BEL-NOR, Mo. — The Incarnate Word Academy community came together during a prayer service for their beloved basketball coach who had a medical emergency just before the state championship game.
Head coach Dan Rolfes has been in critical condition since he collapsed last Friday.
Rolfes has been leading Incarnate Word Academy’s girls basketball team to state championships for 24 years.
“Knowing him as a coach and how he coached me, I always thought he was like this crazy, psycho man that was just yelling all the time. He's trying to do way more than that. He's more than a coach. He's a mentor,” said one of his former players and former assistant coaches, Brittany Carter.
The Red Knights are undefeated and have been since 2020 winning 131 games in a row.
“Our goal is not to go undefeated, our goal every year is just to win state,” IWA assistant coach Sam Cavlovich said.
The last one of those games was the hardest for them because their head coach collapsed after they won their state final-four game. It happened hours before they’d have to come back to the court and play in the state championship.
“I was just really trying to keep the girls together and keep everything under control ... not trying to freak anybody out ... try to handle it as best we could. But, it is not a call you ever want to receive,” Cavlovich said.
Even though Rolfes wasn’t on the sideline that night, they played hard through their emotions to bring home the state championship win, for themselves but especially for him.
“We all wrote as a team ‘Play for Rolfes’ on our wrist. We always had that reminder to look down. I know he was there with us that game. He truly got us to that point,” IWA senior player Kaylynn Janes said.
The Rolfes family provided an update to everyone at the prayer service, saying his heart has made improvements but he’s still on a ventilator and round-the-clock dialysis at University Hospital in Columbia.
“When he does wake up, he’s able to respond by nodding his head or shaking no or wiggling his toes or squeezing our hands,” the family said.
He always fights for his players and now they say it’s their turn to fight for him through prayers.
“Our prayers are working, we're gonna continue to pray and stay positive. H's a fighter. We know that he's going to fight his way out of this just like you would anything else. He's too competitive not to,” Cavlovich said.