W.F. West coach Mike Keen celebrates with players after the Bearcats' earned a 4-0 win over Ridgefield in the 2A District 4 softball tournament championship game at 7th Avenue Park in Longview on Friday, May 18, 2017.
W.F. West's Jordan Crawford celebrates with coach Mike Keen after Crawford hit a triple against Centralia during an Evergreen 2A Conference softball game at Recreation Park in Chehalis on Wednesday.
W.F. West coach Mike Keen high-fives Kim Frazier next to Kindra Davis after Frazier struck out the last batter of the inning during a nonleague game against Prairie on Wednesday at Recreation Park in Chehalis.
W.F. West coach Mike Keen smiles while talking to his team after earning his 300th career win after the Bearcats defeated Prairie 9-3 on Wednesday at Recreation Park in Chehalis.
There was plenty of pressure on Mike Keen back in 2003, when he took over as head coach of the W.F. West fastpitch team.
Keen had been an assistant with Russ Lunders for all 10 years of the program’s existence, a stretch that featured five trips to state and the 2000 state championship.
“It was like Russ had built a car from the bottom up, and he gave me the keys, and said, ‘Don’t screw this up,’” Keen said. “Ever since I was head coach, I was in fear of screwing up a great program.”
It’s safe to say Keen, who finalized his decision to retire from coaching on Monday, didn’t screw anything up.
W.F. West has been to the state tournament 14 seasons in a row — the longest active streak in the state — and has a 50-16 record at state over that span. The Bearcats have won three of the last six state championships, and two of the last three; they haven’t lost an Evergreen 2A Conference game since 2012, and haven’t lost a District 4 tournament game since 2011.
Keen, meanwhile, retires with 333 wins in 15 years.
“There just comes a time,” said Keen, who will also retire from teaching on June 16 when Chehalis’ school year ends. “It’s a great group of kids to leave with an incoming coach.”
He leaves the Bearcats’ next coach with a group that includes five starters from this season’s team, which went 22-3 and won the State 2A championship.
“I feel really good handing the program over to the next coach, and it’s nice, when you put in the time, to see the fruits of your labor, I guess,” he said. “I don’t have any regrets.”
Keen started working in Chehalis in 1979, mainly teaching sixth grade until the 2002-03 school year, when he moved to the high school to teach history.
And now?
“I’m going to make birdhouses, and crochet. My passion’s cooking …” he joked. “My wife (Dennina) and I are going to travel. I’ve got grandkids, and I’ll actually get to watch them play baseball — just family stuff.”
He got into coaching early on, helping Kevin Zylstra — a longtime fastpitch assistant — with the Bearcat slowpitch team before joining Lunders’ staff when Chehalis moved from slowpitch to fastpitch in 1993.
The most notable part of his 15-year career, though, doesn’t come with a banner or a trophy.
“The highlight is every day you get to hang out with kids that have a passion for the game, and just practice hard and play hard,” Keen said. “That’s the highlight.”
That’s a byproduct of the coaching philosophy Keen and his staff — which, this year, included Zylstra, Jenny Taylor, Caty Lieseke and Meagan Cory — apply with the players.
“I tell the girls the first day of practice, at tryouts, that I’m going to assume that what I’m seeing is their best — their best effort at what they do,” he said. “And if I’m seeing something that’s not good enough, that’ll impact playing time.
“We try to instill a pride with the team, and we make it fun, too,” he added. “Too many coaches apply pressure to the kids, and I know parents do, too. We try to loosen it up a little bit.”
He’s sent plenty of players on to the next level, including, most recently, 2016 University of Washington graduate Dani Braun and current Princeton senior Marissa Reynolds. Ali Graham (2015) just finished her sophomore campaign with Oregon Tech, and Jessica McKay (2016) just wrapped up a successful freshman year at Boise State.
“It’s been a great experience to say that I knew them when,” he said, “and to see them succeed and get their degree in college, and go on into the real world and be a success.”
