Ken Stange built a tennis empire at Coupeville High School, one well-placed shot at a time. (Photos courtesy Stange)
The mission is complete … for now.
Ken Stange recently wrapped an 18-year run as Coupeville High School tennis coach, leading the Wolves through two seasons most years.
As he marinates in his “retirement” down at Bailey’s Corner Store, he’s sharing memories, deep thoughts, and (maybe) clues to where the bodies are buried.
A nine-part odyssey inside the mind of the man, the myth, the always-entertaining net guru:
Welcome to “By the Numbers, a.k.a. Tooting My Own Horn.”
Eighteen years of coaching (32 seasons) – 17 girls’ tennis seasons – 15 boys’ tennis seasons, 17 league titles – 12 with the girls – five with the boys.
One girls’ Bi-District team championship and six trip to state.
2008 — Hannah Bush (Merrell) and Megan Mindemann (Monroe) – My first trip to state.
I consider Hannah and Megan to be the mothers of the girls’ tennis program over which I presided.
They led an outstanding team during that season, and they lost very few matches.
They got pasted at state, but their sacrifices led to better experiences for future state qualifiers.
2010 — Julia Sierra Castaño – The Spanish Assassin was her nickname.
Julia (or Hoolia, as it was humorously spelled) was a Spanish exchange student.
She could hit forehands as hard as me.
She won a match at that state tournament and was in the mix for a medal.
She was easily the best singles player I ever coached on the girls’ team.
2014 — Aaron Curtin and Ben Etzell – tennis was their hobby sport.
In real life, they were serious baseball players who were part of a state championship little league team when they were younger.
They had a wickedly strong fall season in 2014 and qualified for the state tournament in the spring by surviving a very tough group of Seattle private school teams.
The problem was that their baseball team also made it to state that spring, so we only had about three hours of court time together before the tourney.
That said, they still won one of their matches. Had we more time to prepare, a medal would have been within reach.
While Ben would move on to a successful college baseball career, Aaron was only a junior and would be back the next season.
Aaron and Ben occupy the top boys’ doubles spot on my all-time team.
2015 — Aaron Curtin (8th Place) – Aaron (or A-A-Ron as I liked to call him) was the best boys’ singles player I ever coached.
Pressure and stress were not part of his athletic vocabulary.
When he came back for his senior year, we said, “Why not just go to state in singles this year?”
He did. He placed 8th, my first player to earn a medal.
Basking in the afterglow with Aaron Curtin.
2018 — Payton Aparicio and Sage Renninger (4th Place).
Payton and Sage were the most professional players I ever coached. They worked extremely hard at improving their doubles game.
As ninth graders, they showed up on one of the deepest teams I’d ever had.
There were four veteran doubles teams vying for the coveted #1 doubles spot in the lineup.
One by one, Payton and Sage took their teammates down, eventually locking down the top spot for themselves for four years.
They took their lumps that first year, but by the time they were seniors, they were battle tested.
In the regular season, they played about six doubles teams that would end up qualifying for state at the A or AA classifications.
They showed up to state expecting to take home hardware and won their opening match.
In the quarterfinals, they squared up and took on the defending state champions from Overlake.
Payton and Sage didn’t back down.
They lost the first set but adjusted and took the second set.
They ended up losing that match, forcing a third match of the day, in sweltering heat.
They dug deep and took down their opponents, earning them a spot in Saturday’s medal matches.
It was one of the gutsiest wins I’ve ever seen.
On the morning of their medal match, I waited for them in the hotel lobby.
When I saw them, the effects of the previous day’s seven hours of tennis were not evident. They were on their toes and ready.
Before they stepped on the court, I knew they were going to win an easy match. They did just that.
Payton and Sage are the only players I coached who ended their state run with a win, winning the 4th/7th place match.
They also occupy the top girls’ doubles spot on my all-time team.
Sage Renninger (left) and Payton Aparicio ruled the CHS courts for four years.
2023 — Helen Strelow – Helen was the reason I kept coaching after the cancelled COVID season.
We only got to hit for a little while that spring, but as a sophomore, Helen came back and steadily improved each day.
As a junior, she came up a bit shy of qualifying for state, but in her senior year, she carried the team to league and district titles, as well as a state berth for herself.
She won a match at state too.
That young woman did it all: accomplished artist, valedictorian, state cross country runner, state tennis player, and a two-time academic state champion during her senior year.
Qualifying for state was always the lofty goal.
In a state tennis tournament, there are only 48 kids who qualify.
It’s not like football and its sixteen teams of 50+ players.
It’s not like track and field, with a multitude of events and hundreds of participants.
It’s 48 kids, and many of those kids play for private schools and practice year-round on indoor courts.
Beating them is special—somewhat of a David taking down Goliath.
These numbers and stats make me proud.
If you look at the walls of the CHS gym, each sport has placards representing major accomplishments.
Each sport has different types of accomplishments that can be reached, but one that all teams have in common is league titles.
Over 32 seasons and 18 years, my tennis teams won 17 league titles.
Between 2005-2023, the tennis teams won more league titles than all the other teams combined.
I know that sometimes we were in small leagues that were easy to win, but we nonetheless beat the teams that were put in front of us, at least most of the time.
It’s not just the numbers that make me proud.
It makes me proud to know that we did it on a shoestring budget that did not allow for an assistant coach.
There were times when I had 30 kids playing tennis and it was next to impossible to keep track of them all.
The older players were the assistant coaches, and they did a fantastic job of showing the new kids the ropes.
There were leaders, and when future leaders emerged, the current leaders passed the torch to them, so to speak.
It was the system.
We played against much larger schools with much larger tennis teams and we held our own.
It sustained itself for the better part of 18 years.
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