MOUNTLAKE TERRACE — The Hawks are perched at the edge of an historical milestone.
Mountlake Terrace High School’s football team finished the past two regular seasons with a winning record. If the Hawks, a Wesco 3A team, win one of their final three games, they will achieve a winning record for a third-consecutive season — the first such streak in the school’s history.
“We’ve had some nice years here and there but we’ve never put together three-straight winning seasons at the school,” Hawks coach Tony Umayam said. “If we can get to that fifth win, or when we get to that fifth win, that’s going to be a pretty significant thing.”
Umayam has helped re-write the record books at Mountlake Terrace High School. The coach, who played for the Hawks until he graduated in 1990 and went on to play for Willamette University, led Mountlake Terrace to the playoffs for the first time in school history in 2009. The Hawks have made back-to-back appearances in the playoffs the past two seasons and are eager to get back for a third time.
“The same (goal) goes with the playoffs,” Umayam said. “The longest winning streak at this school is four and we’ve won three in a row so this (Friday) would be four. There’s a lot of things historically that we share with the players and there’s other things we bring out as we hopefully achieve them.”
The coach says the turnaround began with the 2008 team that eventually got to the playoffs a season later. After a down year in 2011 — the freshman season for the current Hawks seniors — Mountlake Terrace has been on the upswing. The team finished each of the past two regular seasons with a 5-4 record and reached the postseason after winning crossover games against Marysville Getchell (2012) and Stanwood (2013).
Postseason losses gave the Hawks a 5-5 record to end each of the past two campaigns.
Mountlake Terrace is 4-1 this season and clinches a winning regular season by beating either Glacier Peak (3-2), Lynnwood (3-2) or Kingston (1-4).
Umayam credits several factors to the Hawks’ reversal of fortune in recent years.
“First, you have to have excellent kids come through the program,” Umayam said. “We’ve had a really nice crop of kids come through the last six years or so.
“Then it’s just a matter of executing. We’ve won a couple close games this year and when you have two evenly-matched high school teams the difference a lot of times is just who makes plays that night. Fortunately, we’ve been on that (winning) side a couple of times this year.”
Success has helped breed success at Mountlake Terrace, where the players have higher expectations now after being to the playoffs in consecutive seasons, Umayam said.
“I think the players have been real positive and there’s been a great atmosphere around the program,” Umayam said. “… Here, the players aren’t terribly surprised about being 4-1. We’ve been relatively successful the last four or five years. It’s been a long time. They were little kids when Terrace used to be the whipping boys in the league.”
“I don’t think we’re surprising ourselves,” senior running back Ryan Lacasse said. “We’re surprising other people, but I think we knew all along we were going to be good.”
Lacasse, who has 568 yards and nine touchdowns on 61 carries, has been a huge part of the Hawks’ success this season. The senior also has come up big as a defensive back.
“Ryan Lacasse has been a playmaker and been one of the better players in the league,” Umayam said. “He plays every down for us and is (among the league leaders) in rushing. He’s also had two critical interceptions on the goal line to really help us in two games — against Mariner and Edmonds-Woodway.”
The running back attributes Mountlake Terrace’s early-season success to practices. He said that’s the starting point for the Hawks’ success.
“We’re just working hard during practice,” Lacasse said. “We have more intense practices and that’s just paying off in the games. We’re getting our name out there. We’re becoming a better program each year and we’re just going to continue to improve.”
Umayam also credits the senior leadership, including Lacasse and fellow senior Josh Hopkins, with helping keep Mountlake Terrace competitive.
“I think the leadership and the attitude that we come in to practice with and making sure that we do the best every single day to get better has helped a lot,” said Hopkins, who plays wide receiver and defensive back. “This year has been great. This group of guys have been playing together for years and it’s nice to know that we’re one of the schools to be reckoned with now.”
In order to prove they’re a team to be reckoned with, Mountlake Terrace must have a strong showing against reigning Wesco 3A South champion Glacier Peak. The Grizzlies shut out Mountlake Terrace 31-0 last season.
“I think, first off, we need to do what is probably the key for us being so successful this year so far in that we are in the big plus-side in turnover ratio,” Umayam said. “We’ve been able to create some timely turnovers on defense and we haven’t turned the ball over hardly at all on offense.”
Mountlake Terrace isn’t just looking for a fifth win and a berth in the playoffs — they want to make a deep run into postseason.
“We’re looking to (win out and) go 7-1 before the crossover game,” Hopkins said. “We want to get this ‘W’ to really put our school on the map. We’re trying to go to state this year. It’s a big stepping ladder compared to years’ past but we think we have the talent and the capability to do it this year.”
“What’s been in front of the players is to make the playoffs again and knowing that the challenge of making the playoffs going into this year was a lot higher this season,” Umayam said. “That’s the focus for the players. The winning season is just something that happens along the way.”
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