Philomath High School is searching for a new head softball coach after the district last month decided to not bring back Travis King.
“I’m frustrated about it but the school wants to go in a different direction and that’s fine,” King said. “They wanted to start with a clean slate.”
King had served as the program’s head coach since 2020 and leaves with an overall record of 24-61.
King said his departure from the program involved the district asking him to resign. Athletic Director Mike Hood said “the move is the result of PHS wanting to shift directions.”
King, who works locally and is visible in the community — he was throwing pitches at Wednesday night’s Frolic and Rodeo Home Run Derby — said he’ll still be around the game. Daughter Haley King just finished her freshman season.
“I still have my own kid who has three more years and don’t get me wrong, I’ll still work with my kid and I’ll still work with any other kid who wants to work … I’m not giving up on them at all,” he said. “But by the same token, I’m going to take a step back and be a parent.”
Hood said he has no replacement in mind for the job, which is currently being advertised.
Following King’s dismissal, assistant coach Saff Evans led players into two summer workouts, Hood said.
Philomath High represented King’s first head coaching experience at the varsity level. He coached youth softball for several years before joining the PHS program in 2018 as a junior varsity coach. By the following year, King was helping then-coach Erik Remington as the varsity assistant.
The softball program appeared to be in good shape at the time with plenty of wins and a high participation rate. But in what was supposed to be his first season, the program hit a brick wall with COVID leading to the 2020 season’s cancellation.
After he had been the coach for 14 months, King’s first game finally occurred in April 2021. The Warriors had an 8-5 record in an pandemic-abbreviated season. The team went 10-14 in 2022 and just missed the 4A playoffs by falling to Baker on the road, 14-13, in a play-in game.
The program struggled the past two seasons with six wins combined, including 1-23 this past spring.
Despite the win-loss record, King felt the team had established a positive culture over this past season and felt they were close to turning the corner to better days ahead.
“It was a way better, more positive experience for the girls this year,” King said. “That was one of our main goals — to change the culture. However, we had a new group of kids at the varsity level but they were starting to get it, they were starting to pick it up, they were starting to play better at the end of the season.”
King said he wanted to continue the journey.
“It’s frustrating that we didn’t get to work towards continuing to build on that next year,” he said. “We had gotten things at a more positive level where the kids were enjoying playing with each other and starting to get what we were trying to teach them.”
As far as a highlight during his four years of coaching PHS, King said the 2021 COVID season comes to mind.
“That was my oldest’s senior year,” King said, referring to daughter Emily King. “Her and Kamden (Combs) and Kaili (Saathoff) — they were my three seniors and I enjoyed the heck out of coaching them.”
Hood said that from an AD’s perspective, managing coaches at a smaller school like Philomath can be a challenge.
“Navigating relationship dynamics is a challenge in any community, especially a small community like ours,” he said. “Expectations of coaching contracts — both from district and from individual coaches is another challenge. The district is poised to work on clarity that will help on all fronts in this regard.”
