DICK ABRAMS HAD more than a plan. He had a book.
The former Stanwood head football coach knows exactly what he wants to do with the struggling Port Angeles football program.
He even mapped it out in a booklet he distributed to questioners during his interview for the vacant Roughrider football head coaching position.
Now that the Port Angeles School District announced his selection as the Riders’ leading man on Tuesday, the longtime coach will get a chance to see it through.
“To me the football field is really a classroom,” said Abrams. “It’s an educational process, and I want my assistant coaches to be good teachers just like any coach is a good teacher.
“That’s why I coach football, because I believe in the life lessons kids can learn from it.”
Port Angeles found itself more than a teacher in Abrams.
The 56-year-old coaching veteran is also a bit of a psychologist. At least that’s what his doctorate from Central Washington University states.
Not only will Abrams serve as Port Angeles’ gridiron guru, he will also be the school psychologist for the Port Angeles School District.
“He interviewed very well for psychologist just on his merit,” district athletic director Jeff Clark said. “We were very fortunate.
“It’s exciting to think about the coaches meeting him, and the kids meeting him and hopefully being inspired to kind of renew the program. Sometimes a new leader can do that for you. I think the potential is there.”
Familiar with situation
What Abrams will encounter at Port Angeles isn’t too far removed from what he inherited when he took over Stanwood.
Much like in Port Angeles, which has had five different coaches this decade, Stanwood had three coaches in three years prior to his arrival.
He ended up holding the position for seven years after that, posting a 36-32 record that included a WesCo North division title in 2004. His teams had winning records in four of seven years, although his Spartans went 6-13 in his last two seasons combined.
“Sometimes we get kind of stale in the situations we are at,” said Abrams, who estimates more than 20 of his Stanwood players moved on to play college ball.
“It just seemed like the right time for me [to move on]. I knew I wanted to keep coaching, I just wanted to try somewhere else.
“I saw Port Angeles as being a challenge, a place to go, a beautiful community and a new place to get a chance to start a program.”
He will certainly get an opportunity to do that.
Rough ride
The Riders have suffered through a tumultuous decade to say the least.
Since 2000, Port Angeles is 29-57 with just two winnings seasons and one playoff appearance.
Not a single coach has lasted longer than three years, with the last two gone after just two seasons each.
As outgoing coach Keith Moorman said following a forced resignation in December, “There’s a lot of rebuilding to do in this program before the wins are going to come.
“Changing out the head coaches like underwear is not the fix. However it unfolds, we need to have some consistency. [Success] is not going to happen overnight.”
Abrams envisions it taking a few years before his program is in place as well.
That includes developing synergy with the youth programs as well as an established philosophy.
“It takes two or three [years] just to get your own stuff going,” Abrams said.
“After that you just build upon it. So we definitely plan on being there for a while.”
Long history
Abrams played football (tight end) and baseball (catcher) at Willamette University.
He began his career as a coach and educator in 1978 in the Kennewick School District, serving as a school psychologist and offensive line coach at Kamiakin High School.
In 1984, Abrams moved to Spokane, where he coached at Lewis and Clark, and Ferris high schools.
Abrams eventually landed at Everett High School in 1988, handling defensive coordinator duties for coaching legend Terry Ennis. They won a AAA (now 4A) state championship together in 1991.
Abrams signed on at the Everett School District’s newly opened Henry M. Jackson High School in 1994, where he was head football coach and athletic director.
After four years at Jackson, Abrams moved to take the head coaching position at neighboring Marysville High. Finally, in 2002, Abrams accepted the head coach job at Stanwood High School.
All told, Abrams has spent 33 years pacing the sidelines of football fields in the Pacific Northwest, 15 as a head coach.
“It sounds like a long time, but it went really fast,” he said.
Abrams has a soft spot for the Wing T offense he learned under Ennis and prefers odd defensive front (think 3-4 or five-man front), but he said he will tailor his schemes to his personnel. In recent years he modified the Wing T to operate much as a shotgun spread attack.
“I’ve run many offensive schemes and many defensive schemes,” he said.
“A lot of teams are going to [spread offenses] now. It presents problems to the defense. But I’ve always believed in running the ball. So if I can run the ball in a spread, I’ll do that too.”
Abrams will begin his search for assistant coaches in the next couple of weeks and intends to have a summer program in place.
Yes, he’s already got it all mapped out.
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Matt Schubert is the outdoors and sports columnist for the Peninsula Daily News. His column normally appears on Thursdays and Fridays. He can be reached at matt.schubert@peninsuladailynews.com.
