By Grant Clark
Tahj Malone is a renaissance man – a three-sport athlete who seems to excel at everything.
He will currently tell you his favorite sport is football. An all-league selection last year, the senior anchors the Hoquiam High School defense from his middle linebacker position.
Two months from now, however, if you ask him what he likes best and the answer will change to wrestling – a sport he placed seventh in at the Class 1A state tournament in 2015. In spring, it will then change to soccer. He was the Evergreen 1A/2A goalkeeper of the year as a junior, helping the Grizzlies to their first district crown.
“It seems whatever season we are in,” Tahj said, “that’s what I’m most interested in.”
Prior to taking up all these activities, his mother Angela established two rules.
“If he keeps up with his academics, we will support whatever he decides to do,” Angela said, “but school will always need to be his top priority.”
She had nothing to worry about as Tahj’s passion was not simply limited to athletics. It extended to the classroom as well.
He has already narrowed his college selections down to two schools – the University of Washington and Whitman College – due to a very specific reason.
“I’ve always been interested in space and science. I want to study astronomy and astrophysics,” Tahj said. “Washington and Whitman are the only two colleges in the state that have those programs.”
Like I said, the kid’s a renaissance man; and if you were the jealous type, he’d be an easy target to direct your envy toward since he’s just so great at everything he does.
But that’s where Angela’s second rule surfaces.
“Don’t be cocky. That’s something that I can’t stand,” Angela said. “If he ever was cocky, I’d come and take him out myself.”
The truth is Tahj has plenty to crow about, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a more modest individual, never speaking about the individual accomplishments and only caring about the overall team success.
Need an example?
“He decided to play soccer on a whim. He just decided to turn out for soccer and ended up being incredible as a goalie,” Angela said. “He even scored a goal last year as a goalie. It was the most amazing thing. He kicked the ball from his goal and scored. The crowd went dead quiet when it happened. Then everyone started to cheer, even parents on the team started to cheer.”
Ask Tahj about the moment and you’ll receive a soft chuckle, almost downplaying the event.
“It’s probably one of my favorite sports moments,” Tahj said, “but when it happened I didn’t have a clue it went in at first. (The opposing team) had a younger goalie and he was playing too far from the net, and the ball bounced over him.”
Tahj first started picking up all the different sports in an attempt to follow in his older brothers’ footsteps.
“I just wanted to be like them,” Tahj said. “So, I started doing everything that they did.”
Even wrestling, where he initially had a different type of motivation for picking up.
“When my older brothers started wrestling, they would always try moves out on me. So, that was half because I wanted to be like my brother and half out of self-defense,” Tahj said with a laugh, “but now I love the sport.”
Although they were the blueprint for Tahj, none of the older brothers found as much success as their younger sibling.
“Tahj is easily the best athlete in the bunch,” Angela said. “It just seems like whatever he tries he does well at it.”
That includes football where Tahj has helped the Grizzlies to a perfect 8-0 record and a league championship, which they secured during their 50-22 victory over Rochester on October 23.
“Coach Moore pointed out all the league and district titles the program has won and the 2012 league title really stood out to me because I was a freshman on that team, but never really contributed to anything,” Tahj said. “I’ve wanted to be a part of this program since I can remember. The seniors talked about leaving a mark.”
Hoquiam closes out the regular season against rival Aberdeen before heading into the postseason.
“We’ve set team and individual goals. It’s a pyramid with smaller goals being on the bottom and building up to our top goal, which is a state championship,” Tahj said. “It’s been the best experience playing on this team. It’s easily the best team I have ever played on, in any sport. We know when to push each other. Hopefully we can play together as long as we can.”
