Coupeville Sports

Amanda Fabrizi gets a helping hand from Megan Oakes (left) and Haley Sherman.

Valen Trujillo waits for the ball (NOT the one on the wall) to come down.

Kacie Kiel (left) and Madeline Strasburg are all about the kung fu.

Monica Vidoni skies for the tip.

Hailey Hammer (left) and Breeanna Messner are just excited to be in the gym.

Tiffany Briscoe returns serve.

 Fabrizi is surrounded by fellow seniors (left to right) Oakes, Sherman, Messner, Allie Hanigan and Sydney Aparicio.

Kacie (left) and former Wolf volleyball player Katie Kiel share a sisterly moment.

They are nothing if not photogenic.

The stars of the Coupeville High School volleyball squads appreciate a good photo shoot, in or out of game, as they proved again Tuesday night, when they posed and played while traveling clicker John Fisken recorded them for posterity.

Click on the photos to expand them into all their glossy, poster-worthy glory.

And, if you want to see more, head over to the following links:

(Varsity) http://www.cascadeathletics.com/index.php?act=view_gallery&gallery=4544&league=2&page=1&page_name=photo_store&school=24&sport=0

(JV) http://www.cascadeathletics.com/index.php?act=view_gallery&gallery=4543&league=2&page=1&page_name=photo_store&school=24&sport=0

And remember, a portion of all purchases go to help fund college scholarships for CHS student athletes.

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Jae LeVine keeps the ball in play Tuesday. (John Fisken photos)

McKenzie Bailey goes low for the bump.

It got better.

Bouncing back from a rough first set, the Coupeville High School JV volleyball squad put up a progressively stronger fight as its match rolled on Tuesday night, before falling to visiting South Whidbey in straight sets.

A 25-8, 25-13, 25-18 loss to a very strong Falcon team notwithstanding, the Wolves had their moments.

Monica Vidoni had several strong plays at the net, where she used her height to stuff South Whidbey kills, and continued to crack low, screaming, hard-to-return serves while at the stripe.

In support of her, Valen Trujillo was everywhere at once, including one tip in which she froze two Falcon players in mid-stride and dumped the ball into a narrow gap between them for a winner.

McKenzie Bailey, Miranda Engle and Ally Roberts all had hustle plays, and the Wolves found a better passing rhythm as the match progressed.

Punctuating the match was two consecutive plays late in the third set, when South Whidbey players twice drilled other players by accident.

The first time a Wolf was on the receiving end, followed by a Falcon at the net getting hit in the back of the head when her own teammate sent a low serve into the back of her skull.

Coupeville played without foreign exchange student Merle Fitzenhagen, who is out with a concussion after taking a vicious shot to the face in the team’s last game.

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Wolf junior Kacie Kiel unleashes a sizzling shot she likes to call “The Knee Buster.” (John Fisken photo)

CHS soccer star Sean Donley talks to the authorities. (Shelli Trumbull photo)

As rivalry games go, it wasn’t the best.

Taken out early by South Whidbey’s big hitters, the Coupeville High School volleyball squad put up a bit of a fight Tuesday night but couldn’t derail the powerful Falcons.

Worse, the Wolves played in front of a fairly muted crowd, as the on-going back-and-forth between a previously quite excitable student section and school officials continued to play out.

CHS football star Josh Bayne was sent away to change shirts after sporting a crop top, and, every time the smaller than before section started to get entertaining, they were shushed, preventing any real back and forth with a SWHS fan section which was allowed to be louder than the home fans.

Without leather-lunged super fan dad Steve Kiel in the building to spark things, it all ended with a whimper, not a bang.

The bang was provided by the Falcons, who swooped through the air and slammed spikes that skidded off the floor and, occasionally, Wolf body parts, as they rolled to a 25-13, 25-12, 25-15 victory to sweep the season series between the Island schools.

South Whidbey improved to a shiny 8-3, while the Wolves, who looked very good in brief spurts, dropped to 1-10 with four regular season matches to play. Coupeville travels to Sultan Thursday, a team they came 99.9% from beating the first time around, squandering four match points in a five-set thriller.

Tuesday, the Wolves grabbed an early 3-1 lead in the opening set, then fell apart a bit. With Abby Hodson rolling off eight straight points from the service stripe, and one of her Falcon teammates blasting a spike off of CHS star Breeanna Messner’s face, South Whidbey was clicking.

Kacie Kiel and Hailey Hammer rose to the occasion and punched home a few nice kills for Coupeville, and the hustle never waned. Amanda Fabrizi added to her growing collection of floor burns and she and Messner did their best to patrol the back line against a hard-hitting Falcon offense.

The best play of the match came late in the second set, when Sydney Autio went to the floor, hard, to save a shot, then made a second shot moments later while still on the ground. With the last-second setup, Kiel erupted skyward and unleashed a wicked shot that burned a hole through a South Whidbey player’s hands.

Hammer (three kills, 7 of 8 on serves) and Kiel (two kills, one block) led Coupeville’s stat sheet, with senior spark-plug Fabrizi (16 of 17 while receiving serve and 15 of 21 on defense) her usual solid self.

Autio doled out six assists and Allie Hanigan went above the net on a regular basis, collecting a team-high four blocks.

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Wolf seniors (l to r) Amanda Fabrizi, Sydney Aparicio, Breeanna Messner, Haley Sherman, Megan Oakes and Allie Hanigan.

Oakes (left) and Sherman share a laugh.

Say cheese.

A quiet leader who never plays at half speed, Oakes awaits the serve.

Glossy wall poster #1.

and #2.

Robert Bishop is a man on a mission.

The Island County Coroner is moonlighting these days as the personal photographer for the Coupeville High School volleyball squad. Or, at least, its six-pack of senior spikers, which includes his daughter, Breeanna Messner.

Armed with his trusty camera, he stalks the sidelines and bleachers, documenting the on-court play and off-court camaraderie shown by Messner, Amanda Fabrizi, Allie Hanigan, Haley Sherman, Megan Oakes and Sydney Aparicio.

And now he’s been nice enough to share some of his work (his autopsy photos are still off limits) with the rest of us, which is displayed above.

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