Coupeville Sports

“I played a little ball. Why? You feelin’ lucky, punk? Well, do you?”

The greatest basketball player in Coupeville High School history turns 29 today.

She wasn’t the tallest, or the biggest, didn’t have the greatest hops and wasn’t the best pure shooter this school has seen. But she didn’t need any of that.

She was a killer, cold-blooded, slice you off at the knees and leave you crying while she smiled the smallest of smiles. Off the court, she was among the nicest people to ever walk the face of the Earth, but on the hardwood she never stopped coming.

People looked at her, with her baggy shorts, slight build and (occasional) pigtails poking up skywards and thought she was a ballgirl, or, at best, a freshman they could easily steamroll.

Then the ball got tipped and she went after them like a wild dog let loose. She was relentless and that attitude carried to her teammates throughout her hoops career.

The greatest run of any sport in Wolf history was put together by girls’ basketball starting in the late ’90s, from Tina Lyness and Brianne King to the Black ‘n Blue sisters (Lexie and Brittany), which put up just about all of the banners that are in the CHS gym.

And at the heart of that run was lil’ Ashley Bagby-Ellsworth, tending counter at Videoville and charming customers by day and ripping out and feasting (metaphorically) on the hearts of her b-ball opponents by night.

She was something to see.

There were talented players before her (Marlene Grasser, Emily Vracin, Misty Sellgren) and there have been talented players in the red and black since she graduated.

There is even one coming (Coupeville Middle School 7th grader Mia Littlejohn, who attacks like she just stepped off a playground in Jersey) who so closely resembles Bagby-Ellsworth, it’s scary and enthralling, all at the same time.

But, no matter what they did in the past, or what Littlejohn and others will do in the future, the words Magic Johnson spoke to Larry Bird on his retirement night still linger, just with a name change.

“Ashley, you only told me one lie. You said there will be another Ashley Ellsworth-Bagby. Ashley, there will never, ever be another Ashley Ellsworth-Bagby.”