Frankie Tenore is honored on Senior Night. (Jackie Saia photos)
Sometimes a tie can feel an awful lot like a win.
Walk across Mickey Clark Field Saturday night, a wee bit of October chill in the air, and the scene on the Coupeville sideline post-game was a portrait of celebration and achievement.
The Wolf girls’ soccer squad, back after a two-year hiatus, had just wrapped its final home game with a dramatic defensive stand in stoppage time, forcing a 3-3 stalemate with visiting Sultan.
The non-conference tie brings Coupeville’s record to 2-7-1, with two road games left on the regular season schedule.
It also marked another milestone for a Wolf squad on which 13 of 15 players are 8th graders or freshmen.
Standing toe-to-toe, and hip check-to-hip check with veteran booters from a school whose student body outnumbers Coupeville 466-192.5, is a huge achievement.
“What a great night!” said Wolf coach Jasmine Ader. “We’ve been waiting for this moment and started to see it with how well we played on Lopez Island in the last game.
“Our trajectory is going straight up, exactly where we want it.”
That joy and sense of achievement carried over from the team’s one old pro, defender Frankie Tenore, who had Senior Night honors to herself.
“I’ve played soccer almost my whole life, been on co-ed teams like we had the past two years, and girls’ teams,” she said. “I’m so happy to see our program come back this strong, and to get to play with this amazing team.”
While Tenore will soon depart for new adventures, the youngsters — there are eight 8th graders and five fab frosh on the roster — plan to keep making big plays in her honor.
Finley Helm patrols the net with flair.
Goaltender Finley Helm, just an 8th grader, came up huge in the waning moments Saturday, making three saves in a two-minute stoppage time which felt more like 10 minutes.
Flying out of the goal, sliding across the ground, boldly snatching balls away from her rivals just as they cocked their legs to shoot, she made her old man, CHS assistant coach Jerry Helm, beam under the lights.
Complimented for her often-daring play by a passerby, she looked up and nodded.
“It’s my net!!!”
And then she softly giggled, and went about the rest of her night, awash in well-earned joy.
With the Wolves being such a young team, they don’t know what they don’t know. And one of those things is the old rule that few high school teams come back from a two-goal deficit.
Young and full of fire.
Sultan slipped in a couple of quick goals in the game’s first 10 minutes, off of misdirected balls which found openings in the midst of a scrum of players, and things could have seemed bleak.
Instead, Coupeville’s young guns just started firing.
Tamsin Ward and Lyla Grose came flying in, locked and loaded, often with Lillian Ketterling setting them up with well-placed passes.
Some shots slid wide. Some were stopped by Sultan’s netminder. But some got through.
Ward made a sensational run up the right side, leaving a pack of Turk defenders in her rearview mirror, then punched in Coupeville’s first goal midway through the first half.
Not content to stop there, she netted the tying score in stoppage time, giving her 10 tallies in this, her freshman season.
That makes her just the fourth Wolf girl to hit double-digits in a single campaign — joining Mia Littlejohn, Kalia Littlejohn, and Genna Wright — and already has her sitting at #7 on the career scoring chart for a program playing in its 20th season.
Sultan snatched the lead back eight minutes into the second half, with a Turk shooter snagging a rebound and dumping the ball into a tiny open window, but the Wolves never broke.
Instead, they kept on the offensive, pushing the attack, and then taking advantage when a defender sent Ward sprawling deep in Sultan territory.
Granted a penalty kick, Coupeville put Ketterling on the line, and the sophomore sensation responded with an ice-cold move, slapping the ball into the upper part of the net as the goalie could do little else but watch the ball fly past her head.
It was the first high school goal for the scrappy pitch powerhouse, who is the heart and soul of a team with a bright future.
Lillian Ketterling gives Tenore some love.
Coupeville Sports 