Welcome to districts, the final step on the way to the state tourney. (Kelly Crownover photos)
Coupeville packed lightly.
Wolf players wait to take the field.
Payback is sweet.
Avenging an early-season loss on the road, the Coupeville High School softball squad opened the West Central District 3 playoffs Friday afternoon with a bang, knocking off Vashon Island 5-3.
The win lifts the Wolves to 12-7 and propels them into the district title game at 6 PM Friday against Bellevue Christian, which shredded Klahowya 11-2.
Coupeville now has two shots to advance to state for the first time since 2014.
Beat BC, which knocked them out of districts last season, and CHS claims its first-ever district title in softball and are Eastern Washington-bound.
If they fall to the Vikings, the Wolves return to action Saturday in Lacey, playing the survivor of Klahowya vs. Vashon for 2nd place and the district’s other berth to state.
Friday’s opener was a reversal of fortune for Coupeville, which dropped its final three regular-season games, all to 2A schools.
After giving up two runs in the top of the first, the Wolves played lights-out from there, controlling every facet of the game.
Coupeville got a run back in the bottom of the first, with Lauren Rose whacking a lead-off single, before coming round to score when Vashon had trouble on a hard chopper by Katrina McGranahan.
By contrast, the Wolves defense was on fire, with junior catcher Sarah Wright having an especially strong game.
She gunned down a pair of Pirate runners on the move, with the first coming to close out the top of the second.
A two-out double gave Vashon a glimmer of hope, but Wright came up throwing heat after pretending she had committed a passed ball.
The throw landed in Chelsea Prescott’s glove, the tag came slapping down and rally squelched before it could really begin.
While the Wolves stranded a runner of their own in the second, squandering a double from Hope Lodell, they broke through in the third.
Rose got things started with a lead-off single, skipped to second, then third, on back-to-back passed balls, and scooted home on an RBI ground-out from Scout Smith.
That knotted the game at 2-2, and then the big bats went to work.
McGranahan lashed a single, Wright launched an RBI double, the first of her twin two-baggers, and Prescott crushed a long sac fly.
Vashon managed to escape, stranding a pair of Wolf runners, but the damage was done at 4-2.
McGranahan was throwing pure smoke from the pitcher’s circle, whiffing eight on the day, and her defense was spot-on.
Rose gobbled up everything that came her way at short, Veronica Crownover was a rock at first and outfielders Emma Mathusek and Lodell chased down anything in the air.
The teams exchanged runs in the fifth, with Prescott delivering her second RBI of her playoff debut after Wright narrowly missed a home run, settling for a double.
Then the Wolf catcher put a final stamp on the game.
Following a questionable lead-off walk in the top of the seventh, Wright came up firing and pegged a laser strike to Crownover to catch the straying Pirate.
The field ump originally called her safe, but after a protest from Coupeville’s bench, the plate ump corrected the call and took the last bit of air out of Vashon’s sails.
Coupeville finished with 10 hits, led by Lodell, who collected a double and a pair of singles.
Wright added two doubles, Rose two singles, and Scout Smith, Mathusek and Katrina McGranahan rounded out the attack with a base-knock apiece.
Coupeville Sports 