By Tom Nader

Publisher and Editor

Two years ago, Mandy Cardinal was dealt the unexpected.

A challenge presented without warning became one of the biggest tests she has ever had to overcome.

It tested her.

Physically, but probably more so mentally.

During her sophomore season, in a game at Crestview, the Garfield girls basketball standout made a move across the lane, and her left knee buckled when she went to push off.

She collapsed on the court.

“It was like life went into slow motion,” Cardinal said.

She fell to the ground and just lay there.

After head coach Aaron Gilbert and assistant coach Taylor butler helped her up, Cardinal was convinced that she was fine. That her knee had just given out because she was unbalanced.

She was so certain she was OK, at halftime, she was running in the locker room to prove to her coaches that she was ready to get back onto the court.

However, since the G-Men were trailing by double-digits already, Gilbert chose caution and sat out his leading scorer.

The following morning, a Friday, Cardinal woke up with her leg stuck at a 90-degree angle. She could not flex it or move it without pain.

Her family took her to the hospital for an evaluation. A couple of days later, X-rays and an MRI confirmed that news she did not want to hear: Her ACL had detached from her femur, she had a torn meniscus and either a fractured tibia or severe bone bruise.

Suddenly, a new chapter was forced into Cardinal’s basketball journey.

As a multi-sport athlete, the injury actually had a deeper impact. Cardinal not only missed the remainder of her sophomore basketball season and summer AAU circuit, but also her sophomore track and field season and her junior volleyball campaign.

“It was really hard,” Cardinal said. “The strange thing is that I feel like my recovery was different than most people’s. I was never in a lot of physical pain, but not being able to play the sports I love was the most painful.”

She found herself confined to her bed or the couch, napping a lot, and binge watching TV series.

Eventually, she was back in the gym. Even though she was limited by the large brace on her leg, Cardinal needed basketball. She would work out by herself, shooting off one leg.

Form shooting, chair shots and a variety of other training sessions that she worked through no matter how difficult they were because of her immobility. Even in her motionless state, with her brother Jared as the designated rebounder, she accomplished the program’s 10,000 shots challenge.

She was cleared to return to the court for Garfield’s season opener in 2024-25. The start of her junior season began at Rootstown on Nov. 24.

On the first possession of the game, she got a rebound, dribbled coast to coast, went through a Rovers defender and scored on a layup.

“I am pretty sure that was the only basket I had the entire game,” Cardinal said with a smile.

She was placed on a minutes restriction and, admittedly, Cardinal said she “was really out of shape. Everyone was coming off soccer and volleyball, and the most I had been doing was riding my PT for the last nine months.”

More than that, though, was Cardinal learning to trust her body again on the court.

“All last year, I think she was just convincing her body that she had recovered from the injury and that she could return to being herself,” Gilbert said. “This year, she was back to 100 percent from the start.”

Her statistical totals are evidence of that.

She became the seventh player in school history to reach the 1,000-point milestone, accomplishing the feat on Dec. 27, 2025, in a victory over Brookfield in which she also set the single-game scoring record with 42 points (remarkably, scoring 40 of those points through three quarters).

This season, Cardinal leads Portage County with her 18.5 points per game average, and she is third in the county at 9.0 rebounds per game. She also is averaging 2.6 assists, has 155 field goals, 58 free throws (85 percent), 39 3-pointers and 30 blocked shots.

Few players can impact a game in the variety of ways that Cardinal can.

“Mandy is probably one of the most versatile players that I have had in my 19 years here at Garfield,” Gilbert said. “She has some of the attributes of many of the greats that I have had the privilege to coach here.

“Athletically, she shared many attributes with Grace Mills and Laura McCoy,” Gilbert added. “Their ability to get to — and finish — at the rim was very similar. Her rebounding was up there with Grayson Rose and Jenna Smith. She didn’t have the gaudy numbers Grayson or Jenna put up nightly, but her ability to just go get the ball. Her toughness at times reminded me of Lauren Jones. No one was gonna push her or her teammates around on the court.”

There was one other area that brought pride to Gilbert and it didn’t have any statistical numbers attached to it: Leadership.

“I think the adversity she faced and the lack of success the team had made her appreciate what she had as a freshman,” Gilbert said, referencing the team’s 2022-23 season, when Cardinal was a leading player on a team that won 23 games and reached the regional semifinal. “It made her think back as to why that success happened.

“It wasn’t just the talent on that team, it was the leadership within that allowed that team to be so successful,” Gilbert added. “During her knee rehab, she had to sit back and watch and observe the team, which I think helped her realize her teammates’ strengths and weaknesses and how to lead them when she returned to the court.”

It was a slow and frustrating return that included the obvious physical healing, but required Cardinal to work through her mental healing created through the disruption of routines, goals and her sense of identity.

Her injury may have been unexpected, but the way she gradually rebuilt her strength and confidence was absolutely expected.