Mission Bulldogs remember beloved coach
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ST. IGNATIUS – The Mission Bulldogs lost a coaching icon last week. Coach Les Rice, 61, died after a long battle with lung cancer on Monday, Feb. 11.
“I can think about him and cry and smile at the same time,” said retired Mission coach Lloyd Phillips. “I never met anyone in my lifetime more Bulldog blue than Les. He was a great guy, and there will never be another one like him. This is a great loss for the community.”
Les once said he caught the “coaching bug” after volunteering to help the boys Bulldog basketball team when he was 19. He ended up dedicating more than four decades to coaching in the school and community in a variety of sports from basketball to softball. He was said to be the longest running head girls’ varsity basketball coach in Mission history with more than two decades on the court.
He also served as the school’s athletic director for several years. His wife, Lou Rice, said he did many jobs as the AD including mowing the football field, painting the stripes on the grass and then attending the games. He ran the score clock among other responsibilities during game time.
Les coached whenever he was needed from middle school to high school. He was even the tennis coach for a few years. Many athletes remember him working right along with them during practice time, telling stories on bus rides to and from sporting events, or passionately directing a game from the sidelines.
Phillips said the memories started coming back to him with the passing of his good friend, including many silly things. He remembers picking up one of the whiteboards coaches use to draw out plays during a boys’ basketball game. The team was huddled together. Phillips started to draw out a play to create a visual for the team but nothing happened. The tip on the blue marker was gone. He didn’t have to ask. He knew Les had already gotten to it.
“He would be so passionate when he was talking to the team that he’d press down on the marker until nothing was left. I would give him hell about it,” Phillips said jokingly as he thought about the regular occurrence.
Les found his passion for sports long before his coaching career started. He was born in Missoula in 1957 and grew up in St. Ignatius. As a kid, he developed a bond with his grandpa, Sidney Allard.
“His grandpa got him into sports,” his wife said. “His grandpa would take him to tournaments, and they loved going to them. His dad wasn’t into sports, but his grandpa really loved them.”
Les also played sports as a Mission Bulldog. He graduated from high school in 1975. And Lou, his wife, attended school at the same time. They were married in 1982. She said Les was quick on the court, but his real strength was in coaching, although, he did make a good cheerleader. “When girls’ basketball was getting started, the boys decided to be cheerleaders for the girls,” she said.
She remembers the boys trying to do tricks as they cheered on the team. This one time, she said, they held a bench over their heads while posing for a photograph. The photo was supposed to be flipped upside down when it was printed in a publication. “The boys wanted it to look like they were doing a headstand on the bench, but the photo didn’t get flipped, so they are just standing there holding a bench. They were so funny.”
Les started coaching little league sports after he married Lou and became a father to her three children. He coached softball, baseball, soccer and anything else the kids wanted to do, Lou said. He picked up the next sport as soon as the season ended on the last one. “He was always coaching something.”
In 1987, Les started coaching boys’ high school basketball as the assistant. Phillips was the head coach. The two basketball coaches spent a lot of time talking about plays and drawing them out on napkins when they weren’t in the gym.
“He had such a passion for the game,” Phillips said. “I never met anyone who was as knowledgeable about offense and defense. He was always working on the perfect play.”
Phillips said Les liked competition. He was driven to make sure his team was prepared. With that drive, he took his teams, boys and girls, to state competitions several times, but it wasn’t all about winning. “He cared about the game, but he cared even more about the kids,” Phillips said.
For years, the girls’ basketball team played in the fall and the boys played in the winter. Les was able to assist both head coaches. When the school decided to run both teams in the same season, Les was offered a head coaching position for the girls’ team in the early 90s. Terri Biggs became his assistant coach.
“There was never a dull moment coaching with Les,” Biggs said. “I loved going to practice and coaching with him. He made it fun. And he was very structured. He had everything, all the drills, planned out.”
She said Les even made the long bus rides to and from the games enjoyable with fantastic stories of ogres and knights. He would start out with a character on an adventure and the story often involved rescuing a queen.
Biggs remembers Les having an intense passion for the game. “He often said he bled Bulldog blue because he loved the team so much,” she said.
The two spent about 22 years coaching girls’ basketball. Les retired from coaching high school sports in 2014, two years after he was diagnosed with lung cancer, but he wasn’t finished coaching.
He decided to focus his full attention on middle school football. After a few years, he started coaching girls’ middle school basketball when his daughter, Amanda Rice, became an assistant coach. “It was an honor for her to get to coach with her dad,” Lou said. And the experience was even more special because his granddaughter, Brynn Pule, was playing for the team.
When the St. Ignatius school announced on Facebook that they had lost a “beloved” coach, blue hearts popped up in the comment box. “I learned so much from this man,” one person said. And another said, “Truly a legend in athletics.”
Phillips said there weren’t too many kids at the school who played sports that weren’t coached by Les. And in the coaching community, he was well known.
“If you say the name Les Rice, people know who you are talking about,” Phillips said. “He was well know, loved, and he will be missed.”
The community gathered at the St. Ignatius school gym on Monday, Feb. 18, to remember Les. The attire included anything Bulldog blue. People were asked to wear gym shoes so they could shoot hoops after the service.
