YAKIMA — Port Angeles head coach Kasey Ulin choked back tears while realizing the magnitude of the team’s accomplishment with his assistants after the Roughriders’ 70-68 overtime victory over Prosser — the first state trophy haul for Port Angeles since the 1996-97 squad and only the fifth in school history.
“Joy and reflection,” Ulin said. “We’ve had so many good teams that have climbed ladders over the last seven years. Unfortunately, the ball didn’t go our way some nights. To see these kids stick together and overcome adversity in that moment, it’s why we do what we do. It’s why we spend so much time investing in these guys for these moments and there was a lot of emotion released right there.”
Ulin included the entire Roughrider family in enjoying this historic victory.
“To see coach [Danny] Linde, who grew up here and played in the program and has family so invested in our success,” Ulin said.
“Coach [Easton] Joslin who was in those shoes and was our first freshman on varsity. We were 5-15, 63rd-ranked team in the state [his first season in 2015-16] and year by year to see all these kids buy in to our culture and invest in each other and to start to have success and become competitive teams and then league championship teams and teams on the cusp of getting to here. And three years in a row of absolute heartbreak [in district tournament games].”
Ulin wants to make these trips a year-in, year-out occurrence and said that seeing success on the state stage was crucial for the future.
“We believed we belonged here and we expected to do well,” Ulin said. “Now the underclassmen know what it looks like, kids in Port Angeles haven’t seen it happen in forever and now they understand what it takes.”
