Senior Hunter Smith is #24 on the CHS boys basketball career scoring list. With 11 regular season games left, and possibly a playoff run, he has a shot at cracking the Top 10. (Photos by JohnsPhotos.net)
Coupeville’s new covered grandstands debut this spring, in time for soccer and track.
Class of 2022 athletes, who include (l to r) Kylie Van Velkinburgh, Samantha Streitler and Bella Velasco, make their high school debuts next fall.
After falling a single strike short of state last year, Coupeville softball is ready to rumble this spring.
A new sports year begins.
Will it be filled with championships, celebrations and euphoria or much weeping and wailing (metaphorically, at least) on the prairie?
And, perhaps even more importantly, will you, the readers, continue to chip in and keep Coupeville Sports chugging along with your support, via financial donations, tasty treats and kind words?
Only time, and the passage of the seasons, will tell.
One thing is for sure. By the time we get to the end of 2018 at least a dozen things NOT talked about in this article will have surfaced to capture our attention.
Happens every year. Surprises, good and bad, fill our days, and the future is crammed with the great unknown.
But, looking into my (cracked) crystal ball, here are the story lines which, for now, seem likely to dominate conversation in 2018.
WINTER:
A new league — Coupeville calls it quits after a four-year run in the Olympic League at the end of the 2017-2018 school year. That we know for sure.
Where we land is up in the air until late Jan., when the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association will rule on our request to drop from 1A to 2B.
CHS was 2B for many years, and the current student body count plants us firmly in that category.
But, we were (barely) a 1A school in 2016, the next WIAA count is not until 2020, and we need special permission to move at this point in time.
If Coupeville gets the OK, we return to the Northwest Conference and reignite old school rivalries with La Conner, Concrete, Darrington, Orcas Island, Friday Harbor and Mount Vernon Christian.
If we’re denied for now, we join South Whidbey and state title-winning juggernaut King’s, along with Cedar Park Christian (Bothell), Sultan and Granite Falls in the brand-new 1A North Sound Conference.
Either way, the times, they are a’changing.
A sweet swan song? — With 2/3 of winter sports and all of spring left, the fight for dominance in the about-to-implode Olympic League gets serious.
Coupeville, the smallest of the four schools by far, is hot on the heels of Klahowya, the state’s biggest 1A school, for the varsity wins crown covering the 10 sports the Wolves compete in.
If nothing else, girls basketball and tennis are both shooting for a fourth-straight league crown as they exit stage left. Time to go out with a bang.
A lot of candles on the cake — CHS boys basketball marks the 101-year anniversary of the first hoops game in school history (a 29-7 win over Langley) Jan. 19. Chimacum visits Cow Town, and, if the school is on top of things, the night could be festive.
SPRING:
A new stadium — After a two-year wait, the Wolves have a gorgeous new covered grandstand at Micky Clark Field. Work finished right after football season ended, so the new stadium debuts this spring with soccer and track.
Swing for the stars — Coupeville’s softball squad won 19 games last year, second-most in the 40-year history of the program, and returns almost every starter.
The Wolves fell a single strike short of the state tourney last year, and a senior-heavy team led by Katrina McGranahan, Lauren Rose and Hope Lodell would love to put a final exclamation point on their careers days before graduation.
Heating up the oval — Jacob Smith finished 3rd in the 200 as a junior, and both the guys who nipped him graduated, making him a strong contender for a state title.
Maya Toomey-Stout was the first Wolf girl to compete at state in four events in the same season, and she was only a freshman last year.
But the leader is Lindsey Roberts, who, through two seasons of track, has three school records and four state meet medals.
Only three CHS girls have more, with Makana Stone (7), Natasha Bamberger (6) and Yashmeen Knox (5) forming the holy trinity.
Tyler King is the all-time school leader with 11 medals, nipping brother Kyle (10) and forever winning Thanksgiving family dinner arguments.
FALL:
Goodbye and hello — The Class of 2018, which has enjoyed a truly stellar run, especially on the girls side, graduates in the spring. Come fall, the Class of 2022, which boasts a number of promising young stars, arrives on campus.
Run in your own town? — CHS hasn’t had an active cross country program in years, which meant Danny Conlisk, who went to state in 2017, trained and traveled with South Whidbey, then ran in a Wolf uniform.
As interest in running has risen in recent years – Henry and Sam Wynn also competed last year — buzz about Coupeville relaunching its own program has intensified. Sweet possibility or hot air? We shall find out.
Sister, my sister — Kalia Littlejohn (33 goals) will enter her senior soccer season needing just three scores to unseat big sis Mia (35) as the program’s top career scorer. After that comes the school record of 45 goals, held by Abraham Leyva.
ALL SEASONS:
Gossip makes the world go round, so we’ll be buzzing about coaches (who’s leaving? who’s arriving?) and daydreaming about breakout stars like Port Townsend’s Noa Apker-Montoya, Klahowya’s Maile Lueck or South Whidbey’s Kody Newman shocking the world and transferring to Coupeville.
Hey, I didn’t say it was GOING to happen. I said, it COULD happen. New year, anything’s possible.
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