While teammates Hunter Downes and Hunter Smith were tying offensive records Saturday, Axel Partida was going all-out on defense. (John Fisken photo)
It was a record-tying day when ultimately it needed to be a record-breaking one.
Coupeville High School quarterback Hunter Downes connected on four touchdown passes Saturday afternoon — tying a school single-game record held by his offensive coordinator — but came up one pass short of rallying the Wolves past a feisty Bellevue Christian squad.
Despite a stellar performance from the Wolf junior, who threw for 243 yards while dealing with a wet football, and a record-tying game from receiver Hunter Smith, Coupeville was nipped 34-28 in a game played at Lake Washington.
The loss drops the Wolves to 1-3 in league play, 2-5 overall.
Downes four scoring strikes, two of which came in the fourth quarter, ties a mark set by Corey Cross in 1971 and tied twice by Brad Sherman (the current CHS play-caller) in 2001.
Smith hauled in three of those TD’s, making him the fourth Wolf receiver to ever accomplish that feat.
Glenn Losey (1970), Brian Fakkema (2001) and Josh Bayne (2014) are the others to pull off a trio of scoring catches in one game.
Unfortunately, all the records set Saturday are overshadowed a bit by the final score.
Coupeville looked like it was going to pull off a stunner, rallying from the brink of death with less than five minutes to play.
With the weather far balmier and a million times less windy than forecasters had predicted, the only storm was on the scoreboard, with CHS trailing 34-21 and having just turned the ball over deep in its own territory.
Holding on to a two-score lead and taking over at Coupeville’s 17-yard line, BC was ready to put the hammer down.
But, with their main running back, senior Daniel Ficca, having hobbled to the bench a few plays earlier, the Vikings went away from the run and tried to seal the deal with a pass.
It was a bad move, as Cameron Toomey-Stout picked the pass to put the ball back in Downes hands.
Two dropped passes and a sack later, Coupeville was shoved back to its 15, Downes was sent to the bench for a play by the refs after getting leveled and the Wolves needed another miracle.
And they found it, as Smith promptly connected with Toomey-Stout on a 67-yard catch-and-run in which the super-speedy #11 twirled like a ballet dancer, bouncing off of bodies and carrying half the Bellevue team down the field with him.
Bursting back into the game, Downes got Coupeville into the end zone four plays later, sliding a four-yard pass into Smith’s waiting hands, helping both players tie single-game marks at the same time.
Closing to within 34-28, the Wolves seemed to be crafting a storybook ending.
They forced the Vikings to go four and out, accepted a punt and stood 51 yards away from victory with 1:56 to play.
But the football gods, unlike the weather gods, were not smiling on Coupeville, as a Bellevue player read things correctly, jumped the route and picked off Downes on the Wolves next play.
Unable to stop the clock, Coupeville missed on getting one final play when the officials allowed too much time to bleed off the clock at the end of the game.
It appeared BC would have to punt, but, thanks to a fast clock and a slow ref, the Vikings escaped unscathed.
Up until the wild end, the game had been a back-and-forth affair, with Bellevue scoring and then Coupeville responding.
Despite the on-and-off rain, Downes was on point most of the afternoon, raining down fire from above.
His first scoring strike, set up by a Chris Battaglia fumble recovery, was a 30-yarder to Smith in the first quarter in which he flung a frozen rope that split two defenders in mid air.
Downes then came back with a 75-yard scoring play early in the second quarter on which he threw a bomb out into the great unknown and let Smith outrace two defenders to snag it.
Touchdown #3 went to Toomey-Stout, a 40-yard play early in the fourth quarter, before #4 went to Smith during the furious finale.
While the wind never developed into a problem of any magnitude, a slick ball was often hard for both teams to hang on to, as multiple fumbles were lost.
Dane Lucero joined Battaglia in snaring a loose ball, while a third was scooped up by an unknown Wolf in the middle of a dog pile.
CHS coach Jon Atkins praised his defense, giving credit to Uriel Liquidano for being a rampaging force of nature and Lucero and Axel Partida for “doing a really good job of setting the edge.”
Up in the press box, Clay Reilly’s super-powered leg, shown off on extra points and kick-offs, was the #1 topic of discussion among the locals.
Unofficially, Coupeville threw for 310 yards (243 from Downes and 67 from Smith), with Toomey-Stout accounting for 166 of those yards and Smith 144.
Jacob Martin led the Wolves with 62 yards on the ground, while Coupeville had three kick returns of 15+ yards.
Smith brought one back 26 yards and another 19, while Matt Hilborn creased the defense on a 16-yard return.
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