Longtime Camas football assistant coach Dale Rule is taking over as the head coach of King’s Way Christian

Paul Valencia
ClarkCountyToday.com

A winning season.

A league title.

Playoff wins.

Maybe even a state championship.

Those are the goals that a lot of coaches will bring up when they take over a program.

Dale Rule has taken over the King’s Way Christian football team, and while he would love to accomplish all of those things listed above, he has a different goal in mind for the Knights.

“It’s bigger than a game. Always has been, always will be. It’s absolutely bigger than a game,” Rule said. “Wins, losses, they all take care of themselves in the end. It’s what you do in between that matters.

“I have one simple goal: That is to be the most admired program in Clark County. Period.”

His players will work hard. On the field. In class. They will be respectful. On the field. In the community..

Dale Rule has coached football for more than 30 years. He has been an assistant with the Camas Papermakers for the past 13 seasons. 

For the first time, he felt the calling to become a head coach. 

He believes King’s Way Christian will be the perfect spot for him, too. His beliefs coincide with the school’s beliefs.

He even loves the mascot, the Knights, because he can use some play-on words to get his message across.

“We are going to call it Knight Vision,” Rule said. “Who are we? What do we do? What do we believe in? What does it look like? How do you live in January? How do you live in February? What are you thinking in July? How do you act in the classroom? How do you act in public?”

Dale Rule wants the community to be proud of his Knights.

Again, wins and losses on the field will take care of themselves. To Rule, though, the things associated with the game are bigger than the game.

“When non-believers beg their parents to play football at King’s Way Christian, (that’s when) we’re successful. Now we’re impacting kids and influencing a family,” Rule said. “Football is a vehicle for us. That’s a vehicle for us to do our greatest calling, and that is to share Jesus. We get to do it through a game.”

Rule met with some of the King’s Way Christian players during the interview process. He came away impressed with them.

Now, it is his job to work the hallways, if you will, at King’s Way Christian. He wants to grow the program by adding to the number of players in the program.

He had 40 students attend a team meeting earlier this spring, and that does not include the incoming freshmen. But he wants more. 

He has a pitch:

“I challenge kids, give me a chance. If you don’t like it, walk away, I’ll love you just the same,” Rule said. “But give me one shot.”

This is his first head coaching position after those decades of working under others. For most of those years, he never thought of being a head coach. He had it pretty good, after all. At Camas, for example, he has been part of a program that has won two state titles and played in another state championship game.

He recently turned 51, though, and a good friend advised him that if he really wanted to make a difference in the lives of teens, he had to be in charge. Rule prayed about it.

“I just honestly felt a calling that it was time,” he said.

He is not going to waste this opportunity. 

Football, he said, will be fun. Football, under his leadership, will be a place for all to be embraced.

“You don’t get a little me. You get all of me,” Rule said. “I’m an all-in guy.”

This week has been Rule’s first time on the field with his new team as football teams across Washington participate in what are called “spring drills.” Official practice starts in August, but, honestly, football practice started this week.

For the first time, Dale Rule is in charge of a program.

“I absolutely love the game of football, what it does, what it brings,” Rule said. “I can’t wait to play Coach Lambert (and perennial Trico League power La Center). It’s going to be a blast. It’s going to be a task, as monumental as it possibly can get. But the bottom line is I get to coach football and impact and change lives.”

Using, of course, Knight Vision.