Wolf senior Scott Hilborn closed his stellar high school baseball career by pitching Coupeville to a win at the state tournament. (Morgan White photo)
It’s a new generation, writing a new story.
Playing with four freshmen and two sophomores in the starting lineup, the Coupeville High School baseball squad broke a 13,147-day dry spell Saturday in Castle Rock, winning a state tournament game for the first time since 1987.
Seeded #10 in the 12-team 2B tourney, the Wolves upended #7 Toledo 3-0 behind timely hits from Chase Anderson and Peyton Caveness, and a big-time pitching performance from Scott Hilborn.
That win propelled CHS into the state quarterfinals, played on the same field as the opener, where likely future Major League Baseball draftee Zach Swanson of Toutle Lake proved to be too much.
The junior hurler whiffed 13 across five innings, carrying the Fighting Ducks — last year’s state runners-up — to an 11-1 win and a trip to next weekend’s semifinals.
#2 Toutle Lake will face #11 Adna, which had a day, shocking #6 Cle Elum-Roslyn and #3 Jenkins (Chewelah), while #1 Brewster, the defending state champs, plays #4 Tri-Cities Prep.
Those four teams will take home trophies, while the Wolves finish at 17-6 in Steve Hilborn’s first year as head coach.
Coupeville shared the Northwest 2B/1B League title with Mount Vernon Christian, won the District 1/2 tournament, then became the first Wolf team in any sport to win a game at state since CHS softball thumped Deer Park 14-2 in 2019.
In terms of a baseball win, the victory over Toledo was the first since May 23, 1987, when the Wolves beat White Swan 2-0 on their way to a program-best 3rd place finish.
How Saturday played out:
Game #1:
It was a pitcher’s duel, sort of, through four scoreless innings.
Scott Hilborn retired nine of the first 10 hitters he faced, while Toledo’s pitching staff kept getting into trouble, then getting back out.
Coupeville put runners aboard in every inning but couldn’t break through until the top of the fifth.
Early walks to Hilborn and Coop Cooper weren’t enough to turn a spark into a fire, and the Wolves stranded three in the third.
A one-out single from Hilborn, followed by walks to Anderson and Jonathan Valenzuela, had the bags juiced, but a strikeout and a lineout ended things prematurely.
The Wolves got another walk in the fourth, only to see their runner picked off, but the fifth was magic time.
Hilborn reached on an error, alertly sprinted to second base when Toledo hesitated, then came around to score on an RBI single to right off of Anderson’s bat.
Toledo smacked a pair of singles in the bottom half of the fifth, but Hilborn wasn’t having it, getting out of the frame unhurt before sailing through the sixth.
CHS gave itself some breathing room in the top of the seventh, tacking on two runs to stretch things out to 3-0.
Hilborn walked, Anderson bopped another single, then Caveness crunched a ball to center to break things open.
One run came in on the hit, the other thanks to an error by the Toledo centerfielder on the play, and the Wolves were on the edge of breaking their three-decade-plus dry spell.
A strikeout, a fly ball which settled into Aiden O’Neill’s glove in center, and then out #21 came on a bouncer to Camden Glover at third, the freshman snatching the ball up and firing it to Caveness at first.
And just like that, a new chapter of success written by the modern generation.
Na na na na, na na na na, hey hey, goodbye. Toledo baseball heads home after Coupeville ended its season. (Bennett Richter photo)
Game #2:
Toutle Lake lost its first two games of the season to Toledo, and now has reeled off 22 straight wins.
It doesn’t hurt to have Zach Swanson, who committed to Oregon State University as a freshman and now throws 93+ MPH as a junior.
The lanky 6-foot-3 chucker struck out the first seven Wolves he faced, only allowing runners aboard in one inning.
That came in the top of the third, when Cole White broke Swanson’s spell with a one-out single to right.
A couple of wild pitches later, he was bouncing on third base, then came flying home when Hilborn smashed an RBI single to left to cut the margin to 6-1.
But that was it, as Swanson was otherwise untouchable.
Toutle Lake outhit the Wolves 5-2, but it was six errors and seven walks which killed Coupeville in its finale.
An out here, an out there, and things might have been different, as the Ducks scored nine times with two outs.
To make that stat worse, Toutle Lake had two outs with nobody on base in each of the first four innings, yet still put together scoring rallies each time.
It was only in the bottom of the fifth, when the Ducks pushed the game into mercy-rule territory with two final runs, that they did so without first getting two outs.
The game was the final one for Coupeville’s two seniors, Hilborn and Valenzuela.
The former helped carry Wolf teams to state in football and baseball, while the latter, who also played basketball, went to state in all three of his sports.
Of the 10 Wolves to play Saturday, eight can return, with Caveness and White juniors, Landon Roberts and Jack Porter sophomores, and Glover, Anderson, Cooper, and O’Neill just freshmen.
Saturday stats:
Chase Anderson — Two singles, one walk
Peyton Caveness — One single
Coop Cooper — One walk
Camden Glover — Three walks
Scott Hilborn — Two singles, two walks
Jonathan Valenzuela — Two walks
Cole White — One single
Peyton Caveness is a key member of a strong group of players who can return next spring. (Morgan White photo)
