard on June 16, 2019. On June 21, there was a daylong visitation held at the Wayland Gym, where his casket sat under a goal. The following day, King Kelly’s funeral was held at Hall’s Funeral Home, in Martin. West, by then quite close to Kelly, delivered these sentiments in eulogy.
“Kelly didn’t just belong to Wayland… he belonged to all of Kentucky,” West said. “He never forgot where he was from. He loved coming back home. In the end, he was a proud man. Proud of what he accomplished, not only playing basketball, but financially in his businesses. His last years were helping raise money for the Mountain Hall of Fame Museum in Wayland.”
To those in attendance and those there in spirit, those words befitted a King.
