URUMA, Okinawa — While 2025 featured many a major sports happening, one week in October will be remembered for one major roadblock — the government shutdown — and its effects on events that did not happen.

Still, there were plenty of exciting narratives, drought endings and continuing of championship streaks to make the year quite memorable.

Here’s a look back at the year’s Top 10 stories involving DODEA-Pacific teams and athletes, not necessarily in order. Some of your favorites may have been left out, but face it — that’s part of the fun of it.

The government shutdown stretched to a record 43 days in October and November. It shelved DODEA-Pacific sports for the first seven days, until clearance was given for athletics to resume.

Four homecoming football games were canceled: Nile C. Kinnick at Humphreys and Kadena at Kubasaki in Division I, and Yokkota at Robert D. Edgren and Matthew C. Perry at Zama in Division II. A handful of DODEA-Japan volleyball teams were unable to travel to the American School In Japan YUJO tournament.

Sports got the go-ahead to resume on Oct. 8, a week after the shutdown began. None of the canceled events were rescheduled and E.J. King and Matthew C. Perry could not play in the Western Japan Athletic Association volleyball tournament.

Veterans Caleb Steele and Eldon Egbert on the boys side and youngsters Taliana Longoria, Ava Steele and Naomi Spuler in the girls lineup helped Guam High’s cross country team to a sweep of all major titles in the fall.

First, the Panthers boys won their sixth straight All-Island title and the girls made it two in a row in Guam’s season-ending meet on Oct. 14. The Far East team titles came next for the second straight year, Oct. 17-18 at Ikego Heights Naval Housing Facility in Japan.

Longtime coach Joe Taitano’s dynasty then capped the campaign with its second straight sweep of the Asia-Pacific Invitational crowns, Oct. 24-25 at Guam’s Ypao Beach and John F. Kennedy High School’s Ramsey Field.

Need a big play on offense or defense? Just call on Brian Taylor, if you’re Humphreys’ football team.

The junior receiver-safety scored the game’s only touchdown and made a crucial interception as the Blackhawks (4-3) won their first Far East Division I title, blanking Kubasaki 9-0 on Oct. 24.

Humphreys ended the defending champion Dragons’ 12-game winning streak and reversed the outcome of the teams’ two regular-season games, won by Kubasaki 13-7 on Aug. 30 and 21-7 on Sept. 13 at Humphreys.

The difference? Cutting down on turnovers. “We took care of the football this time,” Humphreys coach Reggie Meno said. “And our defense hung in there, from the start of the game to the end.”

Overcoming the fact that each player had bull’s-eyes on their respective backs and fronts was one thing. But Ryunosuke Roesch also had to battle a nagging bicep throughout his tennis season.

Still, the Yokota junior prevailed, going unbeaten in the regular season, capturing his second straight Far East Division II title, then third overall DODEA-Pacific singles crown. He also teamed with his brother Kotaro, a sophomore, for the doubles title.

Junior Chloe Lee led a Blackhawks assault on the Far East individual and D-I team titles. She won her second straight D-I and overall singles titles and teamed with freshman Skylar Park for the doubles. Junior Julian Cho and senior Rebecca Kruelski added the overall mixed doubles.

Two weeks after Far East, Lee won the Korea post-season tournament singles title for the second straight year and Humphreys nearly swept every event in the tournament.

Teams that relied mainly on pitching in the 2024 season also broke out the bats last spring on the softball diamond as Kadena’s and Yokota’s softball teams made it three straight Far East titles.

Erica Haas tossed a no-hitter, the 20th in the Pacific last season, and tournament MVP Zaylee Gubler drove in two runs and stole two bases as Yokota downed Matthew C. Perry 16-1 for its third straight D-II title and fifth overall. The win capped a 24-4-1 campaign for the Panthers.

Kadena made it three straight and a Pacific-record eighth overall behind senior twins Jessica and Julia Petruff and MVP Jada Wolfgang. They combined to go 9-for-11 with five RBIs and six steals as the Panthers routed Kubasaki 15-1 in the D-I final. Kadena finished 15-3-2.

Meanwhile, freshman Brody Kuchera, pitched a complete-game victory and added two hits and an RBI as Zama upset Robert D. Edgren 9-3 in the D-II baseball final. The Eagles (16-9) were favored over Trojans (6-16-1), who made it three straight D-II titles and four overall.

A handful of Pacific athletes laid waste to several region records during the track and field season last spring.

Kadena’s relay team ran the 400 meters in record time, 42.49 seconds, breaking a nine-year-old region mark. Kubasaki senior Carlos Cadet topped the Pacific 110-hurdle record with a 14.61.

Okinawa Christian junior Jeremiah Tucker ran the 100 in a Pacific-record 10.45 on May 2. Sophomore Cassandra Jarzabek of Humphreys, fresh off a record-breaking Pacific cross country campaign, topped the Pacific 1,600 record with a 5:03.27.

And that was before the Far East meet May 21-22 at Yokota. There, six meet records tumbled, including the girls 800, which Jarzabek ran in a Pacific-record 2:15.68. ASIJ beat its own meet and Pacific record in the 1,600 relay, clocking 3:22.70.

Cadet also broke the Far East meet triple-jump record, as did Helsa Sokpoh of Kinnick. Guam High’s boys and Kinnick’s girls topped the meet records in the sprint-medley relays.

Talk about a game that can put hundreds of extra grey hairs on a basketball coach.

Isaiah Kimbrough scored seven points and Nicholas Whyte five in the two extra sessions as Kinnick outlasted St. Mary’s 76-70 in double-overtime in the D-I basketball final at Kinnick’s Devil Dome.

It was the Red Devils’ second straight D-I title and third in the last eight seasons.

And it came a year after Kinnick needed a buzzer-beating bank shot to edge Kadena 87-86 in the 2024 D-I title game.

The Red Devils finished the 2024-25 campaign 23-7, starting slowly and struggling through an opening weekend at Perry, then finishing fourth in the ASIJ Kanto Classic when they were missing three starters.

“We did OK at ASIJ, but they bonded and came together and they peaked this week,” Kinnick coach Robert Stovall said.

The fastest-growing high school sport in the United States got the go-ahead from DODEA-Pacific to get its own stand-alone Far East meet starting with the current season.

Girls now have a full 13-weight class lineup, with Kadena, Kubasaki and Kinnick already fielding full or almost-full teams. Other schools have had struggles putting together full lineups, with one coach suggesting it may take a year for all the dominos to fall into place region-wide.

Wrestlers such as Kinnick’s Julia Blackwell and Audrey Snyder are already making their mark, as are Kubasaki’s Jaylene Sanchez and newcomer Raegan Cayce and Kadena’s Juli Thompson and Mia Espiritu.

The first DODEA-Pacific Far East meet is slated for Jan. 28-30 to be hosted by Kadena.

Underclass players are generally new to their particular sport and spend most of the time learning their craft. Freshman Priscilla Ramirez and sophomore Leilani Zuniga apparently didn’t get that memo.

The two strikers combined for an eye-popping 87 goals and senior midfielder Sasha Malone added 16 for Perry’s girls soccer team.

Coming off a second-place Far East finish in 2024, the Samurai went 27-2-2 last spring and won their first D-II tournament title in eight years. Ramirez got her region-best 55th goal and Perry shut out Sacred Heart 1-0 on Samurai Field.

It was a Samurai team chock full of youngsters, including freshmen defenders Naiya Burford and Catalina Feliz, with sophomore Brooklyn Hunter in her first year as goalkeeper. And Feliz had the tough assignment of marking the Symbas’ top scorer Mia Belitz.

And the Samurai ended up losing eight of its 15 players to graduation or transfer, including Ramirez and Zuniga. “We had to do it this year,” coach Daniel Burns said. “And we had the tools to do it.”

For the last three seasons, Kubasaki’s volleyball team rode the right spiking arm of outside hitter Yuri Biggins. In this, her senior campaign, the Dragons finally captured what had been an elusive D-I title and sent Biggins out a champion.

She averaged 7 spike kills per set, 336 kills over 48 sets played by Kubasaki, which outlasted island-rival Kadena in four sets to win the Far East large-schools crown, their fifth overall and their first since 2018. Biggins was named MVP and for the second straight year the tournament’s Best Hitter.

The Dragons redeemed themselves for their three-set defeat in the 2024 final against Academy of Our Lady of Guam. And the Far East tournament might not have happened had not sports been restored a week after the government shutdown began.