Coupeville Sports

Lyla Stuurmans continues to move up the CHS girls’ basketball career scoring chart. (Jackie Saia photo)

Throw out the first seven minutes, it’s a different ballgame.

The Coupeville High School varsity girls’ basketball team played host Chief Leschi dead even for the final 25 minutes Saturday in Puyallup.

Unfortunately, the Wolves trailed 15-0 after that opening chunk, so a tie the rest of the way still resulted in a 38-23 loss.

The non-conference defeat, coming in the team’s second game without injured star Mia Farris, drops Coupeville to 6-11.

CHS has almost a week off now, returning home for back-to-back games in Cow Town Friday and Saturday, Feb. 2-3.

The first of those contests is Senior Night against Friday Harbor and will largely decide which team advances to the playoffs, while the latter is a non-conference rumble recently added to the schedule.

Saturday’s clash with Chief Leschi started poorly for the Wolves, who surrendered a pair of early three-balls and couldn’t get any of their own shots to stay in the bucket.

Down 15-0 and looking for a spark, the Wolves got it from Katie Marti, who finally cracked the seal on the basket in the final seconds of the first quarter.

Things got much better from there, with CHS holding its own in second and third frames which both ended in 8-8 ties.

Madison McMillan gets out of town fast in an earlier game. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)

Four different Wolves scored in the second quarter, with sophomore Brynn Parker notching her first varsity bucket.

She’s the 247th Wolf girl to score in the 50-year history of the program, and the second in her family, joining big sis Skylar.

The third quarter featured Coupeville’s best work on the boards, with Marti, Madison McMillan, and Jada Heaton all scoring off of putbacks.

While Chief Leschi slipped away with a 7-5 advantage in the fourth frame, the Wolves hit some free throws down the stretch to keep things interesting.

Marti finished with a team-best nine points, while McMillan (6), Stuurmans (2), Brynn Parker (2), Heaton (2), Kayla Arnold (1), and Teagan Calkins (1) also scored.

Skylar Parker, Reese Wilkinson, and fab frosh Haylee Armstrong got floor time, while Farris avidly rooted for her teammates while in street clothes.

Along with Brynn Parker joining the sisterhood of scorers, Marti and Stuurmans both passed CHS assistant coach Kassie (Lawson) O’Neil on the all-time scoring chart.

Marti now sits in 63rd place with 191 points and Stuurmans perches in 66th with 185 points, which puts her a slot ahead of O’Neil, who rattled the rims for 184 during her stellar prep hoops career.

No JV action:

Two days before tipoff, Chief Leschi cancelled the second game after deciding it didn’t have enough players to field a full team.