Mikayla Elfrank whacked a grand slam Thursday, crushing the ball over the fence in straight-away center field. (Jordan Ford photo)
The afternoon started in blazing sun, as CHS honored seniors Robin Cedillo, Jae LeVine and Tiffany Briscoe. (Kelly Crownover photo)
The heavens get angry. (Rebecca Lodell photo)
Mikayla Elfrank made the heavens jealous.
First the Coupeville High School junior showed off the guns Thursday, modeling bare arms for a softball game that started with uncharacteristic bright sun and blazing warmth.
Then Elfrank showed what those guns can do, bringing the thunder and lightning with a grand slam to straight-away center field, helping stake the Wolf softball sluggers to a 4-0 lead on visiting 2A Sequim.
At which point, the heavens retaliated.
Sent into a never-ending series of delays by a sudden change in weather, as the sun gave way to booms of thunder and (far-off) lightning streaks, the game came to an unexpected end in the top of the third.
But there is hope for CHS softball, unlike Wolf baseball, which was washed away in the third inning of a scoreless game at Langley, or girls tennis, which never had a chance to play at Chimacum.
With the postseason rapidly approaching, neither baseball or tennis will reschedule Thursday’s action, which would have been the final regular season tilt for both programs.
Softball, though, is scheduled to travel to Sequim next Wednesday, May 10 for its regular season finale.
While it’s not official yet, both coaches agreed they want to pick up Thursday’s game at the moment it went into delay and finish before playing game #2.
And at the moment the first (far, far, far away) lightning strike caught the home plate umpire’s eye, Coupeville was kicking the tar out of Sequim.
The hometown Wolves, who carried a 15-2 record onto the prairie, came out gunning for their big school rivals.
In the top of the first, CHS pulled off a wham-bam-get-back-to-the-dugout play to snuff an early Sequim rally.
With two runners aboard and one out, the cleanup hitter punched a single into center, and then Coupeville pulled off a splendid chain reaction.
Hope Lodell speared the ball on the hop in center, whipped it on a line to Elfrank at short, then stepped back to marvel as her teammate spun and gunned down the runner headed home.
The ball landed perfectly in Wolf catcher Sarah Wright’s glove, and she smacked the tag with emphasis, earning a roar from her fan section.
One fly-out to Robin Cedillo later and Coupeville was off the field with no damage done.
Sequim wasn’t so lucky.
Lead-off hitter Lauren Rose ripped the first pitch she saw up the middle for a laser of a single, then Jae LeVine reached on an error and Katrina McGranahan was plunked by a wayward pitch.
With the bags juiced and no one out, Coupeville fans were on the edge of their seats, hankering for a first-inning explosion under (still) very sunny skies.
It came two batters later.
Rose was nailed at home on a grounder off the bat of Wright, but Elfrank gave the defense no chance whatsoever to come away with her ball.
Her blast was still climbing as it soared over the fence in the absolute deepest part of the outfield, a grand slam that scored three runs for Coupeville.
What? Three runs and not four?
Surprising, but true, as caught up in the excitement of the monster mash, Wright went a step too slow and Elfrank a step too fast.
That allowed a lurking ump to nail the tater producer for inadvertently passing her teammate on the base path, if only for the briefest of moments.
While they had been expecting to be sitting at 4-0, the Wolves made up for the lost run in the bottom of the second.
Hope Lodell lashed a resounding single off the tip of the shortstop’s glove, pilfered second while getting some (still) dry dirt on her uniform, then scampered home on an RBI single from Cedillo.
One of three 12th graders honored on Senior Night, along with LeVine and Tiffany Briscoe, Cedillo drilled a frozen rope, then stayed alert, picking up a second base when Sequim tried to make a late play on Lodell at the plate.
The visitors escaped the inning thanks to a remarkable snag by their pitcher, who, against all odds, speared a cannon shot off of the bat of Rose.
It erupted off of Mouse’s bat with so much force, zinging right back through the pitcher’s circle, that an inch to either side, and the local hospital might have had a visitor.
With Wolf hurler McGranahan firing BB’s — she was one strike away from whiffing the lead-off hitter in the top of the third, which would have been K #4 — the game was extremely one-sided.
Coming against a 2A school which beat Chimacum, Coupeville’s only Achilles heel, earlier this season, there was a genuine buzz in the air.
And then the buzzkill of weather hit.
WIAA rules stipulate a 30-minute break at the first visible lightning, and the clock restarts at each thunderclap or lightning after that.
Cue the clock restarting again and again and again…
The reality is, the game could have been played with no issues, as rain didn’t show up for another hour, and lightning was not even remotely close to Coupeville.
But rules are rules.
So, after much delay, with Senior Night festivities bumped up to fill some of the dead air, Sequim catching the ferry became an issue.
We’ll get back to it in six days.
