Losers yap. Winners smile. Zane Oldenstadt is a winner. (Michelle Glass photo)
He who celebrates last, celebrates loudest.
Yappy Friday Harbor varsity boys’ hoops players acted like they won a state title when they claimed an early lead Friday night in Coupeville.
By the time they exited Cow Town? Those same Wolverines had a lot less to say, after being eliminated from playoff contention.
Celebrating Senior Night in style, a Coupeville squad which features nine 12th graders held firm while being poked, prodded, and verbally harassed, claiming a 56-52 win and keeping alive its own dream of winning a league title.
Now 6-1 in Northwest 2B/1B League play, 14-5 overall, the Wolves are a half-game off of La Conner (6-0, 13-5) heading into a road trip to square off with those Braves on the mainland Feb. 6.
Friday’s win clinches a district playoff berth for CHS, but a win over La Conner, which it lost to by a single point the first time around, will give Coupeville at least a share of the NWL title.
Seeding for the four-team, double-elimination, two-teams-advance-to-state district tourney is still in flux, with La Conner also playing Friday Harbor in the regular-season finale Feb. 9.
If the Wolves and Braves finish with the same record, the latter of those teams gets the #1 seed thanks to a pre-season tiebreaker draw by league athletic directors.
But if La Conner loses its final two games, Coupeville snatches the #1 seed and hosts its district opener.
All other tourney games will be at CHS regardless, with the Wolves playing host.
Having clinched a trip to the playoffs, the Coupeville seniors are guaranteed of playing on their home floor again. Still, they made sure Senior Night counted.
It began with the program’s all-time leading scorer, Logan Downes, who was injured just moments into his team’s last game and sat out the majority of that non-conference clash at Chief Leschi.
Logan Downes catches a photo op with the future of the Wolf hoops program. (Angie Downes photo)
Beginning, and ending, Friday night with a walking boot on his left leg, the senior gunner played through the pain, and had the hot hand in the first quarter.
Pulling off his own tribute to Willis Reed (look it up on Wikipedia, teenagers), Downes knocked down a trio of three-balls, then slashed to the hoop for a bucket on a feed from Cole White to cap an 11-point performance in the game’s first seven minutes.
While Friday Harbor jumped out to an 11-6 lead, then prematurely celebrated, Coupeville chipped away at the lead.
White and William Davidson, whose fan club rocked personalized t-shirts, joined Downes in scoring in the opening frame, with the Wolves pulling back within 17-16 at the break.
Showcasing its depth, Brad Sherman’s squad turned to Nick Guay and Chase Anderson in the second quarter, with the lanky duo combining for 15 points as Coupeville used an 18-8 run to claim the lead for good.
Guay pushed the Wolves ahead, rippling the net on a silky sideline jumper, while Anderson, flying pell-mell end-to-end, slapped home a breakaway bucket to stake CHS to a 34-25 lead at the half.
Coupeville pushed its advantage out as far as 14 points in the second half, with Downes getting hot again and Anderson continuing to rampage like a wild beast, gloriously annoying Friday Harbor on seemingly every play.
The lead was at 48-36 heading into the fourth, with the Wolves still up 53-40 midway through the final frame.
But give Friday Harbor some credit — it is a resilient team and one always capable of making a run.
Which the Wolverines demonstrated one final time, carving the lead down to 55-51 late, with a little help from the refs.
The guys in the striped shirts ignored a blatant travel in the middle of the court on a play in which the visitors drained a three-ball, while allowing the yapping to progressively grow.
Anderson drilled a late jumper over the Friday Harbor defense, and Downes hit a key free throw in the final seconds, but the Wolverines got plenty of extra chances.
Despite Friday Harbor’s players endlessly bitching from opening tip to postgame discussion over whether losers get to stop at McDonald’s, it was the Wolves who had the game’s only technical foul called on them.
With five seconds to play and Coupeville up by five.
That set up a potential game-tying finish, but Friday Harbor choked, missing one of two free throws and failing to hit a three-ball at the buzzer.
Coupeville is going to the playoffs. Friday Harbor is not. (Michelle Glass photo)
Basking in the afterglow of the win, and punching their playoff ticket, any Wolf looking at the book would have seen the kind of balanced scoring which delights a coach.
Downes scraped out 19 while playing on one normal leg, and now sits at 1,213 for his career, while Anderson banked in 14.
White (8), Guay (7), Hunter Bronec (3), Ryan Blouin (3) — thanks to a killer fourth-quarter three-ball — and Davidson (2) also scored, with Zane Oldenstadt, Hurlee Bronec, and Quinten Simpson-Pilgrim hitting the boards with authority.
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