COLLEGE SIGNING: Pyper Alton blazes another trail for Port Angeles

Published 5:00 pm Wednesday, April 15, 2026

PORT ANGELES — Port Angeles’ Pyper Alton joined a growing list of trailblazing Port Angeles High School female athletes.

In the past two years, Port Angeles had its first girl sign a college commitment to wrestle (Willow Harvey) and had its first bowler (Zoey Van Gordon) to sign a college commitment.

Alton continued that trailblazing tradition Wednesday by committing to being the first Port Angeles girl to play college flag football. She signed a letter of intent to play at Westminster College in Fulton, Mo., in front of a big group of friends, coaches and family.

Alton is definitely a young woman of all seasons when it comes to sports. She was a star for the Roughriders soccer team and also played tennis and basketball in various years of her high school career. On top of all that, outside of school, she also drives a Legends race car and competes in the Pacific Northwest circuit.

Alton was a key part of Port Angeles’ first flag football team that finished third in the state. She was usually the Roughriders’ lead receiver and scored many of the touchdowns for the team.

“Pyper is very special to me,” said her flag football coach Sam Salanoa. “She was fun to coach. She was very competitive and sometimes she challenged me. I liked that.”

Salanoa said Alton moving on to play college flag football shows that “our dreams are real, too. It’s very important to understand that. You raised the standard for this team.”

“I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to coach her. She is a competitor through and through. She is one of the toughest kids I’ve ever known,” said her assistant coach Kelsey Lane. “I’m so incredibly proud of her for setting the pathway for future girls. She is someone they looked up to.”

Her soccer coach Daniel Horton said that while some of the other kids on the team racked up all the scoring goals, it was Alton that was the glue of the team and the key to the team’s success in the back line of the defense. Horton said it was impossible to tell when Alton was injured because she wouldn’t tell anyone.

“We were a totally different team when she wasn’t in the lineup. She fears nothing. Literally nothing,” Horton said.

Port Angeles athletic director Jarom Packer said that Alton was one of the senior leaders that he heard about and then came to rely on when he first started in his job in September.

“One of the first seniors I talked to was Pyper Alton and I got the ins and outs of how our programs are doing,” he said.

Fellow senior Teanna Clark, a soccer teammate, said, “She’s one of my closest friends. I’m so incredibly proud of her. I can’t wait to see what you do in the future.”

Though she excels at several sports, Alton said she always intended to pick flag football as a college sport. She liked Westminster because it’s in a rural area similar to Port Angeles and really liked the coach. She still plans to return to Port Angeles each summer, however, for her other passion.

“I’m still coming back in the summer to race,” she said.