Sarah Wright had three hits, four RBI and two dazzling defensive plays Saturday in a 13-5 Coupeville win. (John Fisken photo)
It took them a little while to get going, but then … wowza.
Heading into the bottom of the fifth inning Saturday, the Coupeville High School softball squad had just a lone infield single to its credit, and trailed visiting Vashon Island 4-2.
16 batters, seven hits and 11 runs later, the Wolves were finally done with their half of the inning and ready to coast home with a 13-5 win.
The non-conference victory lifts Coupeville to 2-0 on the season as it prepares to open Olympic League play.
The Wolves host Klahowya Wednesday, Mar. 29, then travel to Port Townsend Friday, Mar. 31.
With a rain-out in between, CHS had been off a full week since its opening day win, and maybe that contributed a bit to their early lack of offense.
More likely it was the Vashon pitcher, who had three speeds — slow, slower and slowest — and used them to effectively blunt the Wolf bats.
While Coupeville scraped out two runs in the third on a bases-loaded walk to Lauren Rose and an RBI ground-out from Katrina McGranahan, it wasn’t connecting on many solid hits.
Sarah Wright beat out an infield chopper in the third, but that was it until the floodgates opened in the fifth.
With the rain which had been threatening all game finally beginning to consistently fall, the Vashon hurler looked cold and miserable, at one point having her teammates blow on her throwing fingers.
Seizing the moment, the Wolves pounced.
Rose reached on an error and McGranahan stroked a single into the gap between third and short to set the table, before Wright began the onslaught with a thunderous two-run double to deep center-field.
That knotted the score up at 4-4, but the hit parade soon blew that up sky high.
Hope Lodell lashed a two-run single off a fielder’s glove, joltin’ Jae LeVine crunched a two-run single to center, a passed ball plated yet another run, and boom, it was Wright’s second turn at the plate in the inning.
Wiggling her eyebrows slightly in anticipation, she dropped the hammer, sending the ball careening wildly into the right field corner, where it hit pay-dirt and skipped free.
By the time the ball came flying back in, Wright was on third, her extended family (which was huddled along the first row of rain-slickened seats) had gone appropriately bonkers and two more runs were plated.
If Vashon thought the agony was done, the Pirates were mistaken, though.
The next two hitters, Mikayla Elfrank and Veronica Crownover, whacked back-to-back RBI extra-base hits to cap an inning in which all nine Wolves reached base at least once.
While she didn’t get a hit in the inning, the most grateful Wolf might have been left fielder Tiffany Briscoe, who walked her first time up in the fifth.
Why grateful, you ask?
Because this free pass, her third straight walk on the afternoon, was the first time she didn’t get plunked with a pitch. With two bruises already forming, missing out on the trifecta was cause for internal celebration.
When the Wolves weren’t raining down runs, they played solid defense behind McGranahan, who whiffed five Pirates from the pitcher’s circle.
Wright, Coupeville’s catcher, gunned down a runner at third and nailed another at home after thinking quickly.
With the ball wet from the rain, a pitch skidded past her glove, and the Vashon runner at third bolted for home.
Spinning quickly, Wright played the rebound off the backstop to perfection, then whirled and caught the airborne, and startled, runner with the tag right as she started to drop into a slide.
LeVine added a nifty double play, ending the sixth by snaring a grounder in between second and first, tagging the runner going by, then pivoting and dropping a perfect throw into Crownover’s glove at first.
Toss in stellar work by the outfield, as Briscoe, Lodell, Robin Cedillo and Tamika Nastali ran down nearly everything which came their way, and Coupeville was clicking on all aspects of the game.
The game also marked the varsity debut of freshman Scout Smith, who started at third and lashed a wicked liner in her first at-bat, only to have a Vashon fielder steal a double away with a lunging catch.
