Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
In a formal action at a regular meeting of the Palouse School board Thursday night, a Garfield-Palouse institution will end.
Veteran boys’ basketball coach Tim Coles will retire after 34 years teaching and 29 years as head coach of the Vikings, including three state championships.
Coles, 61, suffered a heart attack July 8 and sought to resign as principal/teacher while coaching one more year.
“His health issues were paramount both from our perspective and his,” said Palouse school boardmember Chris Cook. “It made the most sense to have him step away in both capacities.”
Coles concludes his career No. 8 on the all-time list of winningest high school basketball coaches in Washington state, all classifications.
“I would have assumed to make the decision myself, but they’re trying to look out for me, I suppose,” Coles said of the school board’s call. “It’s hard to walk away when you’re a coach. You get it in your blood and it’s hard to walk away.”
After the decision was made, Coles called Matt Holbrook, the lone senior-to-be returning starter for his old team this winter.
“I feel the worst about that,” Coles said.
Heart attack
Coles, who this summer had just returned to playing recreational softball for the first time in 30 years – joining a AAA 60-over league in Spokane – was shagging balls three weeks ago before a game when he felt his chest hurt, started to sweat and got dizzy.
He pulled himself out of the lineup.
“I was batting fourth,” Coles said. “When yourcleanup hitter takes himself out of the lineup, you better call the medical staff.”
Later that night, he went in for surgery and had three stents put in arteries. Coles already had open-heart, double bypass surgery in 2007.
“It’s time for me to reconsider what I’m doing, and what I’m doing with my time,” he said.
Coles retires after coaching dozens of fathers and sons over three decades, including two halves of that equation this past season – senior Hunter Woltering (father Will) and junior Wyatt Griner (father Ed).
The vocal Coles will now leave a void on sidelines throughout the Southeast 1B league and eastern Washington.
“He gave everyone motivation they wouldn’t have if it was somebody else,” said Brad Hasenoehrl of Garfield, a member of the 2000 and 2001 state championship teams. “Legs feed the wolf,” he’d say, over and over. Keep running, keep running.”
Coles finishes as one of the longest serving coaches in the state at one school.
“There’s going to be a lot of happy coaches and referees,” said Brian Koller, Head Coach at Pomeroy High School, who led teams against Coles for 17 years, including 10 for Lacrosse-Washtucna. “I mean that in the most positive way.”
“A good man, a good coach,” said Ken Lindgren, Oakesdale High School Athletic Director/Coach and WIAA District Nine Executive board representative. “Tim is very passionate about what he does. He’s a competitor. He’ll beat you, but he’s not going to demoralize a kid. He knows basketball inside and out. You watch him, you learn from him.”
Lindgren, who has taught and coached at Oakesdale for 25 years, first encountered Coles in a state B quarterfinal game in the old Spokane Coliseum in 1990. Lindgren was head coach of the Rainier Mountaineers, who met Gar-Pal a game away from the final. The Vikings won, advancing to win Coles’ first state championship.
BEGINNING
After the heart attack, the coach/teacher/principal’s doctors warned him to take stock of what pressures he was under.
“Especially, the way I do things,” said Coles, who was set to teach his first/only grandchild this fall – freshman Keely Burnes. Cole’s wife Tina – a 26-year Language Arts teacher at Garfield Middle School taught Burnes the past two years.
“I love Gar-Pal,” Coles said. “It’s been my life, it’s heartbreaking to leave a great staff, great kids. They’ve been so good to me.”
He grew up in Post Falls, Idaho, and still holds a Post Falls High School high jump school record from 1971 (22’8”). He went to University of Idaho on a football scholarship and played receiver for coach Dennis Erickson.
There Coles met Tina, whom he had seen on opposing sidelines in high school.
The Miss University of Idaho caught much attention.
Coach Erickson knew Coles and Tina were dating and made a comment one day.
“What does she see in you?” he said.
Coles came to Palouse at age 24, after starting his teaching/coaching career in Elk River, Nez Perce and Kootenai, Idaho.
Starting as history teacher at Palouse, it was the first year of the athletic co-op with Garfield, 1981-82.
In 2011 he was inducted into the Washington Interscholastic Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
He now leaves a team that lost in the state subtournament and graduated four starters.
“I know the team will be okay,” Coles said. “But I wish I could have seen them through this year.”
The coach’s drive has been evident all his life.
“I didn’t like to lose,” he said. “I remember as a fifth-grader in P.E. crying because our team lost. My friends would make fun of me but I just couldn’t help it. I just wanted to win.”
When he was six years old, young Coles entered a dog-paddling contest at Lake Coeur D’Alene. He prayed to God he would be a good boy if he could just win. He did.
CONCLUDING
Now his career has come to a close.
“It’s the relationship with the kids. That’s what I’ll miss,” Coles said. “It’s the personal relationship with kids that play for you.”
As a teacher, he’ll miss those relationships too.
“I think some of the best teaching is life lessons,” he said.
The Greek and Roman times are his favorite periods to teach.
“Basketball and schooling, he has his own way with both of them,” said Hasenoehrl.
Teaching, coaching and another activity made for Coles’ influence on the school. He also acted as disc jockey for dances. Last year, as principal he was the D.J. for Homecoming. This year he’ll be there again. They had to get someone else this spring for prom because he was a chaperone for a school trip to Washington, D.C.
At some point in the next two weeks, Coles will go to the high school and clean out his office.
“I will get things and leave but after that, I just gotta create a new life,” he said.
Next coach:
The Garfield-Palouse school boards will now start looking to replace Coles.
“We begin a coaching search in earnest,” said boardmember Cook.
Possible candidates include Coles’ assistants Robert Lopez and Zane Wells, although Lopez had previously indicated that when Coles retires, he would bow out with him.
Garth Meyer is a former Whitman County Gazette reporter.
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