Heady times at West Valley

Nick Brown is confident about a number of things as he prepares to help lead West Valley High School in its first state quarterfinal football game in 22 years.

For starters, the senior lineman is confident his feet will be on solid ground for the first time in weeks.

The fifth-ranked Eagles, undefeated in 11 games, play host to sixth-ranked Othello, 8-2, today at 4 p.m. at Gonzaga Prep and the team will play for the first time this season on artificial turf. That guarantees solid footing for a change.

“Last week (against visiting Selah) was a mess,” Brown laughed. “Between the snow and the mud, it was pretty miserable. You’d step up to the line and get down in your stance and your fingers would sink, like, two or three inches into the mud. You couldn’t push off and you had to work to keep your feet under you.”

Secondly, Brown is confident his defensive teammates will find a way to stop the Huskies.

“It’s gotten to the point where, when we watch game film on upcoming opponents, we like to see them run the ball right up the middle against teams,” he said. “Because we know they won’t be able to do that against us. Teams can’t push around our defensive line, especially late in a game, and our linebackers do a great job.”

Third, Brown has the utmost confidence in his offense.

“We don’t panic, even when we’re down late in a game, because we know we’re going to find a way to win,” he said. “We have two strong running backs who don’t need a big hold to make big yards. And we just know our quarterback, Drew Clausen, is going to make the big plays we need because he’s been doing it now for three years.”

These are heady times at West Valley, Brown said.

“We got a letter from a West Valley alum who’s 94 years old,” he said. “It was so great – he told us that he was proud of us and proud of the way we’re representing the school. He wished us the best of luck.

“We have a lot of support. We’re looking forward to having all our friends and family come out to watch this game.”

West Valley has a solid playoff history. The Eagles reached the state championship game in their first state appearance in 1976, falling to Sumner in the title game. A year later the team returned to beat Hoquiam to capture its lone state football title. The program reached the playoffs six out of seven years between 1981 and 1987, including a loss to Olympia in the 1984 Kingdome final.

Today’s quarterfinal match-up is the Eagles’ first appearance in the round of eight since they lost to West Valley-Yakima in the Kibbie Dome in Moscow in 1987. Between appearances have been a string of lean seasons.

When Brown was growing up and preparing himself to play high school football, the Eagles were going through hard times – the smallest Class 3A school in the Greater Spokane League.

“Things were pretty rough, but I was still excited about playing high school football with my friends,” he said. “Then it was announced that we were going to drop down to Class 2A and play in the Great Northern League and we knew we’d have a real chance to get into the playoffs and have a shot at, maybe, winning a state championship.”

The turning point to this season, Brown said, was the Eagles’ 24-6 win over Clarkston.

“We were so up for that game,” he explained. “It had been 10 years or so since we’d beaten Clarkston and everyone was pumped up for the game. That week everyone showed up on Sunday to look at game films and we got together at lunch during the week to look at film.

“After we went out and won that game, we realized that the extra work and the extra film study helped, so we’ve been doing that for every game since.”

Extra effort is part of the program at West Valley.

“That’s the thing about Coach (Craig) Whitney,” Brown said. “He wants us to do things right, on the field and off the field. He’s always telling us to not go out and do something stupid that would reflect badly on us and on the program. I like that.”

For Brown, going the extra mile meant doing a little recruiting – a story Whitney loves to point to when explaining his program to outsiders.

Brown was a defensive lineman/right tackle when he first came up from Centennial Middle School. His second year, he said, he just hoped to play right tackle on the junior varsity and get some experience, but at the team camp at the University of Montana, coaches moved him to left tackle and inserted him as the starter on varsity, where he’s protected Clausen’s blindside since.

“I was also the team’s kicker, since my other sport is soccer,” he said. “But I always felt that it took away from playing offense and defense.”

Last spring, he decided to do something about it.

“I started talking to some of my soccer teammates,” he said. “I asked a couple of them if they’d be interested in kicking for the football team. The first two guys I talked to turned me down.”

Then a freshman, Randall Harris, initially showed no interest in kicking a ball with points at either end.

“I kept talking to him, though, and he eventually came around,” Brown explained. “I told him he wouldn’t have to take part in drills if he didn’t want to, that he would just have to kick the ball during practice. When he was ready, I held an audition for him and held the ball for him while he kicked.”

Brown instructed the freshman to talk with Whitney and offer his services on special teams.

“Coach had a tryout for him and he liked what he saw,” Brown said. “But he told me to be ready, just in case it didn’t work out.”

Aside from being prepared one week when Harris battled a case of flu, Brown has concentrated on being a two-way starter.

“It helps me,” he said. “It gives me a chance to catch my breath for a minute, to clear my head and get ready to go back out for the next series.

“Besides, Randall is really kicking the ball well – he’s kicked a couple 50-yarders in practice.”