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Bonnell's football adventures bring him to Belfair

Matt Baide | Jan 12, 20230

Matt Baide count

Ray Bonnell poses for a photo at North Mason's gym.

Ray Bonnell is in his first year as athletic director at North Mason High School. His journey to Belfair took him around the world with American football.

Bonnell was born in Cincinnati. His family moved to Kent while his uncle, Barry Bonnell, played baseball for the Seattle Mariners from 1984 to 1986.

He attended Kentwood High School and played football, which got him recruited to play linebacker at Washington State University from 2000 to 2003. The Cougars had three 10-win seasons while Bonnell was in uniform, earning wins in the Sun Bowl in 2001 and Holiday Bowl in 2003. WSU faced Oklahoma in the Rose Bowl in 2003, falling to Oklahoma 34-14.

After his college football career, he went to Europe and was a ski instructor for a couple of years in Innsbruck, Austria. After returning to the U.S., he taught history and civics while coaching football at his alma mater Kentwood, and Puyallup.

In 2015, he got the opportunity to work with teams playing American football in Europe. He coached, did some program development and was even a general manager.

"I lived in Salzburg, Austria, a majority of the time I worked with the Salzburg Ducks, kind of helped them grow a little bit while I was over there," Bonnell told the Journal. "I worked with a couple of programs in the Czech Republic, a team in Innsbruck, a team on the Swiss border, kind of all over the place outside of that larger stint in Salzburg."

Bonnell said American football is healthy in Europe, noting it is the fastest growing sport in central Europe, as evidenced by the support and attendance at the Seattle Seahawks game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in October in Munich, Germany. Salzburg is a two-hour drive from Munich and Bonnell said Austria and Germany are leading Europe when it comes to American football.

The opportunity arose to come to Belfair and North Mason High School through Mike Honeycutt, who coached Bonnell in football when he was 11 in Kent.

"He used to talk about this area and we would vacation out on Hood Canal so during COVID, we ended up looking for teaching and coaching combination positions somewhere and when North Mason popped up, Mosby was looking for an assistant coach," Bonnell said. "They were looking for a history teacher out here at North Mason and I was comfortable with the area because of growing up and vacationing out here and also with Honeycutt talking about it when I was a little kid. It was an easy yes for me to come out here. It's beautiful."

He was hired in August 2020 and started at North Mason in September. His favorite part of living in Belfair is the people.

"People out here are amazing. Small town vibe, it's beautiful, we just bought a house on North Shore," Bonnell said. "We're kind of digging our heels in, trying to be here for a long time. The people are absolutely awesome, everybody knows everybody. Got that small town vibe, I was born in Cincinnati but I was born in a little town called Miamiville in Cincinnati and there's like a population of 120. That's where my family, that's the vibe that I was raised with and when we moved to Kent because my uncle played for the Mariners and my dad was with the Reds organization. He came out to live by his brother so when we moved to the big city, King County, it was actually a bit of a culture shock coming out here. That was probably more a culture shock than going to Europe to be honest. To be back in a small town is really nice, I really love it out here in Belfair."

Alexia Hadfield left as the Bulldogs athletic director last year. He grew up close to the son of the Kentwood athletic director and he said he knew he would be comfortable in the role.

"I honestly thought the athletic director role was for retired coaches and old people," Bonnell said. "I thought that was something I would consider down the road. I was actually debating trying to become a college football coach or what, I wasn't really certain what I was going to do and when the position came open, it kind of fit. I feel like my style and my vision for how an athletic program can be, I think it fits the needs here in Belfair as far as I see them. I'm very new to this role and very new to this area, but I think coming from Kentwood, historically a sports school, an athletic school that's education-based model for athletics, I'm very much bought in so being able to bring that mentality of an athletic department I think fits this area pretty well."

He doesn't do any coaching for the North Mason football team, just consulting so far. He has been working in tackling analytics since 2019 for Atavus Football, working with the Carolina Panthers, Texas Tech, University of Cincinnati and other schools and NFL teams.

"I don't actually work with the kids. That's been kind of an adjustment for me because I've been very hands-on as a football coach for 20-plus years," Bonnell said. "That's been the biggest adjustment for me so far in this role is to be able to just sit back and let the coaches go through the growth that they need to go through, make the same mistakes I made early on working with tackling and things like that and helping them through it. That's been my biggest area of growth other than the athletic director role, it's like drinking from a fire hose, right? It's pretty impressive position. It is definitely a misunderstood position, I did not know 100% what I was getting into, but I enjoy it."

He said the state of North Mason athletics is developing, noting the emergence from the pandemic and the mindset of getting kids to come out and play sports for North Mason while also enjoying the outdoor recreation options kids have available in Belfair and the surrounding area.

He said during his time as athletic director, he hopes to accomplish a cultural shift when it comes to athletics and academics at North Mason.

"When I was at Kentwood, it was an athletic school, but the reason sports were so dominant there is because it was just one of those things where we had this real fundamental belief that if we can instill discipline and create some good future men and women, those good future men and women, they're going to beat the boys or girls that are undisciplined, that take days off or whatever," Bonnell explained. "So the wins come when that culture gets developed so I'm pretty excited to see if we can get that discipline going all the way down through to where kids are on time to class, turning in all their work, responsible, good stewards of the community and watching how that turns into wins and performances on the field the community can be proud of. This area out here is ready to get some fun, entertaining, disciplined, great sports going on."