'It's nice to be back'

Roy Albertson relaxed in a chair in the coaches’ office at Timberlake High on a recent Saturday afternoon.

Moments earlier, the Tigers’ head coach had watched his team edge South Fremont 36-35 in the quarterfinals of the state 3A football playoffs at a chilly Van Tuinstra Memorial Field.

In his postgame interview, in the warmth of the coaches’ office, he talked about all the nice things his team had done to win the game, and the players who made the key contributions to the victory.

Then he paused.

“It’s nice to be back in the playoffs,” Albertson said.

“It’s nice to be back coaching on the sideline again,” he continued.

Darn right.

One year earlier, neither statement would have been true — Timberlake was not in the playoffs, the first time that had happened since 2002.

And Albertson, now in his 16th season as Tigers coach, was sidelined himself as well.

“Best decision I ever made was to come to Timberlake, because it saved my life,” he said with a laugh.

He wasn’t kidding.

ON SEPT. 27, 2017, while at practice out on the practice field at Timberlake, Albertson suddenly collapsed to the ground.

“(Rob) Ranney, (an assistant football coach), he’s the fastest of them all, he ran and got the defibrillator,” Albertson said. “And all the other guys, and our trainer, did the pumps, moving the blood until Ranney came and shocked me one time and I woke up.”

Albertson was airlifted to Kootenai Health in Coeur d’Alene (“I got a helicopter ride and didn’t even know it,” he recalled).

At the hospital, he was told he didn’t suffer a heart attack.

“They don’t know (why his episode happened),” Albertson said.

“In fact, I’ve got a defibrillator right here (as a precaution),” he said, pointing at his chest. “It happens quite a bit to people — the heart just stops. I did need a triple bypass, though.”

But since he was otherwise stable, his surgery didn’t take place until the following night.

Albertson said he doesn’t remember much about that Sept. 27 day, doesn’t remember being shocked.

“It’s tough; they broke four of my ribs (the coaches pressing on his chest, trying to revive him). And then they cut you open ... it’s a tough rehab, because you can’t do anything. But, sports teaches you that when you get knocked down, you’ve got to get up and keep going.”

He came back to work at Timberlake in early December. He says he can do pretty much the same things he did before the surgery.

“The one thing about this surgery — I feel so much better than I have in the last decade,” Albertson said. “Because I have so much more energy, because I was so plugged up.

“I’m just very lucky, very lucky, and my wife (Pat), of course, had to help me get through all the rehab. She’s a real champion, let me tell you.

“She’s always been a housewife, and because of that I ended up with two great kids — two daughters.”

TIMBERLAKE WAS 0-4 when Albertson was sidelined. Offensive coordinator Brian Kluss was named interim head coach.

Without ‘Alby’, the Tigers won one of their final four games of 2017, and finished 1-2 in the Intermountain League — keeping alive a streak of winning at least one league game each season since the school opened in 1998.

Albertson said the team was in good hands without him because many of his assistant coaches had head coaching experience — Kluss as football coach at Preston, Ranney with Timberlake girls basketball. Kluss is also the longtime Timberlake track and field coach. Defensive coordinator Kelly Amos was Timberlake’s first head football coach, and coached the Tigers for three seasons. He’s also in his second stint as the Tigers’ head wrestling coach. Former defensive coordinator Mike Menti, still an assistant, was the Tigers’ longtime softball coach, and is in his first season as Timberlake head boys basketball coach. Assistant Bill Rider was Timberlake’s baseball coach for nine seasons.

“It’s good for me because I have great assistants,” Albertson said. “They run everything. I’m the CEO. I make the money, and make a few decisions here and there.”

Still ...

“It was a tough year for all of us,” said Kluss, in his 20th season in the football program, and 19th as offensive coordinator. “One, we weren’t very good, and we knew we were young and inexperienced. But we kind of anticipated those things. Roy takes a lot of the buffer for us, and I think that was the biggest loss as a coaching staff, is not having him to deflect.”

“He gives us a chance to coach,” Amos said.

“And all of a sudden now,” Kluss said, “when my role changed last year (to interim head coach), I had to try to deflect as well, which is hard to do when you are losing, and still call the plays, and deal with all the crap that happens in school. Roy deals with all that stuff. In fact, he’ll come down to my room, and as soon as he comes in I know some kid’s missing for the day ... it’s never good news when he comes down to my room. It drains us, but on the other hand, he’s there to do that. And we didn’t have that last year. It just really put a lot more stress on me, and on the rest of the coaching staff.”

“And Mike (Menti) was the D-coordinator last year, and I know he felt it as well,” Kluss continued. “As much as he (Albertson) has this contact with the kids, because he’s in the weight room, and he sees them pretty much every day, for us, it’s just his presence and letting us do our job. And he’s really, really good at that. I’ve never been around anybody like him.

“I’ve coached at four different places, and he’s taught me a ton, and most of it is that — how do you, as a head coach, just go over here, and let them do their job ... stressful situations. You watch him on the field, it never bothers him.”

“The other thing that’s always nice with him is that he’s the tiebreaker,” Amos said.

“Kelly and I have spent a lot of nights after practice, when all the coaches have gone, with just Roy, for an extra half hour,” Kluss said. “And we spitfire back and forth what we need to do ... practice schedule, and he’s right — he is the tiebreaker. We always deflect to Roy on everything. And he knows exactly what’s going on, and he is that guy. He knows it all, but he’s also like, let them do their job. It’s really beneficial to have him here.”

It is suggested to the assistant coaches that Albertson makes it sound like he’s the CEO, and the assistants do all the work.

“It is funny that he comes off with that impression,” said Amos, the youngest of four brothers — three of which are football coaches, including Shawn, the Coeur d’Alene High head coach. “But we didn’t have him last year ... yeah, it’s a big difference.”

“That’s when you really notice it, when he’s not there,” Kluss said. “I spend a lot of time with him, and when he wasn’t here I went down to the hospital and spent a lot of time with him, and talk to him about where we’re at ... but it’s just not the same, because he’s not there at practice every day.

“And everything he does, and a lot of people don’t realize with Roy — he is the most generous man you will ever see, to these kids. If a kid doesn’t have shoes — he’ll buy him shoes.”

(Sort of, Kluss explains. Albertson can’t technically give the kid money for shoes. He would go out in the community, find a booster, hook the kid up with the booster and have him do some work for him. Then the kid can use the money to buy shoes, or go to team camp ... )

“He does more of that stuff that’s behind the scenes, that people just don’t know about him,” Kluss said.

WHEN THE time was right, Albertson said there was no doubt he would come back to work.

“I love these kids, and I may be 70 but I feel 40, so I’m keeping on,” he said.

Besides ...

“My wife doesn’t want me sitting around at home, probably,” he said.

“Coaching kids is my hobby. I can’t do anything else, but coach and work with kids,” he laughs. “That’s my hobby.”

Can’t he stay home and, say, help his wife with her gardening?

“Oh no,” Albertson replies. “I mow the lawn. And lately I haven’t been doing a good enough job, because she’s starting to mow ...

“I’m very lucky. She’s a great one.”

Albertson has coached for 45 years.

He still teaches weight training at Timberlake. He taught U.S. history and government at Kennewick High, where he was an assistant coach for 17 seasons. For 13 of those seasons, Ed Troxel, father of former Lake City coach Van Troxel, was Kennewick’s head coach.

Before Kennewick, Albertson was head coach for four years in tiny Dayton, Wash., starting in 1974.

After Kennewick, he was head coach at Chewelah, Wash., for eight years. Then he was hired at Timberlake, succeeding Tim Kiefer, who left after two seasons as head coach to take over for his father, Terry, at Lakeland.

Albertson is only the third coach in Timberlake football history, and his record with the Tigers is 98-60, with 12 league titles and 15 trips to the state playoffs.

(Around this point in the conversation, some of the assistant coaches return to the coaches’ office, and settle back into their chairs.)

“You heard all the Kennewick stories?” Kluss asked me.

“Has he got to Dayton yet?” another coach asks.

“If you get to Dayton, you know you’ve been here for a while,” Amos said.

“When you get to be my age,” Albertson declares, “then you get to tell stories.”

He retired from teaching in Washington when he came over to Idaho to take the Timberlake job in 2003.

He is 2-3 years away from being eligible to retire in Idaho on the “Rule of 90” (age plus teaching experience in Idaho equals 90).

“My comment’s always been that Roy has always thought that Rule of 90 meant you had to be 90,” Kluss joked.

Roy knows better.

“She (Pat) is my rock, that keeps me going, and knows I need to coach,” Albertson said. “I just take one day at a time, one year at a time, and one year I’ll come in and hand my keys in.”

And that part about Albertson being thankful that coming to Timberlake saved his life ...

“Yeah, but he’s probably saved our program,” Kluss said. “This football program is where it is because of Roy Albertson. And we’re really happy that he’s here, and we’ll do whatever we have to to keep him around as long as we can possibly keep him around.”

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.