When Camren Bowes received the call that he had been hired as the next head football coach at Oakville High School, the first two additions he made to his first staff were his father Hal and his brother Chase.
This move was far from an act of helping family members get a cool title in the football coaching world. It was the first example of the culture Camren Bowes hoped to build for his first head coaching tenure, weeks before he ever met any of his players or their families.
“It’s gonna be a family business down there,” Bowes, 26, said. “I definitely wanted the family vibe on my team and my staff. I want the team to be a family. If you don’t have your brothers’ back at the end of the day, it’s going to be hard to be successful and to win and achieve common goals.”
Bowes was hired in April and announced by the Oakville School District as the new head man in May. He and his family bring a wealth of football experience to the Acorns, as Bowes was a three-year starting center at Timberline High School in Lacey from 2015 to 2017 and a two-year team captain. Hal ran the Thurston County Youth Football League (TCYFL) Blazers team, which both Camren and Chase played and coached for, while also serving assistant roles at numerous high schools in Thurston County, including Timberline. Chase, who is one year younger than Camren, was a standout offensive lineman at Timberline and signed with College of Idaho out of high school.
Coaching eight-man football at the 1B level will be a brand-new experience for Camren Bowes. After graduating from Timberline in 2017, he earned his bachelor’s degree in health and physical education from Eastern Washington University with a minor in coaching. Since then, he has been a health and physical education teacher at North Thurston High School while serving as an assistant coach in football, wrestling and track and field. Bowes will still teach at North Thurston while coaching at Oakville.
Despite coming up from the 3A classification as a player and a coach, Bowes fell in love with the concept of eight-man 1B football while witnessing a high-scoring state matchup at the Tacoma Dome.
“I remember when I was younger, the first time I went to the Tacoma Dome, I think it was like Neah Bay versus Lummi Nation for the 1B state title and the score was like 90 something to 70 something,” he recalls. “I was asking, ‘Whoa, what’s going on here?’ I kind of fell in love with that because, as an offensive guy, I love to see long pass plays or long run plays and racking up the points. With eight-man, you’ve got a lot of space you can work with. Defensively, you are going to learn that a great defense is going to win you games.”
Bowes envisions a tenure of success on and off the gridiron for the Acorns, who will play their home games at the Chehalis Tribe baseball field while the high school football team’s field receives new grass, new lights and a new track. He said that success starts with hitting the ground running this summer, not just with practices and studying the playbook but building team chemistry.
“I want people to see that they’re a competitive group and to notice that they’re scrappy. They aren’t going to take anything. They’re not gonna be bullied, they’re gonna be the ones that are bullying other people out on the field,” Bowes said. “We’ll be a well-oiled machine where everybody’s doing their job.”
Bowes also wants to ensure that student athletes prioritize the first word of that phrase and walk away from the program with a high school diploma.
“I want to ensure that these kids come away with the program, one, with their high school diploma, and two, also understanding the ins and outs of how they can be successful after they leave high school,” he said. “For example, I see kids nowadays where they’re 20 minutes late to class or just not showing up and skipping class. That’s really not going to work in the real world.”
In year one, Bowes wants the Acorns to be in immediate contention for a league title and a state berth, the latter of which it has not accomplished in nearly four decades. The Acorns have struggled in the district playoffs in recent years, and the first-year head coach hopes to help the team climb over that hump.
“From watching film, I see there’s lots of talented athletes all over the place. They’re going to be returning quite a bit of athletes. I want to figure out if it’s more of a mental thing or a team bonding thing,” Bowes said. “Skills can only take you so far, but it’s always a team game. I want to make sure we can come together as a team to make the run together instead of having one or two dudes who just do it for us.”
He described his coaching style as “intense” and “militaristic,” which he picked up from his father along with the X’s and O’s and how to both build and operate a program.
“As far as the way I’m going to be coaching, it’s going to be very intense. I don’t want to be a hard ass, but if I’ve got to be a hard ass, I’ll be a hard ass,” Bowes said. “We’ll still have fun, but it’s got to have some structure to it. I’ve seen some programs where you have great athletes and no structure, and it just falls apart.”
Bowes met his players just four days before his eighth graduation anniversary from Timberline. In just his fifth year coaching football at the high school level, he knew he was ready to take the next step and lead a program.
“It means a lot for Oakville to trust me and give me the opportunity to lead their football program, especially at 26. I’m very blessed for Oakville to believe in me,” he said. “I want to ensure that all of my players are successful, good men. Winning games is going to be great, but the people that you mold and shape and create and put out into the community says more of who you are as a coach and a person than how many state titles or league titles.”
