Wolves open playoffs at Nooksack Valley | Baseball

The Coupeville baseball team begins tournament play at 4 p.m. Wednesday, May 2, at Nooksack Valley in a loser-out game.

Last Friday, April 27, the Wolves fell 5-1 at South Whidbey in the Cascade Conference finale.

The winner of the Coupeville (1-11, 3-16)/Nooksack Valley (3-14) game moves on to play Meridian (9-10) at noon at Blaine's Pipeline Fields Saturday, May 5, in the four-team, double-elimination portion of the tournament.

Friday Harbor (12-4) and Lynden Christian (7-13) meet in the other contest at noon.

Later Saturday, the winners will play for seeding and the losers will match up to determine the final team that will advance to the tri-district.

Nooksack Valley defeated Coupeville 7-1 April 21 in a nonleague game.

In the loss to South Whidbey, Coupeville hit the ball hard the first inning to score its one run but struggled as the game progressed.

Jake Tumblin started the game with a single and moved up on Wade Schaef's bunt. After a ground out, Drew Chan slugged a double scoring Tumblin, and Morgan Payne lined a hit to center to put runners at the corners.

Kurtis Smith followed with a shot back to the pitcher for a hard-hit third out.

In the bottom of the first, three errors led to two unearned runs and South Whidbey (2-15, 2-17) quickly gained the lead.

Down 5-1 in the fifth, a budding Coupeville rally was nipped by strong Falcon defense.

Aaron Trumbull and Aaron Curtin singled to put runners at first and third. Tumblin ripped a shot that the South Whidbey third baseman snared with a leaping grab and fell on the bag to double-up Trumbull. Schaef followed with a single that would have made it 5-4 had the Falcons not pulled off the double play.

Payne led the offense with two hits and "played his best game of the year defensively at shortstop," said coach Willie Smith.

Contact Whidbey News Times Sports editor Jim Waller at jwaller@whidbeynewsgroup.com or 360-675-6611 ext. 5060.

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