In 2022, Whatcom County athletes tallied 24 state titles during the spring season alone. Last season they earned 25. Could 26 be on the horizon in 2024? Spring sports mark the return to the outdoors — often with frequent weather-related hiccups in the early season. Snow flurries, torrential downpours and gray, windy days make “spring” sports challenging. But that’s part of the ride.

[ Whatcom County spring athletes have big shoes to fill in 2024 ]

In today’s story, learn about Lynden Christian High School seniors Tabby Dejong and Brody Bouwman.

TABBY DEJONG

Senior, Girls Track and Field, Shotput/Discus

With a quick turnaround from state basketball to track, how do you adjust your mindset?

One thing about track is it’s a very individual sport, so I mean, you have to be very self-motivated. Luckily,
through basketball — yes, you have to be motivated to like help your team and stuff — a lot of us on the team, we want to get better just to be better.

I think coming off a good [basketball] season, too, you come in being more athletic, you come in being stronger, because you’ve been lifting … It’s always been good for me having that turnaround.

What is there left to accomplish after being a state champion in track and basketball?

I’ve got my eyes on the [shot put] school record this year, hopefully. It’s 45 [feet], I threw like a 40 foot, 11
inches last year at the end of the year.

You were the only senior on the basketball team. How different is track for you, experience-wise, on a team level?

It’s an interesting dynamic because going from basketball, which is just everyone’s together and it’s so structured, to track, where there’s a lot of people on the team and there’s a lot of different things you can do.

What contributes to my success in track is we have a lot of good support, but also they allow me and other people to go along the path that will lead us to the most success.

BRODY BOUWMAN

Senior, Baseball, First Baseman

This team made a historic run last season. How do you keep the magic going?

How we keep the team going, [is] make sure we know that the goal is set to make state again and hopefully make it farther. At the end of [last] year, we were getting crazy … hopefully we can just keep going with that, knowing that we’ll have ups and down this season.

If we play as a team and everyone does their job, the whole team can play well and we can come together.

How have you all moved on after last season’s state loss?

For a couple of us, baseball is our main sport. We put in a lot of time in the offseason, during summer, to make sure we can keep doing what we were doing last season. And the rest of the team, they’re ready. We’ve been hitting for like a month or two now as a team, but not with the coaches or anything.

We’re just trying to keep doing what we were doing last year … We did what no other team has done in 20 years.

What are your plans for after high school?

I’m going to Everett [Community College] to play baseball … I really liked the coaches and how they run their practices and stuff. They said they run it like a [Division I] school to get you ready for the next level, and I really liked the team from some players I knew.

Visit CDN’s prep sports previews page every Tuesday and Friday until April 19 to learn about more Whatcom County athletes.