SYRACUSE — Wawasee senior KiLee Knafel’s prep career is coming to a close, but not before claiming her second Times-Union Area Player of the Year award. As a sophomore, Knafel took home the honor before leading her team to a Class 3A Sectional 21 title, averaging 16.7 points for her 15-7 squad. Two years later, she’s become the leader of the Wawasee Lady Warriors, which she prefers. “I always looked up to the seniors and they’d be the ones taking me places,” she said. “Now, I’m taking (the underclassmen) around and they’re looking up to me. I like this role a lot better, because it’s a lot more fun.” On this year’s 10-10 team, Knafel hasn’t only led the way with 24.3 points per game, but has also been a mentor to freshman Kylee Rostochak, who has started most games, and freshman Erin Wiktorowski, who got some spot starts. And with her experience of starting all four years, she’s been able to help them along the way. “Off the floor, (the freshmen) don’t drive,” Wawasee coach Kem Zolman said. “KiLee takes them to get a sandwich before the game or KiLee will take them home or pick them up for school. There’s that camaraderie.” Through his 15 years at Wawasee, Zolman has started a number of freshmen guards, who went on to have great success, including four-time Times-Union Area Player of the Year Shanna Zolman (3,085 points) and two-time selection Taylor Goshert (1,417), as well as Kalyn Lantz (664). With the passing of each highly-talented player, he’s been able to apply lessons he learned while coaching the other girls, beginning with his very first game with his daughter Shanna Zolman. In her first game, the Lady Warriors encountered a defense that was focused on stopping the coach’s daughter. “We’ve had several go through our program, where people need to guard us with a box-and-one or some other junk defense,” Zolman said. “My very first game as a girls basketball coach was a rude awakening for me. They came out in a box-and-one immediately (against Shanna Zolman). I went to Al Rhodes at Warsaw. I went to him and said, ‘Al, you’ve had Kevin Ault, you’ve had this, that, Rick Fox.’ He was just so gracious to just sit down and talk to me for a length of time on all these types of defense. Over the years, we’ve seen just about every junk defense you can imagine. We’ve had girls come through, with KiLee being the latest, so our experience with that has been helpful.” Coming into the season with 1,138 points, Knafel added another 494 through the regular season, giving her a total of 1,632. On a team where she’s one of the only scorers, she’s had to earn those points, being face-guarded most of the time. “Last year, and the year before, I would have gotten frustrated right from the beginning,” Knafel said about the tight defense on her. “The difference this year is I have patience and I’m more mature and mentally focused. This year, I also trust my teammates. I know I can get them the ball and they’ll score.” In what Zolman refers to as ‘junk defense’, opposing coaches have opted to have a girl focus on nothing but Knafel, forcing other Lady Warriors to beat them. And while she’s grown to accept the defense, it’s still difficult to remain perfectly OK with it. “I can’t lie, it is frustrating, but it’s where the mental focus comes in,” she said. “It’s just something I’m going to have to get over. It’s going to happen the whole game. If I let that affect me, the rest of my game is affected.” Guarded so tightly, Knafel’s had to find other ways to score, which include layups off steals or putback rebounds. The Indiana University-South Bend-bound Kna-fel’s scoring ability may overshadow her all-around game, but it shouldn’t, as she also averages 6.3 rebounds, 4.1 steals and 1.9 assists per game. “You don’t ever go to her and just be frustrated with her because she’s not doing this or that – her stat line’s full,” Zolman said. “There’s a lot of games where she’s had a double-double or just a couple away from a triple-double. The steals, she’s been using defensive skills a little better. Then, when I tell her we need her to rebound a little better, she’ll end up with close to 10 rebounds. She’s willing to do what you ask her to do.” This season, Wawasee’s needed all it could get from the 5-foot-7 guard. After starting the season at 6-0, the Lady Warriors dropped eight straight, until they defeated Whitko 45-28 on Jan. 15. With that win, Wawasee won four of its last six games going into Class 3A Sectional 21 At NorthWood High School. “Once we started taking it game-by-game, instead of looking ahead a week, that’s when we started to bounce back,” she said. That bounce back can be attributed to Knafel, who Zolman saw become more patient during the Christmas break. “There’s one thing about being a senior scorer and it’s another to be a senior, mature scorer,” he said. “She’s really matured into the fact that she’s willing to be patient. She’s willing to come down on a fast break and not rush to be the first one. There’s just certain things about the game that are just now starting to come around for her.” And that change may be the last he sees in the school’s second all-time leading scorer, trailing Shanna Zolman’s Indiana state record 3,085 points. “It’s been such a journey with her,” he said.
