Unable to get clutch base hits, the Coupeville Legion A baseball team dropped a nonleague double header to Mount Vernon 4-3, 5-1 at Sherman Anderson Field Tuesday, June 19.

The Merchants were playing their fourth and fifth games in three days. Coach Willie Smith said, “Can we say tired! We didn’t play poorly; in fact, we got good pitching and solid defense, but we were unable to come up with a big hit when we needed it.”

Coupeville (3-3, 5-7) plays Stanwood at 6 p.m. Monday, June 25, at Robert Sherman Field.

Mount Vernon reached starter Josh Bayne for a run with one out in the seventh to win the opening game. Bayne gave up seven hits and only two earned runs.

Smith said the loss “overshadowed how well” Bayne pitched.

Shortstop Morgan Payne helped Bayne with the game’s defensive highlight when he made a running grab on a blooper in short center field and doubled a runner off second in the sixth inning.

Coupeville tied the game at 3 in the seventh on “good situational hitting,” Smith said. Payne walked, stole second, moved third on Wade Schaef’s grounder to the right side and scored on Brian Norris’s ground out.

Norris finished 2-for-4 with a run and Drew Chan added a two-run single.

Kurtis Smith made his starting pitching debut in the second game, “but we had few opportunities to put many runs on the board to back him up,” according to coach Smith.

Coupeville scored its run in the first when Schaef walked, Norris singled and Aaron Trumbull doubled. A failed squeeze and strikeout ended what turned out to be the Merchants’ best run-scoring situation in the game.

While Kurtis Smith received little help from his offense, his defense backed him with a double play and a runner nailed at home by left fielder Aaron Curtin. The play was Coupeville’s third outfield assist at home this week.

Offensively, Coupeville had only four hits and recorded 11 strikeouts.