Kacie Kiel: Stone Cold Killer. (John Fisken photo)
Some day Kacie Kiel will tell her grandchildren the story of Dec. 13, 2014 and they’ll shake their heads and say, “Oh grandma, you’re off your meds again, aren’t you?”
Cause this is a story that makes little sense, that is so outlandish, so unbelievable, that it will seem like a daydream.
But it’s true. All true.
Agony to ecstasy, it actually happened.
Seriously. I kid you not.
For on that day, a Saturday afternoon that started sorta, kinda wretched, the night became one of the defining moments in Coupeville High School sports history.
A night when a Wolf girls’ basketball team which had struggled all game somehow rallied from eight down with 58 seconds to go and pulled off one of the more stunning victories this town has ever witnessed.
A night when Kiel, who mere seconds before had watched in horror as a pass flew by the back of her head and out of bounds, seemingly crushing Coupeville’s hopes, rebounded to nail the biggest shot of her career.
A high-arcing, flawlessly-rotating, three-point bomb from the deepest, darkest part of the right corner that hit nothing but the bottom of the net and sent the entire town of Sequim into a state of depression from which it may never emerge.
The mood in Cow Town, however? The party may never end.
Kiel’s trey with eight ticks left forced overtime, and Coupeville, flying high on endorphins, shut out its completely-deflated visitors in the extra period, pulling out a stunning 42-39 victory.
The victory over a 2A school that came to town bearing a snazzy 3-1 record lifted the Wolves, repping the smallest 1A school in all the land (or at least Washington state) to 4-2.
And it shouldn’t have happened, frankly.
Coupeville was inconsistent early, took some fairly godawful shots and frustrated Wolf coach David King enough that he didn’t want to speak to his team at the half.
But this is a team of destiny, and the Wolves believe it from the top of the rotation to the last girl on the bench. So they reached down and found the kind of miracle which can jet-propel a team to heights previously thought unimaginable.
Trailing since midway through the second quarter, Coupeville pulled within 35-31 with just under three minutes to play.
Makana Stone, the serene superstar, yanked down a rebound, then shot towards her basket, chewing up huge chunks of the court with every stride.
With the Sequim defenders backpedaling frantically, she went airborne and knocked down a flawless pin-point pass to Kiel, who caught the rock in mid-stride and laid it off the backboard.
But, frankly, even then, there seemed no way the visitors were going to lose.
A running one-hander and then a rebound put-back shoved the Sequim lead back to eight and the clock was running too fast.
Only…
This is a team of destiny.
A team that got a free throw from Kiel, a gorgeous jumper from Wynter Thorne — who hadn’t scored to that point in the game — and a swooping steal and bucket from Stone.
But even then, there was no real way. Right?
Only…
Sequim missed the front end of a one-and-one, and, after the ball sailed past Kiel’s head, the visitors, under great duress, committed a turnover in the back-court.
But still…
Kacie Kiel is one of the sweetest young women you will ever meet, and she smiles more on the hardwood than any human, win or lose.
Only…
She is a stone cold killer, one of the hardest-working, most fanatical players to ever put on the red and black. She never quits, ever.
The day she exits CHS will be a sad one for Wolf fans, but we will have the memories.
And she will have a moment to remember forever, a moment when she went Larry Bird on the world and caused her dad, Steve, to lose his freakin’ mind, two inches from my left ear.
Now, he has lost his freakin’ mind before and I have been in close range for those moments. I come prepared now.
But this one?
This one — the shot, papa bear screaming like a banshee, the crowd going bonkers, Kiel busting out one more small grin and waving three fingers at her dad, her mom Elaina, who waged a courageous war against cancer a year ago and never missed one of her games, and proud big sister Katie, who once played along side her — this one is legendary.
It is one of the greatest pressure shots I have seen a high school kid drop in 24 years of covering high school sports.
You could have called the game there. It was over the moment the ball hit the net.
Sequim, which had already fallen apart, had nothing left.
What had been a strong, precision-passing, three-point-shooting team became a squad that desperately wanted to get off the court and bypass McDonald’s on the trip home, and they did nothing right in the four minutes of overtime.
Thorne drilled a jumper, Kiel hit a final free throw and the team of destiny danced into the night, victorious.
Better yet, they did it as a true team, with contributions down the line.
Stone threw down 16, snatched 14 boards and handed out five assists, but it was an electrifying block in the final moments, when she launched herself about 17 feet into the air, that broke Sequim’s morale.
Kiel dropped in all 10 her points after halftime, while Monica Vidoni was a force in the paint with six points and five boards.
Thorne and Julia Myers banked in four apiece, Hailey Hammer added a bucket, McKenzie Bailey and Mia Littlejohn provided hustle and grit and injured star Madeline Strasburg was a vocal, if unpaid, assistant coach, urging her team on like a force of nature, slapping backs, whispering encouragement and screaming out info.
As I said, a team. A team of destiny.
JV falls: A rough third quarter in which they were outscored 23-8 doomed the Wolves, as they fell 58-36.
Kailey Kellner scored 11 to pace CHS, while Mattea Miller chipped in with seven. Both girls hit a long range trey to pad their totals.
Lauren Grove, Tiffany Briscoe, Allison Wenzel and Kyla Briscoe dropped in four apiece, while Skyler Lawrence tossed in two to round out the scoring.
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