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Posts Tagged ‘Battle of the Bats’

A final swing!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , , on July 16, 2017| Leave a Comment »

   Jonathan Thurston (far left) shares a laugh with teammates after a game. (Jess Lucero photos)

Life on the road.

Dane Lucero’s lil’ sister enjoys her pizza.

   A couple of guys are missing, but the core of the CHS summer squad gathers for one final pic.

And thus the season endeth.

The Coupeville High School baseball squad wrapped up its most extensive run of summer play in several years Sunday, playing a fourth, and final, game at the Battle of the Bats.

The Wolves had little luck generating offense in their swan song at Bellarmine Prep High School, falling 9-0 to the PBC Zips, a select team from Auburn.

CHS, which was playing without top players Hunter Smith and Clay Reilly, put up a strong showing over the three days of the tourney while playing elite all-star teams.

Coupeville played in three tournaments this summer, and, with the exception of Reilly, Taylor Consford and Jonathan Thurston, who all graduated in June, the roster was largely comprised of younger players still on the rise.

Getting extra work in, especially while playing as a unit, and not just a scattered player here and there on different teams, is invaluable.

The summer schedule also allowed CHS coach Chris Smith and his assistants — Mike Etzell, Aaron Lucero and Steve Hilborn — a chance to often try out different players in different positions.

Against the Zips, Coupeville had trouble getting runners on base, with just a pair of singles from Dane Lucero and three walks.

Two of those free passes came courtesy Wolves being plunked while at the plate.

The Zips tallied two runs in the first, then tacked on three in the second and another four in the third to put the game on ice early.

As the summer progressed, Coupeville saw 16 different players pop up on its roster at some point.

Three of those players — Austin Boesch, Thomas Anderson and Donny Kloewer — were Oak Harbor players who suited up as Wolves for the summer.

The rest of the CHS squad included Reilly, Nick Etzell, Consford, Smith, Matt Hilborn, Thurston, Jacob Zettle, Jake Hoagland, Gavin Knoblich, Kyle Rockwell, Joey Lippo, Lucero and Jake Pease.

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No retreat, no surrender!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , , , on July 15, 2017| Leave a Comment »

   Coupeville High School senior Jake Hoagland whacked an RBI double Saturday at the Battle of the Bats in Sumner. (John Fisken photo)

The Wolves stayed on the field a lot longer this time around.

Getting an immediate rematch with Honda Baseball at Battle of the Bats, Coupeville High School put up a much better fight Saturday than it did a day before.

While they still fell 9-4 at Sumner High School to the Bellevue select team, which boasts two former MLB players among its alumni, that was markedly better than Friday’s three-inning 15-0 loss.

This time around, the Wolves were tied 4-4 into the bottom of the fourth inning and stayed on the field until the game was called in the sixth inning due to a two-hour limit on games.

Now 1-2 on the weekend, CHS closes the tourney with a Sunday morning game at Bellarmine Prep against the PBC Zips, a select team from Seattle.

Having split two games in pool play Friday, the Wolves entered bracket play seeded #15 out of 25 teams, which set up the unexpected rematch with Honda Baseball.

After falling behind 4-0, Coupeville rallied in the top of the third, turning three hits into four runs of its own.

Gavin Knoblich started things off by eking out a walk.

The CHS sophomore moved to second on a sac bunt by Jake Pease, then scampered home when Matt Hilborn crunched an RBI double.

A walk to Joey Lippo kept things going, before Dane Lucero (a two-run single) and Jake Hoagland (an RBI double) came through with big base-knocks.

Hoagland tried to keep the fire burning extra bright, but was nailed at third while trying to stretch his hit into a triple.

While he departed the field, he took a rival with him after accidentally blowing up the guy’s ankle on the bang-bang play.

Coupeville had two more chances after its big rally, getting doubles from Thomas Anderson in the fourth and Lippo in the fifth.

Both blows turned out to be one-time shots, however, as both Wolf runners were left stranded on base.

Honda Baseball chipped away against CHS hurlers Austin Boesch, Jonathan Thurston and Hilborn, breaking through for two runs in the fourth and three more in the fifth.

The select squad, which will have a chance to play for a title in its bracket Sunday, has been in business since 1988.

There is an extensive list of players who went on to play college ball listed on the team’s web site, with its greatest claims to fame being pitchers John LeRoy and Sean White.

LeRoy had a cup of coffee with the Atlanta Braves in 1997 and can boast a MLB win on his resume, while White appeared in 105 games for the Seattle Mariners from 2007-2010.

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A little bad, a lot of good!!

Posted in Baseball, tagged , , , , on July 14, 2017| Leave a Comment »

   Taylor Consford ripped a pair of hits Friday as Coupeville’s 17U baseball squad won its tourney opener. (John Fisken photo)

One was a beauty, one was a beast.

Playing back-to-back games Friday morning at the 3rd annual Battle of the Bats tournament at Curtis High School, Coupeville’s 17U baseball squad found wildly different results.

In the opener, the Wolves controlled things from the first batter and strolled to a 9-2 win over the Swing Center Shockers.

Ten minutes after that victory, CHS was back on the same diamond, but this time, everything went terribly, horribly wrong.

A mere three innings later, the Wolves staggered off the field, having been thrashed 15-0 by Honda Baseball in a game called early thanks to tournament mercy rules.

After the split in pool play, Coupeville moves to bracket action Saturday.

The final tournament of the summer season for the Wolves, Battle of the Bats features 25 teams in the 16/17 division and another 13 squads squaring off in the 15U flight.

Big win:

Four runs in the bottom of the first staked CHS hurler Jonathan Thurston to a big early lead, and he responded, carrying a shutout into the fifth inning.

The top of the fourth was his moment in the sun, as the lanky hurler gunned down three straight Shocker hitters.

Nick Etzell came on in relief in the fifth and closed out the game emphatically for Thurston.

At the plate, everything worked for Coupeville.

The Wolves picked up three hits in the first — a double from Taylor Consford and singles by Joey Lippo and Jake Hoagland — and mixed those in with a bevy of walks, many of the “batter getting plunked” variety.

CHS tacked on another three runs in the second, again getting a trio of base-knocks (this time singles from Matt Hilborn, Consford and Dane Lucero), before adding a single run in both the fourth and sixth.

Both of those scores came courtesy of bases-loaded walks, with Austin Boesch and Kyle Rockwell picking up RBIs as they strolled to first with a free pass.

Thomas Anderson, one of three Oak Harbor players (along with Boesch and Donny Kloewer) tagging along with Coupeville for this tourney, reached base all four times he came to the plate in game one.

A well-hit single and three walks made Anderson a frequent visitor to first base.

Big loss:

Coupeville, which got roughed up to the tune of three runs in the first, five in the second and seven more in the third, had its shots on offense, but couldn’t capitalize.

The Wolves loaded the bases in both the first and second inning, packaging four walks and singles from Consford and Kloewer.

It wasn’t to be, though, as Honda baseball dodged a bullet both times, getting inning-ending ground-outs to strand all three runners.

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