Before we get to the Outside the Huddle All-Area Team and our end-of-year awards, Bounce wanted to take some time and take a last glance at area conferences and hand out some league-specific metaphorical hardware.
We start today with teams in the area we cover outside of the four main area conferences.
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Brooke Winchester, Warsaw
This could have gone a lot of ways and fairly so. But Winchester had some dynamics about her that made her stand out most to me. Everyone else saw it too of course, with her being named IBCA All-State Supreme 15, with a chance to be an Indiana All-Star this season.
While Winchester’s 13 points per game were third on the team for Class 4A state finalist Warsaw, she was able to be just dominant for her position in and out of the Northern Lakes Conference. Winchester averaged 10.1 rebounds per game as one of just two area girls players to average a double double this season. And she did so in a monster way when you look at her individual games. For four days in January, Winchester played in three games where she had massive double-doubles in each: 21/24 vs. Homestead, 27/15 against Tippecanoe Valley and 22/10 against Concord.
She had 11 double-doubles on the year and even had two games where she had four steals each.
HONORABLE MENTION: Brookelyn Buzzard (Wabash), Kaitlynn Honeycutt (Wabash), Ava McGrade (Lakewood Park), Joslyn Bricker (Warsaw), Brooke Zartman (Warsaw)
MOST VALUABLE PLAYER: Ava McGrade, Lakewood Park
If you know Bounce’s awards and OTH history, you know MVP means something different than Player of the Year. MVP to us is someone who is legit the most valuable to their team and overall success of that program.
There may not be a single player in the area, even in the conferences that we will get to in coming days, that has been more valuable than McGrade. Her calling card was written all over every game she played in her career and she certainly lived up to the hype during her senior campaign.
But McGrade’s body of work overall for her career doesn’t matter as much in this category as what she did as a senior. During the year, she moved into 4th all-time for scoring for a girls basketball player in DeKalb County, also moving into 9th in DeKalb scoring regardless of gender. Her 22.4 points per game was the second best in the area and comprised 43 percent of her team’s scoring during the 2024-25 season. She had five games of 30 or more points including a career best 42 on January 2 opposite Hamilton.
HONORABLE MENTION: Malea Steele (Blackhawk Christian), Jayma Stonebraker (Whitko), Brooke Winchester (Warsaw)
BREAKOUT/MOST IMPROVED PLAYER: Reese Stonebraker, Whitko
Whitko made history this season with both Sectional and Regional titles won. Coming into the season, it was Reese’s sister Jayma who had the most attention for the Stonebraker family, but Reese really showed up and became a breakout star for the Wildcats.
She went from an 8.1 point per game scorer as a sophomore to scoring 13.8 points per game this season as Whitko’s leading scorer. Stonebraker was also second on the team in rebounds (5.9), assists (3.3) and steals (3.1). She scored 20 or more points on four occasions and posted three double-doubles amongst two more times she hit double digits in rebounding in a game. Defensively she was stout with six instances of 5 or more steals in a game, including a season high 8 in a win over Southwood.
HONORABLE MENTION: Luca Bontrager (Lakewood Park), Emma Walker (Manchester), Desi Pope (Blackhawk Christian)
COACH OF THE YEAR: Lenny Krebs, Warsaw
Though he fells short in the state finals, Krebs did everything else he was supposed to along the way as Warsaw reached Gainbridge Fieldhouse and should receive monster credit for it even though in interviews, Krebs makes sure to shift the spotlight to his players far more often than not.
And on the outside, there may be some people who think that he was a coach of circumstance with multiple All-State and Division 1 players on his roster. But that is never an easy thing to coach and balance. The ball has to be spread out, there are lofty internal and external expectations that need to be met. That is where a great coach plays a major role and that is what Krebs did this season.
That is not to say his game prep and X’s and O’s weren’t on point because they were, but he was able to keep a balance in a program that had not been to the promised land of a state title game in a long time.
HONORABLE MENTION: Matt Stone (Wabash), Justin Jordan (Whitko), Jared Estep (Lakewood Park)
GAME OF THE YEAR: Whitko vs. Bishop Luers, January 27
It was an important night for Whitko, not only because it was senior night, but because it was facing a Sectional opponent who just happened to be from the SAC. It isn’t every day that Whitko topples SAC schools historically; they fell to Luers just a year earlier in the Sectional round while the Knights went on to win the Class 2A state title.
On this night, Luers forced overtime with their highest scoring output of the season in the 71-68 loss in overtime. Luers had 18 assists in the game as Reese Rhodehamel went wild for 30 points, countered by Reese Stonebraker’s 25 that led the Wildcats in the win, their seventh in eight games at that point in the season.
These opinions represent those of Bounce and Outside the Huddle. No opinions expressed on Outside the Huddle represent those of any of our advertisers. Follow Bounce on Twitter at Bounce_OTH
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