Bree Daigneault and the Wolf booters aim to take down Klahowya. (John Fisken photos)
Joseph Wedekind is back to help the Wolf netters defend their league crown.
Story-lines as far as the eye can see.
As we begin to wind our way towards the start of fall sports (football practice starts Aug. 17, while the other three CHS teams kick things off Aug. 22), here are a few things to anticipate.
1) History reclaimed — This one is a bit personal, as it’s something I’ve been working on for an eternity, but, when school kicks off, the Coupeville High School gym will look very different than it did when the Class of 2016 graduated.
Or, at least, one wall will.
All the research, all the haggling, all the fundraising will pay off as a new Wall of Fame will rise up around the Sad Coyote painting, celebrating 116 years of Wolf sports.
Did you play on the 1960 CHS baseball squad which won a Northwest League title?
Run for the 1982 girls cross country team which placed 4th at state?
Take the mat for the 2006 competitive cheer squad which brought home a state title?
Now you, your teammates and coaches will have your accomplishments remembered where everyone can see them.
It’s been a long time coming, and with the help of a lot of people, it’s about to be a reality.
2) Oval mania — While it won’t be used until the spring, the new CHS track oval will make its public debut when the Wolves kick off the football season.
After several years of no home track meets because of poor track conditions, Coupeville is back in the game thanks to a levy and a lot of dump truck work.
3) Bucket brigade — The first fall sports event is also the only one which involves a trophy, as the Wolves welcome South Whidbey to the gridiron Sept. 3.
The Saturday night opener (7 PM) may be a non-conference game, but the winner of the rivalry game claims possession of The Bucket for a year and bragging rights for a lot longer.
Coupeville has won in even years recently, claiming ownership in 2012 and 2014. Will 2016 follow suit?
4) New boss, not the same as the old boss — With the departure of Brett and Breanne Smedley, CHS football and volleyball have new coaches in Jon Atkins and Cory Whitmore, respectively.
Both are Oak Harbor teachers who will continue to work up North during the day, then travel to Central Whidbey to lead their teams.
Atkins, the fourth football coach in the last seven years, debuts Sept. 3 (as mentioned above), while Whitmore, the volleyball program’s third leader in the last four years, hits the court Sept. 6 when the Wolves play Mount Vernon Christian.
5) A league of their own — While tennis, volleyball and soccer will continue to play in the four-team 1A Olympic League, football is mixing things up.
Along with Chimacum, Klahowya and two-time defending league champ Port Townsend, they will unite with the Nisqually League (Charles Wright, Vashon Island, Cascade Christian, Bellevue Christian) for the next two years, at least.
The simple break-down?
Coupeville and its counterparts will have a set-in-stone 10-game regular season (no need to scramble and find a foe for a crossover game at the end), with seven league games.
The Wolves also won’t have to play the same teams twice each year anymore.
At the end, the top two or three teams (depending on how allocations break out) advance to the playoffs.
6) History, Part 2? — One of those new football league foes (Vashon) comes to Coupeville Sept. 30.
When they do, the Wolves will be staring across the field at Bryce Hoisington, who put them into the state record books (against their will) last year.
Back then, the game was a non-conference tilt, and Vashon’s running back went off on his home turf for 573 yards and nine touchdowns on 51 carries in a 70-31 Pirate win.
That’s the most yards any runner has gained in a single game in the entire history of Washington state high school football, and it also put Hoisington over the top for the single-season state rushing record of 2,929 yards.
Barring injury or a sudden love of tennis, Vashon’s best player will be back on the gridiron for his senior season, and Coupeville’s defense will be looking for a little payback.
7) Two homecomings in one — Port Townsend hits Whidbey Oct. 7, just as Coupeville celebrates Homecoming.
It’ll be a reunion, as Alex Heilig, a former Wolf assistant coach (and husband of CHS three-sport legend Ashley Ellsworth-Bagby) is the new head coach of the RedHawks.
He’s been gone for two years (one as an assistant in South Whidbey, one as head coach in Granite Falls), but he taught and coached many of the current Wolf players.
8) Defend the crown — Boys tennis knocked off Klahowya to claim the league title last season, the eighth championship in program history and first since 2011.
Wolf coach Ken Stange will be in search of his 12th title at Coupeville (he has four on the boys side, seven on the girls), but he’ll have to scramble to replace his top two singles players, who both graduated.
9) More games that truly count — After two seasons of playing six league games, volleyball and soccer are joining sports like basketball, baseball and softball by jumping to a schedule which has nine league contests.
That means three match-ups apiece against Chimacum, Port Townsend and Klahowya, and less chance of what happened last year, when the Wolves had to play “non-conference” games against conference foes in a bid to fill out their schedules.
More league games also means:
10) Time to clip the Eagles — Of the 10 sports all four Olympic League teams vie in (we don’t count track, as its scoring system exists in its own special world), there are five teams which have never lost a league game in the two-year history of the conference.
Coupeville girls basketball (18-0) towers over everyone, while Klahowya volleyball (12-0), girls soccer (12-0) and boys soccer (12-0) also haven’t been touched.
Rounding out the undefeated is Coupeville girls tennis (11-0).
In eight of the ten sports there have been back-to-back league champs (Coupeville – girls tennis and basketball; Port Townsend – football; Chimacum – boys basketball, softball; Klahowya – boys and girls soccer, volleyball).
The only sports which went different in 2015 than they did in 2014 were boys tennis and baseball, where the Wolves took away titles from their big school rival.
Coupeville won four league titles in 2015, most of any school, after Klahowya nabbed five in 2014.
Now it’s time to keep that momentum going and finally ding the Eagles in volleyball and soccer.
If 2016 is to fully be the year of the Wolf, it all starts there.
