SOUTH WHITLEY – The Whitko High School girls basketball team snapped its nine-game losing streak to the Wawasee Lady Warriors in convincing fashion Tuesday in South Whitley. Defeating Wawasee 68-24, both teams attempted 39 field goals, but the Lady Wildcats (8-8) had much more success, making 23 of it attempts (59 percent) to the Lady Warriors' six (15 percent). "With them playing a zone, I stressed not settling for jump shots before we make five or six passes and give them easy run outs for layups," Whitko coach Brandon Bradley said. "We made five, six, seven passes every possession, and the shots we were taking were rhythm, open jump shots. We weren't settling and that's why we had a high percentage." Working for open shots, Whitko went 8 of 16 from behind the three-point arc, led by senior Katee Reiff's 4 of 6 from downtown, scoring 12 points on the night. Senior Karissa Olinske made another three treys for the Lady Wildcats, leading her to a game-high 16 points, while also tallying four steals, three assists and two rebounds. In all, eight Lady Wildcats scored in the blowout win, as senior Micaela Sylvester had 13, junior Cagney Craig finished with seven and sophomore Jordan Hall scored six. While scoring seemed to come easy for Whitko, the same couldn't be said for Wawasee, which made 1 of 19 first-half shots, leading to a 33-4 deficit at the break. From the start, Bradley's main emphasis was on Wawasee junior KiLee Knafel, who entered the game 29 points shy of 1,000 for her career and was averaging 26.5 points per game this season. To defend the high-scoring Knafel, Bradley returned to his roots of coaching junior varsity boys basketball at Tipton High School 11 years ago. "At a 2A high school, you see a lot of junk zones," he said. "So, I have a good background in how to play it and how to play against it. (Monday) in practice, we experimented with different people guarding our JV coach (Adam Gray)." During practice, Gray commented that the size of 5-foot-10 junior Josie Sparks was more effective in guarding the 5-7 Knafel early in halves, with the quicker 5-4 Reiff taking over to close each half. The combination worked, as Knafel had just one point on one shot in the opening half, finishing the game with 12 points on 2-of-4 shooting from the field. And while Sparks and Reiff had the responsibility of guarding Knafel one-on-one, Bradley said slowing Knafel was a team effort. "Even when Katee and Josie got screened, or there was a rebound or loose ball, everybody else did a nice job of finding (Knafel) and getting to her," Bradley said. "Anytime you have someone coming in who scores as much as she is, you have to pay them special attention." Limiting Knafel, and holding the rest of the Lady Warriors to 12 points on 4-of-35 shooting, the Lady Wildcats evened their season record and got their most lopsided win in over a decade. "It was the most complete game we played on both ends of the court," Bradley said. "We've had our moments in other games. I thought we played well against West Noble, being short-handed with illnesses and injuries at that time. I also thought the Rochester game two weeks ago was really good for us because it was a team we hadn't beaten in a few years and it was a conference game." And Bradley was feeling really good about the win, considering Whitko hadn't defeated Wawasee since a 47-44 victory on Jan. 29, 2004. "We've had girls who ended their careers against Wawasee in the past," he said. "It was nice that the one shot we get against them this year - we play this complete." Whitko takes the court Saturday in Three Rivers Conference competition at home against Northfield, while Wawasee will look to snap its eight-game losing streak Saturday at home against Plymouth.
