PORT TOWNSEND — Port Townsend Keegan Khile was plenty motivated for his senior football season.
A dislocated kneecap and a partially torn patella tendon in his left knee cut his junior season short, just before the Redhawks opened the postseason.
“It definitely changed my state of mind and made me work harder,” Khile said.
“The other few years, I was in shape but I never conditioned enough.
“After the injury, I had to work twice as hard to get back to the level I was at.”
Then, while Port Townsend was at summer football camp, his fraternal twin brother Austin suffered a season-ending injury.
“It was really a hard thing to have to understand that he wasn’t going to play our senior year,” Keegan Khile said.
“After the Port Angeles game [a season-opening 49-0 win for Port Townsend], I went up to and told him the season was for him.”
And what a season it was for the standout middle linebacker.
Khile, the Olympic League 1A Defensive MVP, had 49 solo tackles and assisted on 78 others. The four-year starter also had five sacks and 28 quarterback hurries this season.
He also was named Class 1A All-State honorable mention by The Associated Press at both offensive line and linebacker.
Khile’s performance has earned him the All-Peninsula Football Defensive MVP as determined by a poll of area coaches and the Peninsula Daily News sports staff.
Khile’s play in the middle was the tip of the spear for a potent Port Townsend defense.
The Redhawks pitched six shutouts and allowed just 5.6 points per game on their way to a 10-1 season and the school’s first trip to the state playoffs since 2004.
Yelling out offensive formations and effectively serving as the defensive signal-caller, Khile left an impression on Redhawks head coach Nick Snyder.
“A lot of our defenses, we just called game plan in the huddle and Keegan would make sure our formation was dictated on what the opponent was running,” Snyder said.
“When the opponent broke the huddle, he’d get us aligned right in the correct defense.
“That’s a lot to ask of a high school player, let alone a college player.
“He loved it, though. He loved that part of it. I think if we didn’t do that with him, if we coaches called everything, he might have gotten bored out there.”
Khile chalks up the team’s defensive prowess to “communication.”
“Our defensive coordinator Tom Webster is a hell of a coach,” Khile said.
“And the communication we had, we were synced.
“That’s one thing I can look back on, I was one of the playcallers for us. It makes you a better player, just to figure out how to try and stop each different offensive formation.
“It’s like being a quarterback, you have to know everybody’s assignment to make sure it will work.”
Four years of running the same system helped Khile become a master in the middle.
“We ran the same two base defenses, so by the time he was a senior he understood his gap and coverage responsibilities so well that with his gains in the weight room and his conditioning, he had morphed into an All-State caliber player.”
Much of the Port Townsend defense is predicated on getting upfield and putting pressure in the opponent’s backfield.
For Khile, it was a perfect fit.
“Our coaches love to blitz and bring the pressure,” Khile said.
“It was amazing. We blitzed so much and it worked out for us so well.”
Snyder enjoyed watching Khile pick his spots, literally, on their blitzes.
“We gave him a lot of freedom on the blitz,” Snyder said.
“He was relentless. He would act like he’s blitzing through the gap on the strongside, but switch it up and go through the weakside.
“He was always testing for weaknesses, and he’s such an intelligent player, he was able to make the right reads.”
Khile remembers a big play he made in Port Townsend’s 24-7 state playoff loss to eventual 1A state runner-up King’s as his most memorable.
“Even though we lost, it was a play that really pumped up our defense not to allow another score,” Khile said.
“We were down 14-7 and they were right on the goal line before halftime.
“We had the goal-line formation in, and I slipped through the B-gap and made the tackle and we made a goal-line stand.
“Those kinds of plays can change the mentality of everyone on the field and give them something to build on.
“We weren’t able to win, but that kept us in it and kept us fighting.”
Snyder will miss Khile, whom he called “the best linebacker I’ve had for a long, long time from sideline to sideline.”
But a reminder of Khile may just make it up on the walls of the Port Townsend locker room.
“The fact that he had 127 tackles in an 11-game season is phenomenal, especially with the spread offenses we faced,” Snyder said.
“I want to make a board, put his stats on there, put it up and have the linebackers be able to look at that before they go out to practice.”
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Sports reporter Michael Carman can be contacted at 360-452-2345, ext. 57050 or at mcarman@peninsuladailynews.com.
