Biliew’s and Kelderman’s paths first crossed at Waukee. Before a new Waukee school was created to accommodate the growing size of the town, both players were part of a super team that would roll its way through the Iowa high school basketball scene.

At the time, Waukee was loaded with talent from top to bottom, and with the other players on the team, Biliew and Kelderman were pushed to compete for recognition.

Waukee head coach, and assistant coach during the year Biliew and Kelderman were teammates, Kevin Kanaskie saw that competitiveness every single day.

“Everyone wanted to prove they were the best player on the team. In reality, we probably had five or six best players on the team,” Kanaskie said.

With three other star players on the team—Tucker DeVries, Payton Sandfort and Pryce Sandfort—Biliew and Kelderman had others to push them to get better.

Currently, DeVries is a star player at Drake, averaging over 20 points per game. Payton Sandfort is one of Iowa’s key scorers, sitting at over 15 points per game, and his younger brother Pryce Sandfort joined him as a four-star recruit and the No. 2 player out of Iowa in 2023 just behind Biliew.

With the talent on the team, Waukee’s then-head coach, Justin Ohl, was ecstatic about the high-level basketball on display at every practice and every game.

“That year, our practices were unbelievable,” Ohl said.

Despite the overflowing talent and the competitiveness of the team, everyone was close-knit. There was no ego on the team, which helped build the foundation for each of the players to grow close and form bonds with each other.

Even Biliew and Kelderman were close, despite the looming possibility that they would be rivals in the near future.

“They were. The whole group was close,” Ohl said.

Practices set the same tone as a state championship game due to the high skill level of the group. Although Kelderman was not in charge of guarding Biliew in practice due to their different positions, the two did meet on occasion.

“He was more in charge of getting after [DeVries], guarding him, but I think [Biliew] would set some good screens on [Kelderman],” Ohl said.

Kelderman was always up for a challenge, so when DeVries took a break from giving him the works, Biliew would be the next kid up. With how scrappy and tough Kelderman is, he could compete hard against players much larger than himself.

“He was small, but he didn’t play small,” Kanaskie said.

Biliew may have worked hard in his time at Waukee, but Kelderman still rivaled him in their sophomore campaign.

Waukee Northwest head coach Brett Watson noted that Kelderman’s biggest strength was how hard he worked. Not being the biggest, the tallest, the fastest or the strongest, Kelderman had to work harder than everyone else to keep up. But he was okay with that.

“He has a work ethic that is second to none,” Watson said.

With Kelderman and Biliew sporting a work ethic that only rivaled each other, it was bound to get competitive.

That competitiveness helped both players excel and grow at an exponential rate. Even though a rivalry would form just a couple of years later, the two went on to win the Class 4A state championship on that 2020-21 team.

The bond formed from winning it all together was strong enough where it could not be erased by the rivalry that was about to unfold.

“We won a ring together and everything, so it’s all fun,” Biliew said.

Game one came down to the wire at Waukee Northwest.

Kelderman had to step up in the matchup, as Pryce Sandfort was sidelined with an ankle injury. Pryce Sandfort would have been the player to guard Biliew, but without him, it was up to Kelderman to match up against him.

“We didn’t know who else to guard him. You have to go with your competitive guard that won’t back down from any challenge,” Watson said.

Kelderman rose to the challenge.

Although Biliew filled the stat sheet in every matchup, Kelderman still made his life difficult.

“It was just making it as hard as we could for him. He’s gonna score 20, 25 points, but how hard he has to work to get those 20 to 25 points is really what matters,” Kelderman said.

With seconds left in the game, the win was still up for grabs.

Biliew missed the dagger with time running out and could not draw a foul to get to the line to potentially give Waukee the first win of the series. Immediately following that, with no time left on the clock, Kelderman took the final shot of the game and hit a buzzer-beater to give Waukee Northwest the two-point win.

Game two was a revenge matchup for Waukee. Given the exciting finish of the first game, it was no surprise that the rematch would be highly anticipated. Kanaskie said that the game sold out in minutes.

Now on the Warriors’ home court, they made quick work of the Wolves and ran away with the game. Biliew was the star of the show, opening the game with a dunk, putting up 21 points on the Wolves and even adding to his highlight reel with a through-the-legs dunk to ignite the gymnasium.

Kelderman’s 17-point performance was not enough to power past Biliew’s energetic revenge arc.

However, the best was yet to come, as the two teams met one final time on what was nearly the biggest stage of all.

Biliew and Kelderman met one final time in the semifinal game in the state tournament. The winner would get a chance to play for their second state championship.

“There’s nothing better than a rematch in the state tournament,” Kelderman said.

The game played out similar to the first, with Waukee Northwest getting the last laugh.

Kelderman had to step up again in the absence of Pryce Sandfort. This time around, Pryce Sandfort was not injured but instead was seeing the bench more than expected due to foul trouble.

Biliew put up 21 points, which was nearly half of Waukee’s total points, but it was not enough to overcome Kelderman’s 26-point night as Waukee Northwest cruised to a 20-point win.

“You look at both times we won—Cade Kelderman was unbelievable,” Watson said.

Watson said it was Kelderman’s two best games of his career. When someone needed to step up in games one and three, Kelderman did just that to secure a winning record over his rival.

That 2-1 record that Kelderman has over Biliew is something that he still boasts about to this day.

“[Kelderman’s] quiet, but he also can be a little bit like, ‘Hey, you know it was 2-1,’” Ohl said.

“I’m not afraid to let him know that I’ve got the tiebreaker on him. It’s 2-1,” Kelderman said. “He can’t say anything about that. I’ve got that on him the rest of my life.”

Each of the wins came in their own way and played out differently. Both Biliew and Kelderman have their own things to brag about when it comes to that final year of matchups.

“We joke about it each and every single day—his record against mine, but our one win was better than theirs,” Biliew said. “It was a fun and exciting time.”

Biliew said that Kelderman “proved a lot of people wrong” in his senior season. People doubted Kelderman’s abilities as a well-rounded player, but the marquee matchups showed just how good he could be.

Kelderman’s performances are even what drew the eyes of Iowa State initially.

“Against us, he showed the reason why. He’s not here for no reason,” Biliew said. “That was apparent last year.”

Every game became an instant classic and set the standard for the rivalry to continue. The outings from Biliew and Kelderman in the matchups also helped them rise in the rankings and eventually move on to their dream school: Iowa State.

Now with the Cyclones, the two still reminisce about their games. Even the coaches of both teams made it clear that the 2022-23 season will go down in history and will not be forgotten for years to come.

“We’re gonna look back 10 years later talking about how special these games were,” Kanaskie said.