With New Year’s on the horizon, the year in sports is coming to a close.

State champions, unlikely success stories, big-time tournaments, a new professional soccer franchise. What more could you ask for?

The 2008 Central Kitsap sports scene saw CK’s girls tennis earn a share of the 4A state title, CK football nearly make the 4A state championship game and Olympic’s Branden Yeik win a state wrestling championship.

But those are only a few of the year’s success stories, as coaches retired, college-bound athletes graduated and a new athletic director stepped in.

For every goodbye, there also was a hello. And for every last, there also was a first.

So as a deep layer of snow melts, trickling into the New Year, so, too, does the CK sports scene.

The Central Kitsap Reporter looks back at the great, not-so-great and all that made 2008:

A winter ago

• Girls basketball: Olympic captured its second consecutive Olympic League regular season title, but also fell one game short of the state tournament for the second consecutive year, dropping a loser-out, winner-to-state game against Enumclaw, 45-30, in the West Central District III tournament. Klahowya experienced a sharp learning curve en route to an 0-20 season, while Central Kitsap played near .500 ball, finishing 9-10 overall.

• Boys basketball: Central Kitsap fell shy of the state tournament after being eliminated by Decatur, 63-45, in districts. But the Cougars (15-10) had a solid regular season, finishing second to Bellarmine Prep in the Narrows League Bay Division. The Fife Trojans once again railroaded Klahowya’s season in controversial fashion, this time 73-65 in a postseason game marred by fan ejections and questionable officiating. (The Trojans edged KSS 70-69 in a 2007 playoff game after an Eagle free throw to tie the game was negated by a lane violation call with less than a second to play).

First-year coach Devin Huff guided a young Olympic team to a 6-13 record.

• Girls Bowling: While things could have gone better for the Olympic girls bowling team at the 2008 3A/2A WIAA State Girls Bowling Championships, they also could have gone much, much worse. The Trojans finished in fifth place, knocking down 7,125 total pins. Bremerton won the title with 7,601 total pins. Central Kitsap placed seventh in the Class 4A championships.

• Wrestling: Klahowya coach Wayne Gizzi knew his grapplers would do well at the 2A West Central District Region II Wrestling Championships. But just how well the team did was better than even

he could have hoped. The Eagles advanced seven wrestlers to the finals, six of whom won, and scored 181 total points to edge North Mason for the crown. Eagle Neil Sell then went on to capture second place in the 135-pound bracket at the WIAA 2A Mat Classic State Wrestling Championships in Tacoma.

In what was a somewhat tumultuous year for the Olympic Trojans wrestling program, balancing several strong performances with a slew of off-mat obstacles, then-sophomore Branden Yeik saved the day, and maybe the season, in the biggest way possible. Yeik did what few outside the Kitsap Peninsula believed he could do at the 3A WIAA Mat Classic state wrestling championships: first knocking off the bracket favorite, Sedro-Woolley’s Shane Hunt, before outlasting Ferndale’s JJ Reiser to claim the 130-pound crown.

• Marvin Williams: The Bremerton grad and most decorated basketball player Kitsap has ever produced made his final appearance at Key Arena, scoring a then-career-high 33 points to guide the Hawks to a 102-87 victory over the Sonics in front of more than 13,000 fans Jan. 25.

• Boys swim and dive: Central Kitsap then-senior Seth Parker won the boys 100-yard freestyle at the Class 4A WIAA State Boys Swim & Dive Championships in Federal Way with a school record time of 46.9 seconds to narrowly edge Decatur’s Tom Cunningham (47.03).

• Olympic College mascot: The Rangers nearly became the Bears after a change of mascots was suggested and initially supported. The Olympic College Board of Trustees, however, rescinded the decision, choosing tradition over change.

Sping-ing to state

• Baseball: Olympic and Central Kitsap each had solid seasons on the diamond, with both teams advancing to their respective state tournaments before bowing out. The Trojans beat Hazen 12-4 at districts to secure a No. 3 seed in the 3A state tournament, where they were eliminated by eventual runner-up Kelso in the first round, 5-0. The Cougars advanced to the 4A quarterfinals thanks to a first-round victory against Mountlake Terrace, 11-5, but then lost to eventual champion Snohomish, 9-2.

Klahowya ended an otherwise strong season with back-to-back losses against Fife and Kingston in the West Central District III 2A Baseball Tournament, missing state by one game.

• Fastpitch: CK coach Bruce Welling guided his team to the state tournament thanks to a strong showing at districts and the arm of Carolyn Cross. But the state run ended prematurely with the Cougars falling to Monroe and Kentlake.

For Olympic, the season ended too soon. The Trojans went 0-2 at districts, losing 2-0 against Auburn Riverside and 8-1 against Bonney Lake 8-1. Oly standout Kelsey Anchors signed to play at Oklahoma State University and then-coach Rachel Davenport took a job in the Bremerton School District.

One district win wasn’t quite enough for the Klahowya fastpitch team to advance to state. After beating Washington in the first round, the Eagles were eliminated with consecutive losses against Fife and Steilacoom.

• Boys soccer: Central Kitsap boys soccer coach Christopher Floro said he could stomach his team getting beat in a loser-out, winner-to-districts playoff game. What made the 1-0 2007-08 season-ending loss to North Kitsap so painful, however, was the way it happened. NK scored the game’s only goal with about 17 minutes remaining to eliminate the Cougars in a defensive battle.

No matter what the Olympic Trojans soccer teams do, they always seem to get the short end of the district seeding stick. Last spring was no different, as the Trojans fell 3-0 to Mount Rainier, which was 13-2-3 at the time.

• Boys lacrosse: Klahowya’s 8-4 season ended in the second round of the Washington High School Boys Lacrosse Association Division II playoffs, where the Eagles lost 11-7 against Seattle Prep.

• Girls tennis: For the second consecutive season, Central Kitap won the team title at the West Central District III tournament at Tacoma’s Sprinker Recreation Center. Doubles tandem Aya Sugimoto and Corinne Wurden then won the state doubles championship, defeating Bellarmine Prep’s Julia Galbraith and Nell Shonnard in three sets. That win helped the Cougars grab a share of the team title with Mead.

Klahowya also advanced to state — for the first time in school history — thanks to a district championship. Singles players Shelby Hunter and Jessica Wilson and doubles combo Misty Noster and Katie Stephens all made state appearances.

• NABA West Sound: All Scott A. Capestany wanted to do was continue to play baseball. That’s why the 39-year-old entrepreneur whose business interests have ranged from film and television production to a taxi service he recently started, took his business know-how into the baseball realm, opening the doors on NABA Westsound, a men’s adult recreational baseball league on the Olympic Peninsula. Additional information is available at Capestany’s Web site, http://www.centerfieldstudios.com.

• NCAA Golf: Gold Mountain Golf Complex in Bremerton played host to the NCAA Men’s Golf West Regional in May. The University of Washington was among the 30-team field.

Summer standouts

• Female Student-Athlete of the Year: The Central Kitsap Reporter named then-junior Carolyn Cross the 2008 Female Student-Athlete of the Year in July. Not only did Cross post a 0.74 ERA to help CK fastpitch advance to state for the second consecutive year, she also maintained a 4.0 GPA in the classroom.

• Male Student-Athlete of the Year: CK’s Caleb Brown, who will play baseball for the University of Washington after getting drafted in the 42nd round of this year’s MLB Draft by the Boston Red Sox, and KSS’ Jordan Green, who hit .447 for the Eagles baseball team while scoring a team-best 22 runs and 14 RBI, were named 2008 Male Co-Student-Athletes of the year.

• BlueJackets: The Kitsap BlueJackets finished 19-23, losing five of their last six games to miss the playoffs. With a handful of pitchers sidelined before the season started, coach Matt Acker was forced to mix and match his rotation.

• Xtreme Bulls : Pendleton, Ore.’s Joe Meling won the Xtreme Bulls competition, headlining a soggy weekend at the Kitsap County Fair & Stampede in August. Xtreme Bulls was televised on ESPN.

• Silverdale Thunder: Kayleigh Perkins won the Silverdale Thunder hydroplane race in Dyes Inlet for the second consecutive year. Perkins is the only female in the Unlimited Lights Hydroplane Racing Association’s UL class to win an event. She has won four.

Fall football, fútbol

• Pro Soccer arrives to Kitsap: A partnership between the Bremerton School District and the Kitsap Soccer Club allowing the franchise to play its home games at Bremerton Memorial Stadium was formally announced Sept. 30. The club, owned by 67-year-old Tracyton resident Robin Waite, has since launched a Web site, www.kitsapsoccerclub.com, and released season tickets, among other items, in preparation for its inaugural season, beginning May 2009.

• Football: Howie McDonald and the CK squad turned heads not only in Silverdale and around the state with an improbable postseason run that finally ended in the state semifinals. The Cougars upset Snohomish, then-No. 2 Olympia and then-No. 9 Rogers to advance within a game of the 4A title game. Issaquah ended the run with a 31-13 semifinal victory at the Tacoma Dome.

Running backs Larry Dixon (Olympic) and Andre Moore Jr. (Klahowya) also lit up the field for their respective teams.

• Girls soccer: The Trojans advanced to the state quarterfinals, the furthest the team has gone during Steve Haggerty’s coaching tenure. Neither KSS nor CK advanced to state, but both teams finished with winning regular-season records.

• Volleyball: The 2008 volleyball season culminated with Silverdale hosting the West Central District volleyball tournament at the Kitsap Fairgrounds Pavilion. Olympic split two matches to open 3A action, but then were eliminated by state-bound Kennedy. CK, competing on the 4A side, went two and out.