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Big Ben brings the heat!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , , , on March 20, 2018| Leave a Comment »

   Ben Etzell (right) is making dad Mike (left) proud by ringing up hitters while pitching for his papa’s alma mater, Saint John’s. (Kristi Etzell photo)

Etzell brings the heat. (Photo by Libby Auger)

The weather was warm, but the pitching was hotter.

Sparked by Coupeville grad Ben Etzell, the Saint John’s University baseball squad successfully capped a four-day trip to Tucson, Arizona, and now head back to Minnesota boasting a red-hot 14-2 record.

The Johnnies went 6-1 on their Arizona trip, including a 16-7 win Tuesday over Buena Vista (Iowa).

Etzell, a senior, came on to pitch a 1-2-3 ninth inning to put a final, definitive stamp on Saint John’s warm weather jaunts.

As they wait for things to un-thaw back home, the Johnnies kicked off the season with a nine-game stand in Florida, then hit Arizona.

They’ll play for the first time in their home state Mar. 30, when the league season begins.

While SJU has been beatin’ the crud out of the ball, it has also been getting solid work from a deep pitching staff.

As he heads down the stretch run of his collegiate career, Etzell currently sits at 1-1 with a 1.93 ERA in four games this season.

That ties him for the team lead in appearances among pitchers.

He’s tossed 4.2 innings, surrendered just one hit and struck out six.

For his career, Etzell is 9-3 with seven saves over 41 appearances, which includes nine starts before the Johnnies made him their bullpen closer.

In 97.2 collegiate innings the former Cascade Conference MVP has struck out 82 hitters.

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Nipped on the road!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , , on March 20, 2018| Leave a Comment »

   Coupeville senior Joey Lippo had two hits Monday, including a two-run single during a seven-run rally. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)

Two different types of foes, two different kinds of results.

When Coupeville has faced fellow 1A teams this season, they’ve blasted them.

And, when the team in the other dugout has hailed from a large 2A school, the Wolves have fought until the final batter, but taken the narrowest of defeats.

Monday it was a big-school rival, Bremerton, and Coupeville couldn’t hold on to a five-run lead, falling 9-8 on the road.

“Another tough loss in a one-run game. Again another opportunity to work on mental toughness and our resilience as a team,” said Coupeville coach Chris Smith. “We are not defined by our losses but in the manner in which we played and what we learned from it.

“We played well as a team and fairly error free,” he added. “Unfortunately, we just stranded more runners on the bases then they did.”

The non-conference loss drops the Wolves to 2-2 on the season, heading into another match-up with a 2A school, North Mason, this Friday at home.

Five of Coupeville’s 20 regular-season games will be against 2A schools, and while that may put a ding in its win-loss record, playing against bigger schools could help the Wolves grow as a team.

CHS has shown resiliency against their big-school rivals, and Monday was a prime example of that.

Trailing 2-0 headed to the top of the fourth, the Wolves must have found the magic elixir to rub on their bats, because they started smoking.

Raking eight hits in the inning, including a pair of singles from Jake Pease, Coupeville exploded for seven runs, forcing Bremerton to call on its bullpen.

The big blows were an RBI double from Kyle Rockwell and a two-run single off the bat of Joey Lippo, but everyone in the lineup was dialed in.

Jake Hoagland started things with a base-knock, with Gavin Knoblich, Matt Hilborn and Dane Lucero also connecting for a hit in the inning.

The share-and-share alike philosophy carried over to the bench as well, with Jacob Zettle coming in to pinch-run and promptly scoring.

Bremerton wasn’t going away though, chipping away for three runs of its own in the bottom half of the inning to cut the lead back down to 7-5.

While the Wolves added a solitary run in the fifth, with Nick Etzell walking and coming around to score on a grounder by Hilborn, BHS was now in full come-back mode.

Four runs in the bottom of the fifth reclaimed the lead for the host team, and, after that, Bremerton’s bullpen closed out the game strongly.

Coupeville swung the bats well in the loss, with all nine starters recording a hit.

Pease led the way with three singles, Lippo added two base-knocks, and Hilborn, Hunter Smith, Hoagland, Rockwell, Knoblich, Etzell and Lucero joined the hit parade.

Smith was a force on defense as well, robbing a Bremerton hitter with a nice diving catch on a liner back up the middle.

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Forward we go!!

Posted in Baseball, Boys Soccer, Girls Tennis, Softball, tagged , , , , , on March 18, 2018| Leave a Comment »

   Coupeville High School baseball coach Chris Smith checks to see if any raindrops are falling. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)

And we’re off.

The first days of spring sports played out this past week, at least when the rain drops weren’t putting a damper on things.

Three of the four spring Coupeville High School varsity teams to keep track of a win-loss record are sitting with winning records as you read this, which is always a nice start.

Very few Olympic League contests have been played so far, with one of the big rain-outs preempting Coupeville and Chimacum from meeting on the baseball diamond.

But, the few that have made it into the books have gone exactly the way expected, with Coupeville and Klahowya coming out on top.

The two schools have fought for the varsity wins crown the past four years, with the Eagles coming out on top in years #1 and #2 and the Wolves claiming top dog status in year #3.

This year, in the final go-round for the four-team league (Coupeville is hopping conferences in the fall), CHS is out in front once again.

The Wolves exited winter with a 31-28 lead, based on girls soccer, football, volleyball, boys tennis and girls and boys basketball.

With a pair of early wins over Port Townsend in baseball and soccer, Klahowya has narrowed the gap to 32-30, ensuring what should be a fairly thrilling stretch run.

The week ahead, while chock full of games, won’t have much of an impact on the wins race.

Most of Coupeville’s games between Mar. 19-24 are non-conference tilts, though the two which are Olympic League clashes are both head-to-head with Klahowya.

The two teams are scheduled to meet on the tennis court Mar. 22 and the soccer pitch Mar. 24, with both contests on Whidbey.

Standings through Mar. 18:

Olympic League baseball:

School League Overall
Klahowya 1-0 2-2
COUPEVILLE 0-0 2-1
Chimacum 0-0 0-4
Port Townsend 0-1 0-2

Olympic League boys soccer:

School League Overall
COUPEVILLE 1-0 2-1
Klahowya 1-0 1-0-1
Chimacum 0-1 0-2
Port Townsend 0-1 0-2

Olympic League girls tennis:

School League Overall
COUPEVILLE 0-0 0-3
Chimacum 0-0 0-1
Klahowya 0-0 0-2

Olympic League softball:

School League Overall
COUPEVILLE 0-0 1-0
Klahowya 0-0 2-1

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All the pics, all the wins!!

Posted in Baseball, Softball, tagged , , , , on March 17, 2018| Leave a Comment »

Matt Hilborn is locked ‘n loaded. (Photos by JohnsPhotos.net)

Katrina McGranahan comes in hot for one of her four runs on the afternoon.

   South Whidbey baseball coach Tom Fallon (left) and Wolf hardball headman Chris Smith exchange pleasantries.

CHS first-baseman Veronica Crownover gets low to snag a hot grounder.

   Hunter Smith was flinging nothing but the high, hard cheese, whiffing 13 rivals on his way to a 1-hit shutout.

   Off the field, Lauren Rose is a truly gentle soul. On the diamond, however, she will cut you off at the knees and laugh as you bleed out.

Let the beatins’, and the photos, commence.

Coupeville enjoyed a very pleasant Saturday jaunt to Langley, shredding the Falcon softball and baseball squads 12-0 and 10-0, respectively.

Wanderin’ photo bug John Fisken stopped by the ball fields on his way home, and captured the pics seen above.

To marinate in everything he shot, pop over to:

Softball — https://www.johnsphotos.net/Sports/Coupeville-Softball-2017-2018/2018-03-17-at-South-Whidbey/

Baseball — http://www.johnsphotos.net/Sports/Coupeville-Baseball-2017-2018/2018-03-17-at-South-Whidbey/

And, when you do, remember, purchases help fund college scholarships for CHS student/athletes.

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Wolves claim Island baseball supremacy!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , , on March 17, 2018| Leave a Comment »

   Gavin Knoblich was part of a 13-hit, 10-run explosion Saturday, as Coupeville thumped Island rival South Whidbey. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)

South Whidbey had no answers for Hunter Smith.

The Coupeville High School senior made his season pitching debut Saturday and came within one questionable call of throwing a no-hitter as the Wolves scorched host South Whidbey 10-0.

The non-conference victory, coming less than 24 hours after a 10-inning thriller with Sequim, lifts CHS to 2-1 on the season.

Everything was clicking in the sun for the Wolves, from booming bats and quick feet to superb calls from coach Chris Smith.

His best call? Handing the ball to his middle child.

Hunter Smith whiffed 13 Falcons, getting at least one in every inning, and faced just three batters over the minimum in seven pristine innings.

Two of those South Whidbey base-runners made it to the bag thanks to Wolf errors, while the only hit was a disputed one-out base-knock in the bottom of the sixth inning.

While Coupeville’s ace was dealing, the Wolf bats were booming, as they picked apart three Falcon hurlers for 13 hits.

“Solid performance all around,” said Chris Smith. “Hunter was outstanding on the mound.

“We stayed aggressive at the plate,” he added. “Barely missed the opportunity to break the game wide open with a few great plays from the South Whidbey  center-fielder with two outs.”

Coupeville jumped on the very first pitch of the day, with Matt Hilborn peppering a single on his first swing to kick-start things.

While Joey Lippo was robbed by a nice snag on a line drive, Dane Lucero’s RBI double and Kyle Rockwell’s RBI single, packaged around a walk from Jake Hoagland, put the Wolves up 2-0 after a half inning.

CHS added another run in the second thanks to two Falcon errors and another single from Hilborn, but what could have been a much-bigger inning came to a premature close when Hoagland’s long fly to center was run down.

Ultimately, it didn’t matter much, as the Wolves continued to hammer away at South Whidbey, piling on three runs in the fourth, one more in the sixth and three in the top of the seventh.

Both the sixth and seven innings started with Coupeville in a two-outs, no-one-on-base hole, and yet the Wolves responded each time by scraping together rallies with their backs to the wall.

Nine of Coupeville’s 10 runs were the direct result of a hit, sac fly or fielder’s choice, with only one run being plated on a Falcon error.

Lucero and Hilborn paced the Wolf offense with three hits apiece, with Lucero popping a double for the day’s only extra-base hit.

Hunter Smith and Lippo each rapped out two singles, while Rockwell, Gavin Knoblich and Nick Etzell collected one apiece.

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