Risen Johnson scored 10 Wednesday, but the Wolves fell to visiting Chimacum. (John Fisken photo)
One team played crisply, cut to the basket with conviction, made the extra pass and looked impressive.
Unfortunately for Coupeville High School boys’ basketball fans, their team wasn’t the one that fit that description Wednesday night.
The Wolves had stretches where they were on fire, and got another strong performance out of junior Wiley Hesselgrave, but inconsistency got hammered by consistency as visiting Chimacum ran away with an 87-55 victory.
The loss dropped Coupeville to 4-9 overall, 0-3 in Olympic League play. The Cowboys sit atop the standings at 3-0.
And they looked like the best team in the four-school conference, running and gunning right past the Wolves from the opening tip.
Holding Coupeville without a field goal for nearly eight minutes — Risen Johnson finally banked in a driving layup with 11 seconds left in the opening quarter — Chimacum bolted out to a 23-8 lead and never looked back.
The Cowboys rained down three long-range treys to break things open, with one coming while the Wolves were forced to play 4-on-5.
Wolf senior Aaron Trumbull crashed awkwardly and grabbed his leg while on the floor in the back-court, but the refs let the play go on.
With his teammates attention divided between the action at the other end and Trumbull’s pain, Chimacum took advantage and worked the ball around quickly before lofting in a three-pointer.
Only then did the refs whistle things dead, and Trumbull hobbled off (but did return later).
After an equally rough start to the second quarter allowed Chimacum to stretch its lead to 24, Coupeville put together its best run of the night, closing the half on an 11-2 surge.
Hesselgrave threw down nine points during the run, finishing the quarter with 11 and the game with a team-high 17.
Any hopes of a second-half comeback were snuffed out by Coupeville’s inconsistency, however.
As soon as they put together a 12-6 run, the Wolves suffered a 16-2 letdown in which every Chimacum basket seemed to be of the runaway layup variety.
The Wolves actually put together their best scoring total of the night in the fourth, banging home 18, but even then were outscored by four points.
The final period offered two players a chance to showcase their often electrifying talents.
Johnson pumped in six of his 10 points using a variety of high-flying moves, while DeAndre Mitchell made his varsity debut a successful one.
Following in the footsteps of older brother Anthony Bergeron, Mitchell played the fourth quarter and hauled down several rebounds, then pulled off a steal and layup combo at the buzzer for his first-ever varsity points.
Aaron Curtin, Joel Walstad (back-to-back three-pointers) and Trumbull each scored six to back up Hesselgrave and Johnson.
Matt Shank and Gabe Wynn each dropped in four to join Mitchell in rounding out the scorers.
JV loses a close one: Despite a run in the latter stages of the game, the young guns saw their win streak snapped at three, losing by seven.
“We lacked the energy that carried us the last couple wins,” said CHS coach Dustin Van Velkinburgh. “Made a late push but couldn’t string together enough stops to secure a comeback.”
The loss dropped the Wolves to 5-7 overall, 2-1 in league play.
Coupeville also suffered a second loss when sophomore swing player Gabe Wynn hit the floor hard and had to leave.
A visit to a doctor took a little sting away, as he was found to have a sprain and nothing broken. He’s expected to be out for a week.
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