New Prairie's McKim, Riley's Lee named co-football coaches of the year

For the second straight year, a South Bend area football team represented northern Indiana in a state championship game.

New Prairie capitalized on a dominant regular season, advancing to the 4A state championship game for the first since 2014.

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Because of this year's success the Cougars Casey McKim, as well as South Bend Riley's Darrick Lee, were tabbed as this year's South Bend Tribune co-football coaches of the year.

"It's the culmination of the work of a lot of people," McKim said. "Individual awards don't happen without how well our players played, our coaching staff, all of the work put in during the offseason. It is a sign that everyone did the right thing and good things happened. It is a validation of all the stuff we have done over the last year."

For McKim, and New Prairie, their trip to Indianapolis wasn't unexpected due to a roster full of playmakers, led by a coach that has been on an upward trajectory.

The Cougars advanced farther into the playoffs in each of McKim's three seasons as head, losing in sectionals in year No. 1, going to semi-state last season and then to Lucas Oil Stadium Thanksgiving weekend, before falling to East Central.

"There has been a lot of success here before I got here and they understood what it takes," McKim said. "I came from a program (Valparaiso) with a lot of success, so I understood what it took. It was really about working together every single year and just being more committed as a group towards the ultimate goal we have together."

New Prairie (13-2) won its first seven games of the season before losing to Penn midway through the year, its only other loss. It rolled through the 4A playoffs, beating Kankakee Valley, Lowell, Hobart, Northridge and Kokomo before falling one win short of the program's first title.

Something McKim, and his returning players, will be hoping to finish next fall.

"Every year we have to reprove ourselves," McKim said. "The thing in my mind is we had two really talented classes back-to-back, we have a lot of talented kids and can we have kids that will keep that standard and do it again. Can we reload? We have quite a few guys we will have to replace this year. That is the challenge and the biggest thing."

That is the same challenge that Lee has at South Bend Riley, proving his success in year No. 1 with the Wildcats was no fluke.

Lee, who came to Riley from Muncie Central, guided Riley to a 5-5 record, the best of any South Bend school. It was more wins than the program had combined over the last two football seasons.

"The biggest buy-in was from your coaches," Lee said. ''When they buy in completely and believe in you and your vision, it is easy for the kids to do it, too. There wasn't a day that we weren't on the same page. I was blessed to have a phenomenal coaching staff supporting me in every way."

Lee, a former South Bend Washington student, came back to his hometown with a winning pedigree. Immediately, he injected confidence into the program that success could happen on a yearly basis.

"It meant the world to be able to come back and help change a program in a city that has meant everything to me," Lee said. "It has meant the world to me to be able to come back and impact lives, help kids that come from the community I came from."

In the end Lee said Riley fell short of their expectations of winning the NIC North-South title and winning a sectional game, falling to Northridge in the first round of this year's playoffs.

With sights already geared towards year No. 2, Lee believes those achievements aren't too far away.

"Our next step is becoming more disciplined," Lee said. "Buying into the weight room completely and continuing to increase our numbers. As long as we can keep things fun and competitive, we will be playing for a sectional title and a regional title. That was our goal. Beating teams in South Bend is great, but we don't want to be South Bend good. We want to be a team that competes for state titles."

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Strong season lead NP's McKim, Riley's Lee to co-football coach of the year