Coupeville Sports

   Careful pitch selection was key Monday, as Coupeville turned 12 walks into a 9-0 win at Friday Harbor. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)

Take what they give you.

Showing patience under pressure Monday, the Coupeville High School baseball squad walked its way to a blow-out win at Friday Harbor.

Turning 12 walks, and a handful of errors by their hosts, to their advantage, the Wolves cruised to a 9-0 win while only eking out four hits.

The non-conference victory, Coupeville’s third straight triumph and fourth in its last five games, lifts CHS to 6-3 on the season.

The Wolves, off to their best start in more than a decade, don’t play again until Saturday, when they host 2A Cedarcrest.

Using the Olympic League’s web site and Max Preps, I can go back as far as 2008, and, during that time, no Coupeville baseball squad has gotten off to better than a 5-4 mark.

The Wolves hit that mark in 2017, 2015, 2013 and 2010, but this time around they turned Friday Harbor’s weaknesses into a sixth, very satisfying win.

With hurler Hunter Smith firing BB’s on the mound (whiffing nine and retiring eight of the final nine hitters he faced), Coupeville didn’t need much offense.

Which doesn’t mean it wasn’t happy to accept what Friday Harbor offered.

The Wolves scraped out the only run that mattered in the top of the first, using a single from Matt Hilborn, a sacrifice from Joey Lippo, a passed ball and an RBI single by Smith to “bust” things open.

Coupeville added two more runs in the third, a single tally in the fourth and a game-capping five-run explosion in the top of the seventh, while not notching a single hit in those innings.

In the third, Hilborn and Lippo each walked, stole second and came around to score on Friday Harbor errors, while Nick Etzell pulled off the same maneuver in the fourth.

The Wolves gave Smith a much-bigger cushion in the fifth, again using a mix of walks (five this time) and booted balls by their hosts (two more) to plate five.

The final run came home off of a ground-out by Hilborn, one of the few times CHS was given a chance to put the ball into play in the latter stages of the game.

After collecting two base-knocks way back in the first, Coupeville didn’t get another hit until Smith ripped a fifth-inning single.

But, like Dane Lucero, who led off the sixth with a double, he was left high and dry, stranded and unable to score.

Not that it mattered much, as the Wolves capitalized on what they were given, with seven of nine hitters scoring at least once.

Hilborn and Lippo each tapped home plate twice to lead the scoring attack, while the only two starters not to score, Kyle Rockwell and Jake Pease, both picked up RBIs with bases-loaded walks.