From mountain climber to Washington high school football coach

An ex-mountaineering guide, Wyatt Evenson guided his Washington high school football team to a playoff spot in his first season at the helm in 2023

In his first season as coach in 2023, Wyatt Evenson led downtrodden White River to four wins and a playoff berth out of 2A SPSL. / Photo courtesy of White River athletics tT

Others might shudder at the thought of being left uninhibited in the back country.

That is Wyatt Evenson's comfort zone.

And he has experienced some pretty teeth-chattering extremes over the years- in football and in mountaineering.

You could say he has given the White River High School football program a compass to relevance after leading the Hornets to four victories and a district playoff berth last fall coming out of the 2A SPSL.

"Everything is here. to be successful," Evenson said. "It's all about getting the buy-in."

A quick-to-pivot introduction came early in football career. As a junior at Shadle Park, he was a wide receiver catchng a ton of passes in a wide-open passing attack.

"My senior year, we switched to the Power-T offense," he said.

Even as a college player, then as an assistant, he has never stuck to one system - from being a wide receiver in a run-based offense at the University of Puget Sound before transferring to pass-happy Eastern Washington University, and then as an offensive coordinator watching Brett Rypien breaks state passing records as his alma mater at Shadle Park to running it down the throat of defenses at Park City in Utah.

That is stuff played on a football field. Imagine being a mountaineering guide for trips to one of the most dangerous national parks in the country - Denali National Park in Alaska.

While working for American Alpine Institute in his mid-to-late 20s, Evenson took seven three-week mountain-climbing trips in Denali National Park with two other guides and nine clients willing to spend approximately $10,000 for an adventure of a lifetime.

"You get on a bush plane that flies you into base camp," Evenson said. "And they drop you off with 150 pounds of food to haul around on a mountain for three weeks."

Evenson admitted there was imminent danger everywhere - from grizzly bears and wolves, to the threat of rockslides and extreme weather - but all of his climbs were along the popular West Buttress route. His final trek was in 2021.

"I walked out of there with nothing crazy happening," Evenson said.

Perhaps his biggest "climb" was awaiting him at his first head-coaching job in Buckley.

After the family decided to move back from Utah to Washington in 2023, Evenson applied for a few offensive-coordinator jobs on the west side.

A coaching pal recommended Evenson take a hard look at the White River head opening, which he also applied for - and was ultimately hired.

"So much here was broken," Evenson said.

What Evenson, now 34, did was collect a good cast of assistant coaches, including former Hornets coach Joe Sprouse. And he started recruiting kids from other sports to look at football - mainly wrestling.

What Evenson was blessed with from the get-go was inheriting a big quarterback who could make all the throws in Aaden Rathbun, who is now playng baseball at Shoreline Community College. And he discovered an out-the-shadows 1,000-yard wide receiver in Tate Bowen, who set a couple of single-season records.

"We chucked it around the yard," Evenson said.

White River also registered wins over perennial playoff teams Fife and Washington to earn a playoff spot.

And even though the Hornets will be more balanced on offense this fall, the goal is the same - make the playoffs out of their new league, the 3A NPSL.

"I've noticed," Evenson said, "people like their football here."