Basketball is a game of skill and endurance, and this year’s lady Wolverines are learning all about that.
One of the required courses to graduate from Cordova High School is Alaska Studies, and the daunting travel schedule they are playing this year should earn them an automatic “A” in that class.
Just think about it. They have already seen parts of Alaska that many of us will never see.
Last week they traveled 900 miles to Dutch Harbor, the king crab capital of the world. They opened the away season at Scammon Bay, a small village on the edge of the Bering Sea 650 miles away. And to cap off this latest trip, they will bus up from Anchorage to play Su-Valley, with Denali — the tallest mountain in North America — in the background, before going on up the Parks Highway to face Effie Kokrine in Fairbanks.
Sounds like the itinerary of one of those exotic tour passages you see advertised, except the accommodations and meals — sleeping bags on classroom floors and cafeteria food or grab-and-go paid out of pocket by their parents — aren’t quite as nice.
Most recently, the lady Wolverines dropped both games to Unalaska. On Friday, Jan. 27 the final score was 53-43; Saturday it was 42-26.
“It took us a little bit to get going in the first game,” said Coach Stacie Chappell. “By the fourth quarter the girls were playing together and our shots started falling.”
Shaunessi Schandel lead Cordova with 13 points in both games.
“The second day we were tired,” said Chappel. “With Asha Estes and Jheryel Itliong out with a muscle strain and cold our eight girls we were down to six. They still played their hearts out.”
