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THE FRONT ROW WITH JASON ELLIOTT: Edelblute steps away from one family to spend more time with his own

| June 12, 2021 1:10 AM

When Rob Edelblute returned to his alma mater 23 years ago, it was a big deal to him.

Being a part of Lakeland’s first two state wrestling champions (1988 and 1989 under coach Jim Whiteman), as well as finishing as a runner-up at state in 1987 (98 pounds) and 1988 (103 pounds) and winning the A-2 title in 1989, it is a big deal.

Now that he’s passing the whistle, it’s still a big deal.

EDELBLUTE, WHO has coached at Lakeland for the last 23 years, 22 as head coach, stepped down as head wrestling coach in early June.

“I’ve thought about it for a couple of years,” said Edelblute, 51, who took over for Mark Johnson as head coach in 1999. “Then I’d think, ‘Ahh, I really like this group coming up.’ And even this group coming up, I love them too. But you’ve just got to rip that Band-Aid off. I’ve been wrestling since I was in third grade, and it’s 40-plus years of my life that I’ve been involved with it, so I can’t imagine just being able to walk away and stay away. I’m sure I’ll be around helping in the (wrestling) room and at every tournament.”

And the decision didn’t come without advice from his fellow coaches.

“It was hard,” said Edelblute, who teaches fourth and fifth grade at Twin Lakes Elementary in Rathdrum. “Just talking to (Coeur d’Alene coach Jeff) Moffat and some of those guys that I’ve built relationships with over the years, it was a tough decision.”

“The first thing that comes to mind when speaking of Robbie is class,” Moffat said. “He always carried himself in a classy way. We always liked facing Lakeland because we knew that it was going to be a battle and they would compete to the bitter end. Our teams shared a bus to the Rollie Lane for many years, and we shared a bus to the Oregon State team camp for many years, so we had a good working relationship. Year in, and year out, he put a competitive team on the mat. Robbie is a Hall of Fame coach in my book. He will be missed.”

IN DECEMBER, with no Tri-State Invitational at North Idaho College due to the coronavirus pandemic, it gave Edelblute a chance to do something rare.

“This was probably the first birthday I’ve been able to spend with my daughter (Kirstyn) because Tri-State was canceled,” said Edelblute, who wrestled at NIC. “Her birthday is always over Tri-State weekend. This past year, we didn’t have anything going on, so I just thought ‘wow, I can be here for this.’”

Still, resigning as wrestling coach wasn’t a decision that came easily.

“I’d talked about wanting to step down when my nephews (Alex, Sam, Brian, Will) were done, and then grew attached to the senior group,” Edelblute said. “I’ve been kind of working up to it, and didn’t know if I was going to do it or not. Zach Horsley, my assistant, kept telling me ‘Oh, you’re not going to do it.’ But I’m hoping that the program is in the right place and if I stepped down, the program would still be in great shape.”

No replacement has been named yet and the hiring process will begin sometime in the next week, according to Lakeland athletic director Mike Divilbiss.

“I just wanted to spend more time with my family,” Edelblute said. “My daughter, she’s a freshman and grew up in that wrestling room — in a car seat, at 5 a.m. workouts. Often times I’d bring a pillow, blanket and an iPad and just put her in a corner of the wrestling room. Now that she’s a freshman, I’m missing out on all of her sports. I don’t think people know just how much time goes into being a head coach. There has been summers that I’ve been away from home for six weeks at regionals, state, nationals and Fargo, or going to camps.”

And when he’s needed at home, often times he’s on a bus somewhere else.

“I’d come home and see my wife’s (Lori) car parked at the bottom of the hill because nobody has been able to plow or whatever,” Edelblute said. “It’s just little things like that because I’ve been at Central Valley for two days (at a tournament) and I don’t see it. Sometimes I’ll leave to go to school and I don’t get home until 10 or 11 at night on Friday, and then leave again at 5 a.m. on Saturday and don’t get home until 7 p.m.”

THERE WAS that one time at nationals at Utah Valley University in Orem that nearly changed everything.

“Kirstyn’s traveled all over with me,” Edelblute said. “One summer she went to regionals and nationals with me. I think it was the last time my wife let me take her because I lost her at the national tournament and they had to stop the entire tournament. It was a pretty scary moment, but it was one of those things where I told her ‘don’t move, I’ll be right back in six minutes.’ She was gone for an hour or so and was just sleeping in the stands in a crack between the bleachers. I was searching everywhere on the campus and she’d gotten up to go to the bathroom and went to a different part of the gym. But she’d stay in the tent with us and go on the charter buses and slept on the floor in the aisle. They were great memories, I’m not going to lie, and it was great to spend all that time with her. But now, it’s like, 'Dad, I don’t want to go and I want to stay home.’”

Sam, a rising redshirt sophomore and Will, a redshirt junior, are wrestling at Utah Valley.

Now, he’ll have a chance to get outdoors a little more.

“I know we’ll probably be hitting the slopes and doing a little more skiing since we can do that now,” Edelblute said. “That was always taboo during Whiteman’s time because he didn’t want any injuries and stuff like that. As a coach, Sundays come around and you don’t want to do anything after being at a tournament all day on Saturday.”

DURING HIS time as Lakeland coach, Edelblute has coached 106 state placers, 31 state champions, nine Tri-State champions and led the Hawks to eight top-four team finishes in the state tournament with 21 wrestlers inducted into the Lakeland Wrestling Hall of Fame. To be considered, a wrestler must be a four-time placer at Tri-State or state, and advanced to the finals. Winners of those events are included automatically.

“I stay in contact with these guys pretty well,” Edelblute said. “I’m going to Brandon’s (Palaniuk) wedding here in the next month and going to six or seven graduation parties this weekend.”

For Rob, his work never stopped.

"My very first year, I’d pick this kid up at 5:30 a.m. every morning,” Edelblute said. “And he had a rough lifestyle, stepping over family members to wake him up to go to practice. Seeing where he’s at today, and he just retired from the military. And it’s not like he was the best wrestler, and he went to state for me. He went from not breaking the varsity lineup to going to state, and it’s a story I tell my kids all the time. He wasn’t the best, but he was willing to put in the work and time.”

“He’s taught me a lot,” said Horsley, Edelblute’s assistant since 2011 and a 2007 Lakeland High graduate. “Rob is still one of the most competitive dudes you’ll meet, but he was about doing what was right for the kid. Sometimes early on, we’d have conversations about some troubled athletes in the program, and what to do with them and whether or not to keep them on the team. He’d always say no, we’re going to get him to make the right decisions. And most of the time it worked out. He never gave up on a kid and always did what was best for them.”

“I don’t care if it’s 1 or 100, I always told the kids that if you want, we can go do these extra workouts,” Edelblute said. “I’d be up in the weight room with Kyle McCrite, Brandon Richardson or Connor Shepard, or picking up Larry Johnson every day at 5 a.m., just going to the weight room or to wrestle. Those were things that they’d ask if I was willing to do that, and I’d tell them, ‘sure.’ My wife would be ‘of course he’ll do it.' And my wife has been so supportive. She knows that when it comes to our spring breaks, it revolved around Reno Worlds. And I’d spend our spring break in a gym while she was at home, and it wasn’t much of a spring break for us.”

Somehow, he’ll get his break next spring.

No question, that’s a big deal.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for The Press. He can be reached by telephone at (208) 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at jelliott@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @JECdAPress.