One bad inning.

That’s all it took for playoff dreams to escape the grasp of the Coupeville baseball team Tuesday against Friday Harbor as the Wolves’ season ended in a 6-2 loss.

“Our goal was to be in the playoffs and we didn’t reach that, so right now it’s pretty disappointing,” CHS head coach Willie Smith said.

Holding the first place Wolverines scoreless through three innings, freshman pitcher Alex Evans managed to consistently work out of difficult spots. He allowed the leadoff runner to reach in the first three innings, but battled back with poise to avoid any damage.

“He’s had a lot of big games for us in the past,” Smith said. “We played good defense around him and he made good pitches.”

The ability to escape trouble, however, ran out for Evans and the Wolves in the top of the fourth. Ironically, the freshman got the first batter out on an over-the-shoulder diving catch from second baseman Kirby Mitchell, but walked the next four batters, pushing one run across on a bases-loaded walk.

With the next batter at the plate, Evans initiated a ground ball back to the mound. Instead of coming home for a force out, he turned to second and threw the ball into center field, allowing two more runs to come across the plate. An additional bloop single pushed the score to 4-0, before relief pitcher Cory Black entered the game and got a double play.

“That’s kind of the story of the last three games,” Smith said of the mistakes. “We just didn’t make the plays when we needed to, we didn’t get the hits when we needed to — that’s just the way baseball is, and life is.”

Black held the Friday Harbor bats at bay for the next two innings, retiring seven batters in a row while allowing the Wolves to attempt a comeback.

Taking advantage of an error and a single from Trevor Mueller, Coupeville drove its first run across the plate on a line-drive single from Black down the first base line. Anthony LaPoint added an RBI double into the gap, but with the tying runs on second and third and one out, the Wolves couldn’t come up with a big hit.

“You’ve got to come through and we didn’t,” Smith said.

Friday Harbor, who improved to a perfect 12-0 in the Northwest A/B, tacked on two more insurance runs in the top of the seventh on a long home run over the left field fence from Chas Lawson.

Coupeville ended the season at 6-6 in league and 12-7 overall, racking up the most wins in the 11 years Smith has been around the program. They finished just one win shy of forcing a three-way tie for second place and a three-team tournament for the final playoff spot with La Conner and Concrete this weekend.

“They did a lot of things that haven’t been done in baseball here for a long time,” Smith said.

Mitchell, Mueller and LaPoint, all seniors, played in their final game for the Wolves.

Despite the loss of key players, Coupeville will bring back a deep core to next year’s team.

“We’ve got some young kids coming back, who’ve been in this situation,” Smith said. “So you hope next year it pays off.”

Friday Harbor 000 400 2 – 6 7 1

Coupeville 000 002 0 – 2 8 1

Shanks, Lawson (5), Roth (6) and Lawson, Shanks (5), Lawson (6). Evans, Black (4) and Larson. WP-Shanks. LP-Evans (2-1).