LAKEWOOD — The Cougars fell victim to the most unfortunate of spring circumstances March 31.

It wasn’t a rain out, but spring break was what held them back in a 16-3 Cascade Conference home loss to Cedarcrest.

“We’re down a few,” said Lakewood coach Steve Barker. “And the girls feel that the way we played this week is not indicative of who we are.”

Missing as many as four starters, the Cougars played two teams in South Whidbey and Cedarcrest that still had spring break ahead of them, and were at full strength, resulting in a pair of losses.

Against Cedarcrest, it was a 10-run fourth inning that did Lakewood in. The Red Wolves brought 15 hitters to the plate in the fourth, resulting in 10 hits and a pair of walks.

“They were hitting the ball hard, but we also kept making mistakes on defense and that is something that we don’t normally do,” he said.

Cedarcrest started scoring early with a run in the first. After loading the bases with nobody out, Lakewood pitcher Amanda Bean pitched her way out of a jam with minimal damage. With the score 3-0 in the third, Lakewood got it’s first run of the game when Arianna Barrio walked, stole second and eventually scored on a wild pitch.

Barrio scored her second run of the game in the fifth after singling to start the inning. She was eventually hit home by sister Kahlee Barrio’s double.

“Kahlee is just on a role,” Barker said of his senior at third base, who is 11 for her last 18. “She is just off to a terrific start to the season.”

Kahlee Barrio would later come around to score on Kortney Fritz’s double. Arianna Barrio finished with a single, a walk, two stolen bases and two runs scored while Kahlee had two walks and a double. Also getting a hit was Mariah Smith.

Lakewood had a hard time stopping the front end of Cedarcrest’s order as Sam Boelter had four hits and five RBIs while Kayilyn Campbell had three hits and four RBIs.

The loss drops Lakewood (3-4 overall) to 1-4 in conference play, but Barker believes that after four days off and everybody back, the Cougars will be poised to make a jump in the standings.

“The good thing about all this is we got to play a couple role players that don’t usually get the time,” he said. “And we found some talents that will help us toward the end of the season an in districts.”

Lakewood takes roughly a week off and will resume play April 7 at Coupeville.