Coupeville Sports

    Aaron Curtin, seen here earlier this season, and his teammates continue to play hard, but can’t buy a break. (Shelli Trumbull photo)

These are the times that try men’s souls.

Two games into a six-game road trip, the Coupeville High School boys’ basketball team ran into a brutally efficient Cedarcrest squad Friday night and got slapped hard. That they came back off the mat and put out their best effort in the second half, when the game was long gone, speaks well for them, however.

The 71-28 loss, the 33rd straight defeat for the Wolves, dropped them to 0-13 overall, 0-8 in Cascade Conference play. They will get a chance to immediately bounce back Saturday, when they head to Mount Vernon Christian for a non-conference bout.

Cedarcrest tops the league at a crisp 7-1 and they showed why fairly quickly Friday. Limiting Coupeville’s shot opportunities, they rolled out to a 34-4 lead at the halftime break.

The Wolves then reversed a season-long trend of struggling in the third quarter, putting up their best showing of the night with 13 points and adding another 11 in the final period of play.

Nick Streubel rumbled through the paint for a team-high eight points, while Aaron Curtin and Carson Risner each banked in five. Ben Etzell and Aaron Trumbull popped for four apiece and Caleb Valko rounded out the Wolf scoring attack with a bucket.