Jacob Zettle had himself a Saturday, collecting four hits and four RBI in a doubleheader split. (John Fisken photo)
Baseball is a fickle game.
One moment it rewards your efforts with great joy and the next it stabs you in the back and leaves you to bleed out in the street, awash in despair.
OK, that might be a tad dramatic, but after five-plus hours and two games with wildly different results Saturday, the Coupeville High School JV baseball squad now fully understands the capriciousness of the game.
Having traveled up-Island to face off with Oak Harbor’s C-Team, the Wolves pulled out a win in a 14-11 slug-fest in game one, then fell 6-5 in the conclusion of their doubleheader, sabotaged by a final-inning meltdown.
The split left Coupeville’s young guns at 4-1 heading into a home game Wednesday (4:15 PM) against Concrete.
While the Wolves were mentally heading to the bus with a sweep, they still came out of their split with a 3A school looking pretty good.
Coupeville combined for 15 hits, 12 walks and 13 RBI over the two games, with 11 different players reaching base.
The MVP?
Sophomore Jacob Zettle, who cranked a pair of doubles in game one, then notched a pair of singles in the nightcap, knocking in two runs apiece in each game.
Hot on his heels were freshmen Shane Losey (four RBI, including a three-run single in game one) and Matt Hilborn (three hits on the day while playing shortstop, third, pitcher and catcher at various points.)
Game 1:
The Wolves came out loaded for bear, erupting for five runs in the top of the first as they eventually charged out to a 13-3 lead.
Then, in a late bid to make life interesting for coaches Chris Smith and Mike Etzell, they almost gave it all back.
Before the fans even settled in on the bleachers, CHS was on fire, with catcher Joey Lippo knifing a one-out single up the middle to kick off a run of five straight Wolves reaching base.
Julian Welling rounded first on a throwing error, Dane Lucero chopped an RBI single to left, Hilborn beat out a bunt single and Nick Etzell walked with the bases loaded to force in a second run.
Oak Harbor finally got a second out — one of the few times Zettle would come up empty on his breakout day — but Losey promptly mashed a bases-clearing moon shot to deep right center.
As he clapped his hands at first, having staked Coupeville to a 5-0 lead, the rout was officially on.
With Wolf hurler Hilborn firing BB’s on the mound, CHS tacked on two more runs in the third (including Losey’s fourth RBI of the game on a ground-out) and four in the fourth.
That rally started when football lineman Brenden Gilbert beat the throw to first when a third strike got loose from the catcher’s mitt and featured a walk, two Wildcat errors, two passed balls … and not a single Wolf hit.
Zettle’s two-run double to center in the sixth, a high, arcing shot that brought his fan club to delirium (for the first, but not last time), stretched the lead to 13-3 and tantalized Wolf fans with the idea of the mercy rule being levied.
It wasn’t to be, though, as Oak Harbor stayed scrappy, rallying for two in the bottom half of the inning.
After Cameron Toomey-Stout brought in run #14 for Coupeville with a seventh-inning sac fly, the ‘Cats got more than scrappy, however, scoring six in the final frame.
But, with the tying run on deck, Welling reached deep and found a final strikeout in his arm, applying a hardy punctuation to his team’s win.
Game 2:
After a brief break for hot dogs, the two teams suddenly decided to go away from big sticks and play small ball, with Etzell and his Oak Harbor rival trading zeros for much of the sun-drenched second game.
Trailing 2-1 heading into the top of the fifth (Coupeville garnered its run when Etzell took a pitch to the hip with the bags juiced), the Wolves finally found a way to get to the Wildcat hurler.
Welling tied the game with an RBI single that buzzed down the third-base-line, then Lucero and Hilborn followed with consecutive singles to load the bases.
After the go-ahead run scampered home on a Wildcat error on a ball chopped towards third by Etzell, Zettle capped his stellar day with a rocket of a two-run single to right-center.
Now, if Hollywood was writing the script, that’s where the day would have ended, but reality crept in a bit.
After setting down the first six batters he faced after coming on in relief to start the fifth, Lippo tired in the seventh and Oak Harbor took advantage.
Four walks and an error on a ball overthrown at home gave the Wildcats all they needed to pull back to a tie, and then the home squad got to write their own storybook ending.
Pulling off a note-perfect suicide squeeze to win the game, Oak Harbor’s freshmen pulled off a stunner for their first win in four games this season.
Best stat of the day:
Eight different Wolves collected at least one hit, while Kyle Rockwell (two walks), Cameron Dahl (walk) and Gilbert also reached base.
Best top-of-the-dugout-steps monologue by Chris Smith, which made even the ump smile:
“Guys! Guys!! I don’t care about the runner! Well … I care about him as a person. I’m sure he’s a fine young man and all… I just don’t care about him as a runner. So, person, yes. Runner, no!”
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