Photos by Olga-Lidia Ramirez
Above, King City Mustang awards winners (from left) Cedrick Perez, Andres Barrios, Andres Arellano and Angel Trujillo pose for a shot with head coach Jesus Ramirez, who is stepping down as head coach. Below, KC Bronco basketball team award winners were Ashton Headley, Caleb Hood and Estevan Garcia; Frosh boys basketball winners for King City were Levi Hood, Adam Cortez and Joseph White; and Ken Kline served as a coach at King City High School for 50 years.
KING CITY — The King City High boys basketball program held the end of year awards night and banquet March 12 at the school cafeteria. Players, coaches and parents for the Pony, Bronco and Mustang teams attended the event.
Pony basketball coaches Chip Kosty and Ken Kline introduced their team that went 21-3 this past season and won a share of the Mission Trail Athletic League title with Carmel. Kosty and Kline presented team awards to Levi Hood (Offensive Player Award); Adam Cortez (Coaches Award); and Joseph White (Most Improved Award).
Bronco head coach Henry Ventura III presented team awards to Caleb Hood (Offensive Player Award); Ashton Headley (Defensive Player Award); and Estevan Garcia (Coaches Award).
Mustang varsity head coach Jesus Ramirez took the podium and presented special team awards to Cedrick Perez (Most Outstanding Player); Andres Barrios (Offensive Player Award); Andres Arellano (Coaches Award); and Angel Trujillo (Most Improved Award).
Perez received an MTAL All-League medal and certificate for earning a spot on the first-team. Perez was an MTAL Elgie Bellizio Sportsmanship Award winner and was on the MTAL Sportsmanship team.
Arellano was an MTAL All-League Honorable Mention and a member of the MTAL All-Defensive Team. Barrios received MTAL Honorable Mention.
After the varsity awards presentation the Mustang team presented a plaque to thank head coach Jesus Ramirez for his 15 years as head coach. Ramirez began coaching boys basketball in King City in 2003 and has guided the Mustangs to seven Central Coast Section Playoff appearances. Previous to coaching at King City Ramirez served as a junior varsity and head coach of the varsity basketball teams at Greenfield High.
“I will still help the program when I can,” said Ramirez. “I feel good that Henry Ventura will be taking over as the varsity head coach. He is a good person and really enjoys coaching the game of basketball.”
Freshman coach Ken Kline officially resigned as a coach for King City and received a basketball award with 50 years engraved on the award. Kline has helped coach the Pony team for the past six years with Chip Kosty and the duo guided the frosh team to 14 wins in five of those six years. This year’s Pony team won part of the league title and claimed to tournament titles.
“I think 50 is a nice round number,” said Kline. “I coached this year because I knew that we had a good bunch of players coming in and we did really well for the season and that is a good way to end it.”
Kline taught in the social studies department at King High School for 36 yards and his favorite class to teach was Civics. Kline was also the head of driver education for 32 years and personally taught 500 students to drive. Kline has been married to his wife Marilee for 49 years and they have a daughter named Kelly who lives in San Jose with her husband Chris and their daughter Helen.
Kline coached the Lady Mustangs basketball team from 1979 to 2008 and went 25 consecutive years coming in first or second in league. As the girls basketball coach at King City Kline has 524 wins and was tenth in the history of the state at the time of his retirement. The Lady Mustangs won 14 league championships and two Central Coast Section Championships under Kline. Ever the sportsman, Kline received just on technical foul in 393 league games.
“I think earning the two CCS titles (1991 and 1992), was the toughest achievement for the girls team,” said Kline. “Those were the years when you played all the best teams because they were not broken up in divisions and we played in Southern Section of CCS.”
King City Athletic Director Ralph Rianda and Chip Kosty had the same response when describing the knowledge of basketball that Kline brought to the floor.
“Ken Kline has forgotten more basketball that we will ever know,” said the pair. “We won’t believe he is really retired until next year.”
