Diamond men Coop Cooper (16) and Carson Grove congratulate each other. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)
What a difference a change in the calendar makes.
Back from spring break, the Coupeville High School baseball squad hit the diamond Thursday and delivered its best performances of the season.
Snapping a season-opening six-game losing streak in which they were outscored 63-3, the Wolves found their offensive groove while sweeping a doubleheader against visiting Darrington.
Winning 4-1 behind a masterful pitching performance from Coop Cooper, then running up the score in a 14-5 romp in game #2, CHS gets to 2-2 in Northwest 2B/1B League play, 2-6 overall.
How the day played out:
Game #1:
Cooper was on fire while prowling a windy prairie, holding Darrington to just a single hit while whiffing a season-high 16 batters.
Darrington actually scratched out the game’s first run in the top of the first, thanks to an error, a steal, and a passed ball, but that was it for the Loggers.
The Wolves knotted things up at 1-1 in their half of the first, thanks to Landon Roberts mashing a triple and getting his jersey dirty with a sprawl in the dirt.
The senior slugger scampered home a batter later, scoring off of an RBI groundout by freshman Carson Grove, and the game stayed tied until the third.
From there, Coupeville pushed across a run in three consecutive innings to give Cooper a fighting chance.
Camden Glover plated runners in the third and fourth with RBI base hits, before Phin Rhodes capped the scoring with a run-scoring base knock of his own in the bottom of the fifth.
Trailing 4-1, Darrington had a shot to get back in the game, loading the bases with no outs in the top of the sixth.
To which Cooper and his companions said, no sir, not today.
The Wolf hurler induced a groundout to Grove at shortstop, and the fab frosh whipped a note-perfect throw to Roberts for the force-out at home.
A pop up and strikeout later and the first win of the season was all but sealed, with Cooper slamming the door in the seventh with three straight K’s.
Game #2:
If the opener was about pitching, so was the nightcap, just in a different way.
While Cooper was going all Nolan Ryan on the Loggers, Darrington’s pitching staff couldn’t find the plate in the second contest.
Coupeville picked up 17 walks, including having batters get plunked five times, with a number of those free passes coming with the bases loaded.
While the doubleheader was in Cow Town, game #2 was a makeup of a road game from Tuesday which was rained out, so the Wolves played as the visitors.
That enabled Steve Hilborn’s squad to get a jump on Darrington, pushing four runners across in the top of the first.
Three of those tallies came on bases-loaded walks, including Lawless — who was hit by wayward pitches four(!) times Thursday — being plunked with the bags full.
From there, the Wolves steadily pushed the lead out, tacking on two runs in the second frame and a game-busting seven scores in the fourth.
When Darrington’s hurlers weren’t amassing great gobs of walks, they were also being called for frequent balks, with Chris Zenz and Jayden Little both being sent home to score by the umps.
Thursday stats:
Coop Cooper — Three singles, two walks
Camden Glover — One single, one double, four walks
Carson Grove — Two singles, three walks
Riley Lawless — Four walks
Jayden Little — One double, two walks
Jesus Madrigal — One single, two walks
Phin Rhodes — One single
Landon Roberts — One single, one triple, one walk
Leo Rodriguez — One single, one walk
Trent Thule — Four walks
