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Posts Tagged ‘Nooksack Valley’

The “Wolf that wasn’t” Whatcom’s best!!

Posted in Cross Country, Softball, Wrestling, tagged , , , on July 5, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Chloe Gardner

Chloe Gardner

Perhaps the best “Wolf that Never Was” is officially Whatcom’s best.

Chloe Gardner, who moved away from Coupeville with her family when she was in the third grade, was selected Friday as The Bellingham Herald’s All-Whatcom County Female Athlete of the Year.

As a senior at Nooksack Valley High School, Gardner won a 1A state wrestling title at 145 pounds, helped lead the Pioneers to a fifth place finish in the state softball tourney and advanced to state in cross country, a sport she mainly used as a way to get ready for her “real” sports.

I bring this up because if her parents, Wade and Trina, had not chosen to move the family off The Rock in 2004 (a time when Trina was the #1 barista at Miriam’s Espresso), Chloe would have been doing her butt-kickin’ in the red and black.

Albeit in different sports, since CHS doesn’t field cross country or wrestling teams.

But that’s fine. Gardner is a superb athlete. She would have adapted.

Drop in volleyball or soccer for cross country and basketball for wrestling and we’re good to go.

Except…

If we had a time machine, we could go back and convince a third-grader to convince her family not to move, thereby changing the very course of Wolf athletics!

Seriously, who wants to get working on this idea?!?! Anyone, anyone … Bueller, Bueller?

OK, fine, be that way. Personally, I thought the idea had merit.

 

To see more on Chloe’s honor, bounce over to:

http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2014/07/04/3734625/nooksacks-chloe-gardner-rises.html?sp=%2F99%2F110%2F

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Get off the bus! It’s sprinkling!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , on March 29, 2014| Leave a Comment »

The ol' ball coach, Willie Smith, works his magic with the umps. (Shelli Trumbull photo)

  The ol’ ball coach, Willie Smith, works his magic with the umps. (Shelli Trumbull photo)

Assistant coach Chris Tumblin prepares to massacre the ball. (John Fisken photo)

Assistant coach Chris Tumblin prepares to massacre the ball. (John Fisken photo)

They obviously prayed for rain in Nooksack Valley, and it worked.

Finding the only way to avoid taking a beating at the hands of the Coupeville High School baseball squad, the Pioneers relied on weather to wash away their scheduled non-conference game with the Wolves Saturday.

The game has tentatively been rescheduled for Saturday, April 19.

If it’s played, Coupeville (3-1) will have another nine games under its belt at that point, with three-game Cascade Conference series against 2A teams Archbishop Thomas Murphy, Cedarcrest and Lakewood.

The Wolves then close the regular season with similar series against Granite Falls and Sultan.

The series against ATM, with road games in Everett Monday and Friday of next week and a home game Wednesday (4 PM), will pit Coupeville against the current league leader.

The Wildcats are 4-0 in league play, 4-2 overall, while the Wolves (2-1 in league play) are tied with Lakewood, a half game behind Cedarcrest (3-1) for second place.

Coupeville is a game-and-a-half up on South Whidbey (1-3) in the battle for playoff positioning between the only two 1A teams to play baseball in the conference.

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We let a state champ get away!!

Posted in Wrestling, tagged , , , , on February 23, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Chloe Gardner could have been the best athlete at Coupeville High School, but real life had to go and mess that up. (Wade Gardner photo)

   Chloe Gardner could be the best athlete at Coupeville High School right now, but real life had to go and mess all that up. (Wade Gardner photo)

The Gardners (l to r), Bailey, Trina, Chloe, Wade and Taylor.

The Gardners (l to r), Bailey, Trina, Chloe, Wade and Taylor.

Fools! We had a state champion in Coupeville and let her move away.

Now, of course, one could argue that Chloe Gardner, who won a 1A state wrestling title for Nooksack Valley in the 145 pound classification at Mat Classic XXVI in Tacoma Saturday, never would have done that if she and her family had stayed in Cow Town.

Cause it’s kind of hard to win when your town doesn’t have a wrestling team…

But, thanks to the whims of fate, when a new job for dad Wade took the Gardners off-Island in 2004 (mom Trina was the #1 barista at Miriam’s Espresso at the time and put up with me on a daily basis), a whole new world opened for Chloe.

Not immediately, of course, as she was only in the third grade when she left Coupeville Elementary School.

But flash-forward to now, when the senior pinned Enumclaw’s Danielle Cormier in the championship match, and Chloe capped a remarkably successful run as a high school grappler.

Also a standout softball player and runner for Nooksack, she won all four of her matches at the two-day state tourney by pin. Her title followed a third-place finish as a junior and fourth-place as a sophomore.

Chloe’s younger brother, Taylor, who was in second grade when the family left Coupeville, is now a junior and was also at Mat Classic.

He was disqualified after being accused of biting his opponent in the second round, but was reinstated after a video review showed the other kid to be a little liar.

The family drama almost hurt Chloe as she came out slowly in her first match after her brother’s initial DQ and was almost pinned. Then, she got mad, rallied and whomped on the girl with the same intensity she has brought to all her sports.

An eight-time state qualifier in her various sports, Gardner will suit up for the Nooksack softball squad one final time before heading off to Skagit Valley College to seek a degree in Criminal Justice.

Meanwhile, Wolf fans will be left to wonder what could have been if Chloe, Taylor and 12-year old volleyball ace Bailey (who lived on Swedish Fish as a two-year old running the counter with me at Videoville) hadn’t been taken from Coupeville.

Well played, Nooksack Valley. Well played.

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