Wayne Ross to resign as AHS girls basketball coach

Wayne Ross, who has registered more than 220 victories in 20 years as a girls basketball coach at Aberdeen and Hoquiam, will resign as the Bobcat coach at the end of the season.

Ross informed his team of the decision last week.

“I’ve been thinking about for the last year and a half,” he said Monday. “It’s just time. I’ve put my time in and it’s time to move on.”

Ross will continue as a special education teacher at Hoquiam High School through the beginning of the 2012-13 school year. He is undecided whether he will retain his position as a Hoquiam baseball assistant this spring.

The 62-year-old Ross said he reconsidered his initial inclination to step down following the 2012-13 season.

“If I stayed one more year, I’d want to stay two more years (to stay with Aberdeen’s talented group of sophomores through their senior seasons),” he said. “I had to make that decision because I knew I didn’t have two years left in me.”

Although physically fit, Ross said he had grown increasingly tired this season. He also expressed a desire to spend winters in a warm-weather climate. He and his wife, Kathy, own a home in Mesa, Ariz., and intend to split time between Arizona and Grays Harbor following his retirement from education.

The eventual move to Arizona will also enable him to indulge his passion for slow-pitch softball more extensively. He is one of the top players on the Grays Harbor-based Aro Glass Clubbers, who have placed high in several national senior tournaments.

Ross emphasized that he was under no pressure from Aberdeen school administrators to step down.

“Rocky (AHS Principal Rocky Rocquin) told me ‘you’re welcome to coach here as long as you want’ and I thought that was very nice,” he said.

He added that the decision was unrelated to former Bobcat C squad coach Wes Phillips’ recent legal difficulties. Phillips was charged last week with voyeurism and communicating with a minor for immoral purposes over an electronic device.

A 1967 graduate of Hoquiam High School, Ross was named his alma mater’s girls basketball coach in 1992.

The school record-holder for girls hoop victories, he produced a succession of winning teams at Hoquiam. His 2003 club qualified for state and the Grizzlies went 19-1 during the regular season (although failing to survive district) three years later.

While retaining his Hoquiam teaching position, Ross moved across Myrtle Street to succeed Randy Hancock as the Aberdeen girls coach in the winter of 2007. Although this year’s club is currently sixth in the seven-team Evergreen 2A Conference, his previous four Bobcat teams earned district berths.

His Aberdeen record, entering tonight’s home game with Chehalis, is 52-53.

Ross said his decision does not come without regrets.

“I’m really going to miss coaching with Mindy,” he said of Mindy McElliott, his Grizzly and Bobcat assistant for the past nine years.

The association with the players will also be missed.

“I’ve coached 400 or so games and I only remember a few of those games,” Ross reflected. “But I remember a lot of the players. You miss basketball and you miss the kids. It’s just time to move on.”