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Archive for the ‘Softball’ Category

Now a softball sensation.

Hailey Hammer

Monica Vidoni

Monica Vidoni

Madeline Roberts

Madeline Roberts

The games never stop.

The high school season may be over, but many of the members of this year’s state tourney-qualifying Wolf softball squad are still out there slugging away.

CHS senior Hailey Hammer and recent grad Madeline Roberts are playing select ball with the Skagit Thunder, which is taking them across the country.

The team has shined in recent tournament play.

“We got second in the state tune up against a team with multiple Division 1 players signed on it,” Roberts said. “We are doing very well!”

Roberts stayed home, but Hammer hit the road with the team this past week for the huge Colorado Sparkler.

“We drove both ways. Took us two days. We were there for a little over a week,” she said. “Played seven games. We had a lightning delay for one of them.”

Another Wolf lighting up the scoreboard is senior Monica Vidoni, who is playing for a team that brings together South Whidbey and Burlington-Edison.

Calling themselves South Burlington Islands, the squad is 5-1.

Vidoni’s highlight came when she smashed a bases-loaded triple off the wall, then came around to score herself when the fielder made an error on her ball.

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"Yep, keep backin' up. Further ... further ... nope, still gonna hit it over your head."

“Yep, keep backin’ up. Further … further … nope, still gonna hit it over your head.”

Katrina McGranahan flies into second, easily beating the throw.

Katrina McGranahan flies into second, easily beating the throw.

Who’s ready to rumble?

A perfect record is on the line 6 PM Monday, when the unbeaten Central Whidbey Little League Juniors All-Star softball squad opens districts against North Whidbey.

The game, which will be played on the Coupeville High School field, is the first step towards a state berth for a team that has routed teams left and right.

A flawless 15-0 on the season, Central Whidbey has taken liberal advantage of the ten-run rule, ending most of its games early this season.

Now, it needs two wins against its Island arch-rivals to advance to state (July 12-18).

Game two is 6 PM Tuesday at CHS, and, if the two teams split, a deciding game three would be 6 PM Wednesday on the same field.

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Chloe Gardner

Chloe Gardner

Perhaps the best “Wolf that Never Was” is officially Whatcom’s best.

Chloe Gardner, who moved away from Coupeville with her family when she was in the third grade, was selected Friday as The Bellingham Herald’s All-Whatcom County Female Athlete of the Year.

As a senior at Nooksack Valley High School, Gardner won a 1A state wrestling title at 145 pounds, helped lead the Pioneers to a fifth place finish in the state softball tourney and advanced to state in cross country, a sport she mainly used as a way to get ready for her “real” sports.

I bring this up because if her parents, Wade and Trina, had not chosen to move the family off The Rock in 2004 (a time when Trina was the #1 barista at Miriam’s Espresso), Chloe would have been doing her butt-kickin’ in the red and black.

Albeit in different sports, since CHS doesn’t field cross country or wrestling teams.

But that’s fine. Gardner is a superb athlete. She would have adapted.

Drop in volleyball or soccer for cross country and basketball for wrestling and we’re good to go.

Except…

If we had a time machine, we could go back and convince a third-grader to convince her family not to move, thereby changing the very course of Wolf athletics!

Seriously, who wants to get working on this idea?!?! Anyone, anyone … Bueller, Bueller?

OK, fine, be that way. Personally, I thought the idea had merit.

 

To see more on Chloe’s honor, bounce over to:

http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2014/07/04/3734625/nooksacks-chloe-gardner-rises.html?sp=%2F99%2F110%2F

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Katrina McGranahan (John Fisken photos)

Katrina McGranahan, poppin’ smiles and home runs. (John Fisken photos)

Central Whidbey catcher Sarah Wright will not be trifled with.

Central Whidbey catcher Sarah Wright will not be trifled with.

There is a juggernaut coming.

The Central Whidbey Little League Juniors All-Star softball team, which features players who will be moving up to Coupeville High School in the fall, went a flawless 15-0 this season.

Time and again, they crushed opponents, with only the ten-run rule there to save their hapless foes.

Now, local fans will get a chance to see players such as Katrina McGranahan, Hope Lodell and Lauren Rose take the field they will one day rule.

Central Whidbey will kick off the district tournament at home, playing on the CHS field, 6 PM Monday.

Be there or be forever doomed to listen to people tell you for years, “Oh, I knew they were going to be big. I saw them play back in the old days.”

So, don’t say you weren’t warned.

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Mollie Bailey (left) has always wanted to be a catcher, all the way since her younger days. Which, admittedly, weren't THAT long ago...

Mollie Bailey (left) has always wanted to be a catcher, ever since her younger days. Which, admittedly, weren’t that long ago…

The most explosive offensive team in all the land.

Bailey (standing in front of coach Lark Gustafson’s upraised right arm) and her teammates celebrate.

Can you say no to Mollie Bailey?

The irrepressible third child in a family of irrepressible, athletic, camera-lovin’ superstars (following big sisters McKayla and McKenzie), Bailey and her teammates need your help.

Their softball squad, the Sizzlin’ Sisters — a 9/10 team that combines Central and South Whidbey players — romped to a district title and punched their ticket to the state tourney.

Of course, state, which starts July 12, is about as far away as you can possibly get, with the host — Asotin — sitting right on the border with Idaho.

It’s a six-and-a-half-hour drive from Whidbey (if traffic is good).

While few non-family members will be likely to make the jaunt to Eastern Washington to cheer on the Sisters, you can help them just the same.

Toss them a buck or two (or more) and help offset the travel costs for the girls, who represent the future of Wolf sports.

Well, and Falcon sports … but hopefully they’ll all move to Coupeville before high school and we won’t have to think about that.

Regardless, this is a chance to do something for young ladies who have risen above and played their hearts out.

Help fuel their dream (and their parents car’s)!!

To help, jump over to:

http://www.gofundme.com/b0kpvo

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