Going out on top

It is entirely fitting, in Mike Lynch’s final go-round as head coach, for unbeaten Lind-Ritzville to be playing on the final weekend of Washington’s high school football season.

Lynch will hang up the whistle on a storied 31-year career following the Broncos’ State B-11 championship game against DeSales on Friday at 4 p.m. in the Tacoma Dome.

“I’ve never coached with a whistle,” Lynch corrected. “Those things drive me crazy.”

He’s handed that responsibility, among others, to his assistant coaches, one of the three components, he said, responsible for Ritzville’s – and most recently the hyphenated version’s – run of state success since 1980.

“I will look back and say I’ve really been fortunate,” said Lynch. “I’m thankful for a wife who indulged me in this for 31 years. I’ve had terrific assistant coaches. I learned you can’t pack the burden alone. The third component is that I’ve had kids, for whatever reasons, who have played their hearts out. Boy, it’s been a lot of fun.”

The Broncos have made 15 state playoff appearances, including eight in a row at the beginning of the run and six straight since 1997. This is their fifth state championship game, including one title. They’ve reached the semifinals three other times.

Overall, Lynch’s record as Ritzville coach is 215-94-2, including 52-7 in the 2000s. The current team stands 12-0, having outscored its foes 492-108.

“We thought at the end of last spring and the beginning of the summer that we’d have a shot at where we are right now,” Lynch said. “But the football is shaped funny and doesn’t always bounce your way. Things have gone our way.”

There were several reasons why. The Broncos returned all but four players, including a dozen seniors, and four of its front five from last year’s State 1A playoff qualifier.

One, Jarrod Olson, who played on the Broncos’ 2002 state finalist, said the linemen have known each other for a long time and meshed well.

“We know what the other person’s thinking, more than anything,” he said.

Lynch said he never realized how hard the team as a whole would play. “It’s been full-tilt boogie the whole time,” he said.

The production of new quarterback Travis Dewald, who has completed 90 of 129 passes for 1,456 yards and 19 touchdowns, and new tailback Nick Ashley, who gained 1,997 yards on 192 carries for 28 touchdowns, didn’t hurt.

Fullback Jacob Kragt, receivers Jake Phillips, Jon McPherson and Andy Wellsandt and tight end Sam Whitman were also part of Lind-Ritzville’s 2002 state finalist.

“The loss was terrible,” said Kragt. “It served as motivation.”

Their foe this week, DeSales (12-1), is also no stranger to state success. The pass-happy Irish have played in 19 state tournaments, made eight state title appearances, winning four, and two other semifinals games.

“Fortunately we’ve been good enough running the ball,” Lynch said. “You know they throw and the load’s on (the quarterback’s) shoulders.”

The colorful and articulate Lynch seemed destined to affect young lives as an educator and a football coach.

“My (late) mother claims it’s all I wanted to do,” he said, “other than that I wanted to play center for the Jets and hike the ball to Joe Namath.”

He played center at WSU for “the two worst teams Jim Sweeney ever had,” blaming himself in a typically self-deprecating way as the reason why.

“It’s like the old Groucho Marx thing,” Lynch said. “I don’t want to belong to the country club that would have me as a member.’”

Lynch arrived at Ritzville after three years in Castle Rock and never left. The original plan was to retire last year, following his daughter’s graduation.

But he decided to stay another year and help one last group of the many Ritzville athletes he’s touched, while awaiting his wife’s retirement. Turns out it was a wise choice.

Certainly, he said, he’d liked to have gone 310-0. When it’s over he’ll have regrets, remembering the ones that got away more than all of the successes. He’s been involved with football for 47 years, since he first began playing as a youngster, and knows when fall comes around he’ll miss it.

But, he said he wants to travel and stand at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, “before I’m too blinkin’ old to do it.”

Ritzville’s first state playoff team produced a state title in 1980. On Friday, his players want to send Lynch off the same way.

“It will be very emotional for everybody in school as well as the community,” said Whitman. “I don’t think I’d have it any other way than going out with him.”

The feeling of coach for his players is reciprocal.

“You always want to date the homecoming queen and win the hand of the fair maiden. When it says happily ever after, having a fairy-tale ending would be a nice stroke,” Lynch said. “But to win or lose this game shouldn’t diminish what’s been done over 31 years.”