Ben Olsen was a beast on the boards during the CMS season. Nothing has changed. (John Fisken photo)
Contributed by Joe Lippo.
Coupeville Middle School boys’ basketball, as we all know, didn’t go so well this season.
So some of the boys decided to take their ball and play SWISH basketball. Up until now, THAT wasn’t going so well either.
But today they figured out their issue. ALL of these boys are playing the wrong sport.
Today, instead of going to Sedro Woolley and trying to play basketball, they switched it up a bit, and played “hockey” instead.
Yeah, that’s right. They put on the black jerseys and went in hot.
Coaches Connie Lippo and Scott Losey started with five players Saturday, no subs, and told the boys to hang tough until the cavalry (as it were) arrived.
In this case, “The Cavalry” was Ty and Gabe Eck, who were stuck in traffic.
And hang tough they did.
Ben Olsen and Hunter Downes used the theory of “they give you five fouls, might as well make ’em good ones” and started tenderizing Sedro players every chance they got, and while they were busy wondering what hit them, Ethan Spark quickly drained nine consecutive points.
The other two players on the court, Shane Losey and Joey Lippo, were getting screened on nearly every outlet pass, and all of a sudden decided that enough was enough.
So Lippo ran through the next one.
The Sedro player’s lungful of air returned to the atmosphere loud enough to be heard in the top row.
You see, getting hit by a kid that goes all of 105 pounds, is like getting hit with a bag full of broken cinder blocks. At a dead run.
Thus began the “hockey” game.
Sedro had quite enough and started taking bad fouls on retaliation hits, and the Coupeville boys were stellar at the line.
Did I mention that the Coupeville boys were shooting one and one before the halftime buzzer? They were.
The crowd was absolutely riveted. No cell phones, no iPads, not even a bathroom break. Nobody wanted to miss this.
Coupeville enjoyed a 12-point lead at the half, but Downes and Olsen were both in foul trouble and the boys were all gassed since there were no subs.
Thankfully, the Eck boys showed up to start the second half and immediately made an impact, both on the scoreboard and on the Sedro players.
There were not a whole lot of determined picks or blocks by Sedro Woolley anymore and they tried to open it up, but the fresh legs of the Ecks resulted in many turnovers and fast breaks.
With Lippo and Losey tangling with any Sedro player that had the ball, the closest that Sedro would come would be seven points, and that was right at the final horn.
Coupeville (1-2) earned its first win of the season, and learned that its style of play is more like the Hansen brothers than anything else.
