Coupeville Sports

  The sparkiest of spark-plugs, the irrepressible Jae LeVine, scores her first run as a high school softball player. (John Fisken photo)

The fences were in too close.

Back ’em up a bit and the Coupeville High School softball outfielders might have been able to run down some of Lakewood’s moon shots Monday afternoon.

Instead, the Wolves ran into a barrier (and left fielder Haley Sherman almost flipped over it, stretching to try and flag one shot down) and three times the home plate ump cranked the finger skyward and circled, signalling a home run.

Riding their round-trippers, the visiting Cougars strolled to a 9-1 victory, dropping Coupeville to 1-2 on the young season.

While the game was effectively over a half inning in, as Lakewood jumped out to a 4-0 lead, the Wolves continued to scrap until the end, scraping together their run in their final at-bat.

Freshman spark-plug Jae LeVine eked out a one-out walk, then skittered down to second on a passed ball.

After Madeline Roberts reached on an error by Lakewood’s shortstop, Breeanna Messner thumped a gorgeous laser shot line-drive single to left to juice the bags.

Wolf pitcher McKayla Bailey teed off on a ball, and while it fell just a few feet short of a grand slam, it did turn into a sacrifice fly, with LeVine zooming across the plate to score her first run as a high school player.

Hailey Hammer then launched a moon shot of her own, sending Lakewood’s center fielder close enough to the wall that she could lean on it as she snagged the ball to end the game.

Even in defeat, Coupeville had a couple of nice defensive gems.

Roberts gunned down a runner at the plate to end Lakewood’s first inning rally.

Coming up firing from deep in the hole at short, Roberts put the ball right in Messner’s catcher glove, leading her perfectly as her fellow senior blocked the plate and made a graceful sweep tag that caught the surprised Cougar a fraction of a second before her hand could slap home.

Freshman third baseman Emily Licence ran down a foul popup to end the fourth, snagging the ball just as she grazed the fence, while Bailey delivered some heat on the mound.

The junior hurler whiffed six Cougars, including punching out all three batters she faced in a lightning quick fifth inning.

Two of those K’s came on swings that hit nothing but air, while the middle batter was punched out on a called third strike that was so nasty the ump actually laughed out loud as he windmilled the call.

At the plate, Hammer peppered the ball for a pair of singles, while Messner, Sherman, Roberts and Madeline Strasburg each had a hit.

LeVine and Monica Vidoni collected walks, Tiffany Briscoe reached base when the Lakewood catcher couldn’t corral the ball on a third strike and young guns Erin Josue and Robin Cedillo both got small slices of valuable playing time.