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“Great things are coming for this young team!!”

Posted in Boys Basketball on December 15, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Either Wiley Hesselgrave has just been caught in mid-dribble, or he’s picked up the ball and decided to run with it football-style. (Shelli Trumbull photos)

Back on the court, Dalton Martin joins our popular feature — Guys Watching Guys Shoot Free Throws.

Coach V is getting excited.

Six games into the season, Coupeville High School JV boys’ basketball coach Dustin Vanvelkinburgh finally has his entire 11-man roster intact, and it’s a squad which has come close in back-to-back narrow losses.

Friday night the Wolves took visiting South Whidbey down to the wire in a 38-28 loss, which comes on the heels of an even closer defeat to Lakewood three nights earlier.

The South Whidbey game marked the first action for freshman Dalton Martin, who had been recovering from football concussions. A game before, Josiah Campbell made his debut and had an immediate impact, repeatedly taking the ball hard to the hoop.

They join an already solid core headed up by the silky-smooth Anthony Bergeron, explosive Wiley Hesselgrave and tenacious Joel Walstad.

“We played hard,” Vanvelkinburgh said. “We will have growing pains by way of turnovers and poor decisions. They show our youth.

“Another few games and we will hit our stride,” he added. “Great things are coming soon for this young team. I’m excited for the rest of the season. Watch out for us after Xmas break!”

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Hunter Hammer passes down wisdom to the young guns!!

Posted in Boys Basketball, Wolves in college on December 15, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Hammer Time back in the day. Left to right, Ian Smith, Nevin Miranda, Hammer, Ben Hayes, Tyler King and, in front, Scott Davidson.

Forever a star. (Laura Chan photo)

675 days is a lifetime.

Feb. 10, 2011 Hunter Hammer and his Coupeville High School teammates walked off the basketball court in Port Townsend with a swagger to their steps and a smile on their lips. They had just bounced their hosts 49-41 and were advancing on to the next round of the playoffs.

Hammer had dominated as only a six-foot-seven Tower of Power can, shredding the Redskins for 19 points and 10 boards and leading a second-half comeback in what would turn out to be the final win in Wolf coach Randy King’s twenty-plus year coaching career.

A loss to University Prep in the next game brought an end to Hammer’s high school hoops days. With him went Ian Smith, Tyler King, Ben Hayes and one of the best basketball-playing classes in school history.

Now, two years, and 25 more losses down the road, that victory seems far, far away.

But, as the current Wolves fight to get that elusive first win, Hammer offers a few reflections on his own time in the red and black. Thoughts that encompass the joy of winning, but also why you take the court in the first place.

Hah, your right, that has been some time away.

A thing I notice now is just how important those high school days are. How basketball may just be about the wins and losses. But even though the wins are great, the memories outlast it all.

Basketball may have united us, but winning or losing didn’t separate us.

Truth is, basketball and other sports are just games. But that doesn’t mean we give up on those games. Play hard, not just for yourself, but for the players wearing the same jersey.

It’s easy to get caught up in high school. Once it’s gone, you miss the days with the boys on the courts and fields.

My senior class was huge — Ben Hayes, Ian Smith, Tyler King, Nevin Miranda, Nic Anthony, all players who started playing Swish back in the day. That including junior Dalton Engle at the time.

I’ve won and lost many sports games with these guys, but the bonds and friendship we built over the years outweigh the sports.

The Port Townsend game was a fun one. One that almost ended our season.

Have fun with it, play with all you have, leaving it all on the court. The season may not be bright but there is a purpose to everything. Play for the love of competition and the sport.

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We are … Coupeville!!

Posted in Boys Basketball, Community Sports, Fashionable Fans, Girls Basketball on December 15, 2012| Leave a Comment »

This is being published at a little after 1 AM, so you’re probably not in the mood to read a lot of words.

Good thing you don’t have to, then.

Pretty pictures from Shelli Trumbull. Pictures of a Friday night in a small town. Scenes repeated all across America Friday night, but unique to us because of the people in the pictures.

We are … Coupeville!

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Risner and Streubel scare the out-of-towners!!

Posted in Boys Basketball on December 14, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Nick Streubel (back row, far right) lays down the law: "I am the destroyer of worlds! I will swallow your puny shot attempts and devour you very soul!!" (Shelli Trumbull photo)

Nick Streubel (back row, far right) lays down the law: “I am the destroyer of worlds! I will swallow your puny shot attempts and devour your very soul!!” (Shelli Trumbull photos)

You won the game. We have better fans.

These are the moments that freak out a basketball player.

One moment you have the ball, and then the next, you’re scrambling backwards, trying in vain to get in the way of Carson Risner, and, deep down, wishing you hadn’t.

Because when the offensive lineman turned power forward son of former Wolf great Jennie “I will crush your soul!!” Cross and the grandson of Murph “I will burn your village to the ground!!” Cross gets rumbling in the open court, he is a freight train ready to inflict some heavy damage. Best thing to do, pretend you trip and hope to heck he doesn’t step on your face as he goes up for the basket.

While the final score Friday night wasn’t what Coupeville boys’ basketball fans wanted (the Wolves fell 57-37 to visiting South Whidbey), there were moments. Moments that put the roar back in the CHS gym where it belongs.

Risner’s steal and pile-driver charge to pay dirt, part of an eight-point performance on his mom’s birthday, was one of those.

Then there was Nick Streubel’s continued emergence as the Wolves’ go-to offensive guy. The junior banged away in the paint for rebounds, hit a soft little jumper or two when he wandered away from the rim, and then pulled off a neat move, where he picked the pocket of a guy under the Wolf basket, spun the defender around like a top and then dropped in a layup to cap his team-high 11-point night.

It wasn’t all slick moves for Streubel, however, as he laid down two ferocious blocks that rattled the teeth of the would-be-shooters. The second one, when he charged up the court after a fleeing Falcon and caught him from behind, was about one ripped arm away from being grounds for an assault case and pleased the Wolf fans quite a bit.

A game that stayed close for most of the first half took a turn for the worst when South Whidbey drained the clock down to its very last tick, hitting a soul-crushing three-point bomb at the first half buzzer. A 20-8 third quarter and the sight of Wolf guard Ben Etzell’s eye swelling up like a knocked-out boxer’s after he took an elbow to the head put a damper on things, but the Wolves refused to bow down.

With number one fan Danny Savalza rockin’ the dress and headgear at court-side (he later surrendered his Bow Down hat to injured cheerleader Kenzie Kooch), Coupeville put together its best run in the fourth, ringing up a 14-6 tear to close things out.

Risner and Streubel were everywhere, Drew Chan and Aaron Curtin added to the world’s largest collection of floor burns as they chased loose balls like maniacs and Anthony Bergeron, making his varsity debut, swished a jumper and then fed Aaron Trumbull on another basket.

Toss in Josh Wilsey swishing a beautiful trey under pressure and Caleb Valko suddenly channeling his inner Kobe Bryant as he executed a note-perfect move in the second quarter, spinning, hopping and then blowing past his defender for a bucket, and there were moments.

Enough to keep hope alive.

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Endure.

Posted in Boys Basketball, Girls Basketball on December 14, 2012| 1 Comment »

The Coupeville High School girls’ basketball team takes the court tonight at 5:15 PM, followed by the Wolf boys’ squad at 7. (Shelli Trumbull photo)

Basketball is not the world.

The kids who play the game — that’s the world.

On a day when all the talk is understandably about the tragedy in Connecticut, everyone is affected. For those of us in Washington state, sitting on the other side of the country, we may not know people involved. We may not be able to put a name and a face to all those who have been lost.

But we honor them. We are thankful for the children and the teachers who made it home this afternoon, and we mourn those who did not.

It will take a very long time, if it ever happens, for that town to recover. Mental illness or evil, whichever it turns out to be, robbed Sandy Creek Elementary, and the world, of one more bit of happiness.

It has happened before, too many times and too many places. It, unfortunately, may happen again. Schools do everything possible to safeguard children, but there is no easy answer to permanently ward off mental illness and evil.

But we go on, because we have to. There is no other way.

When Coupeville and South Whidbey take the floor tonight for basketball games, the tragedy will be on everyone’s minds. How can it not be?

Whether Coupeville wins or whether Coupeville loses its games tonight ultimately doesn’t matter that much.

Victories buoy a school, its players and its fans for a moment. At the best of times, memories are made that endure, memories that make us who we are as a town and as people.

Winning or losing won’t change what happened in the real world.

But we play on, because by playing, we embrace a better way.

We refuse to give in to illness and evil. We celebrate the positive things our town’s children, any children, accomplish. We come out of our homes and come together and refuse to give in to fear.

Whether it’s basketball, as it is tonight, or a school concert, as it was last night, we are better for the effort when we refuse to be bowed — we stand taller as a town, as a country, as a world.

Be safe. But be brave.

There is more goodness in this world than evil, and goodness has to stand tall.

Hug your child. Teach them there is a better way. Come out and sit on the rock-hard bleachers for four hours tonight and cheer for a kid — your kid, your neighbor’s kid, a kid you’ve only seen in passing as they buy a pop at PC — because, by doing so, you make a statement.

It may be a small statement in the grand scheme of things, but it matters.

We will not give in. We will go on. We will endure.

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