Coupeville Sports

Gavin Knoblich comes flying in to score Monday during a 13-2 Coupeville win. (Karen Carlson photo)

The playoff chase comes through Coupeville.

Putting together their best offensive game of the season Monday, the Wolf baseball squad pasted visiting Sultan 13-2, and now we’re talking about winning streaks and postseason possibilities.

Having won back-to-back games, Coupeville rises to 2-8 in North Sound Conference play, 2-12 overall.

That puts them a half-game up on Granite Falls (1-8, 3-11) and Sultan (1-8, 1-13) as the trio chase the fourth, and final, NSC playoff berth.

The Wolves play two more against the Turks this week, Wednesday in Sultan, and Friday at home, then closes the regular season with three against Granite.

While CHS can’t catch Cedar Park Christian (12-0, 15-1) or South Whidbey (10-2, 14-2), and has only an outside chance of pulling even with King’s (5-5, 6-9), the Wolves control their own destiny in the chase for the #4 seed.

Monday, that meant coming out and puttin’ a hurtin’ on Turk pitching.

In a season in which their single-game scoring high was four runs — in Friday’s epic upset of South Whidbey — the Wolves unlocked the full potential of their bats on this day.

The game was actually close through two-and-a-half innings, knotted up at 2-2 after the Turks scraped together a pair of runs in the first and Coupeville responded with one each in the first and second.

After a momentary jam in the first frame, Wolf hurler Dane Lucero was lights-out the rest of the way, giving up just a lone hit across the final four innings while whiffing eight Turks.

Both of Coupeville’s early runs came thanks to two-out, no-one-on-base rallies.

In the first, Jake Pease whacked a single, stole second, then came round to score after consecutive walks to Lucero, Gavin Knoblich, and Daniel Olson.

An inning later, it was Matt Hilborn who punched a two-out single. A stolen base put him into scoring position, and Hawthorne Wolfe obliged with another base-knock.

But, if the game was a tight affair until the bottom of the third, it became a blowout once Coupeville came to bat in that frame.

The Wolves sent 14 batters to the plate, with 11 of them coming around to tap home, and the bonanza was set up by a mix of walks, Sultan errors and good old fashioned CHS base hits.

Pease delivered the biggest blow, crunching a double, while Olson came around to hit twice in the inning and smacked singles both times.

Toss in base-knocks for Lucero, Knoblich, and Cody Roberts, and seven of Coupeville’s nine starters collected a hit in the game.