THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: Former Lakeland High and Idaho Vandal standout Coffey hopes to keep kicking — but he has a Plan B

Cade Coffey may or may not hear from an NFL team over the next three or four days.

Either way, the standout punter/placekicker at the University of Idaho, and previously from Lakeland High, is cool with whatever happens during or following the NFL draft, which begins tonight.

He already has a Plan B.

And while Coffey will keep tabs on who's drafting whom, looks like he might have some chores to do this weekend, on 10 acres his family owns in Rathdrum, near Hauser.

"I'll probably head back home, and probably help my dad help put up a fence on my dad’s property," Coffey said earlier this week, in a phone interview from Moscow. "We own a couple cows now, so they need some grazing room, so we’re going to put up a fence."

COFFEY, LIKE Austin Rehkow before him, handled all the punting and placekicking duties during his four years as a Vandal.

Coffey averaged 44.4 yards per punt in his career, and his average of 45.8 yards per punt in the recently completed spring season was the fifth-best average in program history.

He said "eight or nine" NFL teams have reached out to him in the last week or so — whether that leads to being drafted in the later rounds, or eventually signing as an undrafted free agent, or neither.

"I’m going through it with the mindset that I feel like I’m good enough to play at the next level, and at least get a camp invite," the 6-foot-1, 199-pound Coffey said. "I’m training right now, and if something happens, that’s awesome. I’m definitely going to try to win a job in the fall, and definitely pursue that.

"And if nothing happens, I have other avenues I’ll pursue and I’ll be happy either way."

Coffey earned a degree in finance in fall 2019, and plans to finish work on a second major, in marketing, in May.

He has a couple offers in the business world, from companies based in Texas.

"I’ve got a couple possibilities down there," he said.

Because of COVID-19, college seniors have the option of coming back for another senior year.

However, Coffey grayshirted after graduating from Lakeland, meaning he delayed his enrollment until the following January, then redshirted the next fall.

"Plus having that COVID year of not playing, I’m at that point where I’m ready to be done with the college experience and move on to the next steps of life," he said.

ASKED TO describe the recently completed spring college football season, Coffey replied with one word.

"Weird."

"I remember when the season got canceled last fall we were like, 'So, are we playing in the spring? Are we going to wait until next fall?' No one really knew anything."

Then in the spring, both Montana schools opted out of playing Big Sky games. So did Northern Colorado and Portland State. The uncertainty lingered.

"No one really knew we were playing until that first game, until we got on the field," Coffey said. "It was a weird season. I’m glad we played, but it was definitely a lot of challenges."

When COVID shut the Vandals down last March, Coffey was pretty much on his own as far as training. He went home for a couple of months, and he worked on his grandpa's farm in the Columbia Basin area.

At home in Rathdrum, he took advantage of his family's 10 acres to work on his kicking.

"We have a soccer goal put up that we’ve had since I was in junior high, and me and my dad built a field goal post off it," said Coffey, who also played soccer at Lakeland, and attracted some recruiting interest in that sport from small colleges. "We bought some PVC pipes and were able to connect them to the goalposts to make some sort of upright to practice field goals."

Most folks cringe at the thought of getting the swab shoved up their nose once as part of a COVID-19 test.

Try having to go through that three times a week, for 8-9 months …

"Not the most fun times," Coffey said. "It took a long while to get used to it. It’s one of those things, it’s just not going to feel comfortable. It’s just not going to feel great."

COFFEY WAS recruited to handle the punting, placekicking and kickoff duties.

He made 38 career field goals, fifth most in school history, out of 54 attempts. He made 114 of 117 PATs, and his 228 career points are sixth-most ever by a Vandal.

"Kickoffs take most of the energy out of you," Coffey said. "After games I would go home and lay down and pass right out because I would be so tired."

The Vandals had been looking for someone to handle kickoff duties ever since Coffey arrived, just to save some wear and tear on his leg.

Midway through his junior year, in 2019, in a game vs. Weber State, Coffey got hit while punting, and suffered a hyperextended right knee, basically forcing Idaho to put someone else back there for kickoffs.

"I was actually relieved when they had someone take away kickoffs from me, so I could focus on punting and field goals," Coffey said. "It was definitely pretty painful the second half of the 2019 season, but I was able to do it," he said of punting and placekicking.

When Seth Harrison of Eastern Washington, a Coeur d'Alene High grad, appeared to make a short field goal against Idaho earlier this spring in the Kibbie Dome, only to have it ruled no good after it sailed higher than the top of the upright, Coffey could empathize.

"At Montana State, we scored a touchdown and I kicked the extra point and they called it no good," Coffey said, "but when you watch the video, and look at all the pictures, it was in by a mile."

Then in 2019 at Northern Colorado, "it was really windy there, and I kicked a field goal straight down the middle, and they called it no good."

He said by the time the wind got hold of the football and veered it to the side, it was well past the uprights.

"That was the frustrating part; we sent both of those films in to the Big Sky, and they pretty much told us ‘tough luck,’" Coffey said. "I was pretty bitter that they actually gave an explanation to Eastern Washington."

COFFEY's CLAIM to fame at Lakeland was a 57-yard field goal just before halftime of a state 4A playoff game at home vs. Skyview of Nampa.

(Rehkow, years earlier, boomed a 67-yarder for Central Valley High in a game at Albi Stadium in Spokane.)

"Coach (Tim) Kiefer used to let me practice long field goals, but we never kicked a long one in a game before. I think my longest during the season was a 45-yarder my sophomore year against Post Falls to win homecoming."

Coffey said he had made a couple of 60-yarders in practice.

As the Hawks reached midfield against Skyview, and the half neared, Coffey figured Lakeland would go for it on fourth down, like the Hawks had several times that year.

Derek Bayley was Lakeland's quarterback the previous year. He missed his senior season of football following shoulder surgery, but he was there on the sidelines during games.

"And he came up to me on third down and said ‘Hey, be ready, because we’re going to kick this.'

"I’m like, ‘What are you talking about?'

Moments later, Kiefer calls out "field goal," and the rest is history, on that chilly early November night.

"As a kicker, and as punter, when you kick a good punt, you just know," Coffey said. "It’s one of those things, once you connect with the ball, you look up and you just know you just slaughtered that ball. Pretty much when I kicked it, when it came off my foot, I was like, yeah, that’s going for a mile."

AT LAKELAND, some smaller colleges had shown interest in Coffey as a punter and kicker, and he had also talked with recruiters from Washington State and Washington.

Cade's dad, Travis, starred at Bonners Ferry High before playing football for the Vandals from 1993-96.

So when Vandal head coach Paul Petrino and assistant Kris Cinkovich (who retired earlier this week) offered a scholarship, Cade jumped at the offer.

"I’ve pretty much been raised a Vandal," he said.

Coffey said he tries to emulate the form of former NFL punter Pat McAfee and current NFL placekicker Justin Tucker.

His main hobbies are anything outdoors.

"One of my secret hobbies is building model ships," Coffey said.

He said he's built "hundreds" of the smaller replica versions of ships.

"I’m a big history nerd, so I like building the World War II ships," he said.

He said the most famous ship he's built is the HMS Victory, which as history nerds know, is best known for being being Lord Nelson's flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805.

"I built that one a couple of years ago," he said.

He has other ships, including the Titanic, on his to-do list.

Whether Cade Coffey sails into an NFL camp after this weekend, or into the business world in a month or two, remains to be seen.

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.