Coupeville Sports

Stuff happened. A lot of stuff.

And, while there are still three days left in 2023, we’re pausing to look back at what drew the headlines over the previous 362 or so days.

In no particular order and drawn from 1000+ stories here on the blog (seriously), what people were talking about in Coupeville.

 

Best of the best:

Grey Peabody (volleyball), Dominic Coffman (football), and Maddie Georges (basketball) played in All-State games, while Scott Hilborn and Jonathan Valenzuela (baseball) participated in the All-State feeder games.

League MVP honors went to Hilborn and Coffman in football, then Hilborn in baseball.

May brought the CHS Athlete of the Year awards, which went to Ryanne Knoblich, Hilborn, and Tim Ursu.

 

Budget battles:

Money is the root of all evil, and also the cause of a lot of hurt feelings.

Everyone has their opinion, and their explanation, but the facts are simple — school district officials initially called for cutting the jobs of Willie Smith (Athletic Director), Jessica Caselden (Athletic Trainer), and Tom Black (Dean of Students).

The decision to hand Smith’s AD duties to Assistant Principal Leonard Edlund, whose own hours were being cut, was reversed long before the school board voted on a budget.

But not before ADs from every other school in Coupeville’s league, and many others, made a public defense for a veteran leader who was in the midst of delivering a record-setting year, athletically and academically.

Caselden’s job was slashed in the final budget, despite a large public outcry, but then the community rallied to do what the district would not — save a valuable resource by funding the position for a year.

A GoFundMe and a car wash — the latter driven by the children of Caselden’s childhood friends — brought in $8,000 and gave school district officials a year to reassess their priorities.

Black was also cut, despite impassioned letters and speeches detailing his impact on the lives of countless Wolf students.

He was brought back on a part-time basis, however, after Edlund took a medical leave at the start of the school year.

As we head into 2024, Black has returned to full-time, for now, with the news the Assistant Principal is unable to return to his duties this school year.

Things remain unsettled, as four CHS secretaries sent letters to the superintendent and school board in December detailing the pressure they are under as the school tries to operate under the current budget.

 

Buzzer beaters:

Valenzuela, down to one good eye after taking an elbow to the face earlier in the game, banked in a three-point bomb at the horn on La Conner’s floor, lifting Wolf boys’ basketball to a 57-56 win in February.

Jump forward 11 months, and it was Mia Farris driving the length of the floor in Coupeville, sliding between two defenders, and slapping home a game-winning layup as the Wolf girls held off Orcas Island 42-40.

 

Cheertastic spirit leaders:

CHS cheer balanced a sideline squad with a return to the competitive mats, with a high point being a 2nd place performance at the Blue Fusion Cheer Competition in Puyallup.

Other highlights included participating in Spirit Day at the U-Dub, and pulling off two hugely successful junior cheer performances, one of which drew 103 kids.

 

Coaching changes:

Brett Casey (CHS football), Hunter Smith (CHS boys’ basketball), and the dean of Wolf coaches, 20-year vet Ken Stange (CHS tennis) left the arena.

Meanwhile Bennett Richter added on a CMS girls’ basketball coaching gig to his high school football duties, while RayLynn Ratcliff, Alex Evans, and Jaylen Nitta took over the CMS boys’ hoops program.

Also new: Kimberly Kisch (CHS girls’ soccer), Amber Wyman (CMS cross country), Kristina Hooks (CMS volleyball), and (for a season) Mia Littlejohn (CMS girls’ basketball), while Craig Anderson and Jon Roberts bounced from middle school basketball to high school.

 

College and beyond:

Multiple former Wolves suited up for college athletic teams this year, including Carolyn Lhamon, Lucy and Sophie Sandahl, Mitchell Hall, Ben Smith, Mica Shipley, Taygin Jump, Logan Martin, Joey Lippo, Caleb Meyer, and Hawthorne Wolfe.

Shipley reached the end of a four-year run as a D-I cheerleader at Eastern Washington University, while Martin earned All-West Region honors in the hammer throw for Central Washington University.

The Sandahl sisters (crew-Seattle Pacific) and Lhamon (soccer-Colorado School of Mines) participated in national championship events, while Sean Toomey-Stout, the first Coupeville grad to pile up stats for the University of Washington football team, took a medical retirement.

Then there were former Wolves playing at a higher level, with Dawson Houston and Kwamane Bowens suiting up for the Everett Royals semi-pro football team and Makana Stone entering her third year of overseas professional basketball.

 

Future phenoms:

Tamsin Ward kicked off her middle school track career by winning 11 times, including taking a league title in the high jump.

The only CMS athletes to top the 6th grader during the years I can … track?

Future high school legends Lindsey Roberts and Alex Murdy, who won 18 and 12 times, respectively, as 8th graders.

Meanwhile, the softball field was once again ground zero for future stars, as the Central Whidbey Little League Majors squad went 15-2, won a district title, and made a strong run at the state tourney.

 

Hit the road:

CHS graduated 88 seniors in early spring, with Helen Strelow and Abigail Ramirez sharing Valedictorian honors.

 

It’s a party:

CHS celebrated the 50th anniversary of girls’ basketball, bringing in a considerable crowd on a night when the current Wolves beat South Whidbey handily in two games.

The top 15 career scorers, led by Brianne King, and the 1999-2000 team — the first Wolf girls’ team to win at state in any sport — were honored, while former coach Phyllis Textor was among those garnering an epic response in their return to the gym of their younger days.

Earlier in the year, Coupeville celebrated Homecoming by anointing Skylar Parker and William Davidson as Queen and King.

 

 

League leaders:

Multiple Wolves claimed All-Conference honors.

The first teamers included Cole White for soccer, Farris and Peabody for volleyball, Logan Downes for basketball, and Hilborn, Jack Porter, and Valenzuela for baseball.

Not to mention Farris, Madison McMillan, and Teagan Calkins for softball and (deep breath) Chase Anderson (on both sides of the ball), Downes, Hunter Bronec, Zane Oldenstadt, Davidson, Marcelo Gebhard, Mikey Robinett, and Jaje Drake in football.

 

Record setters:

Downes blitzed the books, establishing new CHS football records for touchdown passes thrown in a game (5), season (20), and career (40).

As the new year looms, he’s back at it, gunning for the #1 spot on the boys’ basketball career scoring chart.

Downes has 989 points and counting, with 10 games left on the regular season schedule, and then hopefully a long playoff run.

That puts him just 149 points from breaking the record of 1,137, jointly held by Jeff Stone and Mike Bagby.

During the spring Knoblich capped her track career by soaring five feet, two inches in the high jump at the state meet, tying a school record set in 1999 by Yashmeen Knox.

This fall, Wolf booter Ezra Boilek banged in five goals against Grace Academy, while playing just the first half, shattering the school’s single-game soccer scoring mark of four, jointly held by cousins Abraham and Derek Leyva.

 

Soccer shuffle:

A lack of players forced CHS to cancel its girls’ soccer season, but most of the players and coach Kimberly Kisch made the jump to team up with their male counterparts as the school went co-ed on the pitch for a season.

The varsity team, which featured Ayden Wyman and Bryley Gilbert, was ranked as high as #4 in the state at one point, while the JV squad, with close to a 50/50 mix, was competitive every time out.

Will the programs split next fall, or remain together? Only time will tell.

 

State success:

CHS volleyball returned to the big dance for the first time since 2017, holding its own with big-timers Lind-Ritzville and Goldendale.

Wolf baseball beat Toledo 3-0, capturing the program’s first state win since 1987, then scored off of projected Major League Baseball first-round pick Zach Swanson of Toutle Lake in a quarterfinal loss.

Strelow, who also advanced to state in cross country during her Coupeville days, finished her tennis career by playing three matches at the year’s premier event.

Both baseball and tennis captured Bi-District titles, adding to the school’s Wall of Fame.

Cross country sent its boys’ team to Pasco, where the Wolves claimed 10th place in the team results, the best showing since the mid-’70s, while Noelle Western made a return trip as the lone CHS girl in the field.

 

Titanic track:

Alex Murdy became the 10th state champ in CHS history, soaring in the long jump, while the Wolf girls finished 3rd in the team standings, best in program history.

With the CHS boys finishing 5th in their own team battle, that put the cherry on top in a season in which Bob Martin and Elizabeth Bitting also guided their squads to Bi-District titles.

 

Water (and wrasslin’) wizards:

Finn Price is a one-man Wolf wrecking crew in the pool, training and traveling with Kamiak since CHS doesn’t have a pool program of its own.

As a freshman, he competed at districts in two events. Now, barely into his sophomore season, he’s already punched his postseason ticket in four events.

Coupeville senior Jaje Drake is following a similar path, training with South Whidbey while pursuing a season on the wrestling mats.

When the postseason arrives, the Wolf big man will go his own way, with CHS football coach Bennett Richter accompanying him.

 

Wedded bliss:

Among Coupeville athletic stars to tie the knot (and give the blog plenty of page hits) were Sylvia Hurlburt, Jae LeVine, CJ Smith, Payton Aparicio, Zoe Trujillo, and Hunter Smith.

 

What a win:

CHS boys’ soccer stunned state powerhouse Orcas Island 4-3 in the rain at Mickey Clark Field.

The middle school boys’ basketball teams won five of six games against archrival South Whidbey, a year after the CMS program failed to win a single contest.

Melanie Navarro cranked two homers on the same day, as CHS softball dismantled South Whidbey 20-2.

But no victory was bigger than the night CHS volleyball slew the beast.

Celebrating Senior Night, the Wolves thrashed La Conner in four sets, snapping a 12+ year streak of league wins for the Braves and signaling the beginning of the end for their four-year run of capturing state crowns.

 

WIAA recognition:

The bigwigs in the big city noticed Cow Town from time to time in 2023.

Lyla Stuurmans, Downes, and Landon Roberts earned Athlete of the Week honors, while CHS track copped Team of the Month for April.

Also, Wolf girls’ tennis and boys’ track teams earned Academic state titles in 2023, and CHS, as a whole, finished 4th among 2B schools in the yearly Scholastic Cup competition, an all-time best for the school.

 

And some odds and ends:

Former CMS football coach Michael Golden was charged with wire fraud in Alabama and faces up to 20 years in prison.

CHS grad Brian Roberts was honored by paramedics for helping to save a man trapped after a car accident.

The building commonly known as “The Engle Farm,” long owned by the state, burnt down.

The Coupeville Boys and Girls Club opened a snazzy new joint and will no longer have to share an old fire house.

Wolf basketball players gathered 250+ toys for children at Christmas.

Alison Perera was re-elected to the school board, while Charles Merwine was also added by voters.

Race the Reserve attracted 277 runners to the biggest fundraiser for CHS seniors.

The rock outside of CHS was vandalized by pro-Palestinian spray painters, but security camera footage revealed the perps to be outsiders, squashing conspiracy theories that local teachers were radicalizing students.

And the true “Chosen One,” Adeline Richter, was born.