A UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON coach sees an athlete who spent most of their teenage years in Sequim and sees someone with the potential to be a rower.

When the coach inquired about the athlete, he just happened to be talking to a family member.

The coach was correct, and the rower went on to compete internationally.

It’s now happened twice.

First when coach Al Ulbrickson asked Fred Rantz about someone he saw in the gymnasium at Roosevelt High School. That athlete ended up being Fred’s brother, Joe Rantz, who lived in Sequim prior to his senior year of high school.

Rantz would go on to help the United States win a gold medal at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and later be the main subject of Daniel James Brown’s book, “The Boys in the Boat.”

It happened again less than two years ago when now-former Huskies women’s crew coach Bob Ernst saw Elise Beuke at the Northwest Indoor Rowing championships.

Ernst asked about the girl who was tearing it up on the ergonomic rowing machine. The person he asked was Todd Beuke, Elise’s dad.

Ten months later, Beuke was signing a letter of intent to row for the Huskies, despite being new to the sport.

That was all in 2014. Beuke really made her mark in 2015.

Beuke first claimed the U.S. Rowing Northwest Regional Youth Championship at Vancouver Lake in Vancouver, Wash., in May.

That qualified her for the national championships in Florida in early June, the same weekend as her graduation from Sequim High School.

She attended her graduation — at least, digitally, through FaceTime — and then placed second at nationals.

She wouldn’t return to Sequim, or the state of Washington, until August.

Following nationals, Beuke went to Connecticut to compete with 27 of the nation’s top youth rowers for a spot on the U.S. Rowing Junior National Team that would compete at the Junior World Championships in Rio de Janeiro in August.

She made the national team and teamed up with Isabella Strickler of Michigan to place seventh in women’s double sculls.

Mentoring Beuke throughout her young rowing career was Olympic Peninsula Rowing Association coach Rodrigo Rodrigues. Rodrigues even served as an assistant coach for the U.S. Rowing Junior National Team.

Rodrigues resigned as the Olympic Peninsula Rowing Association coach in September to take the helm of a junior program in Long Beach, Calif.

Here are the rest of the top 12 North Olympic Peninsula sports stories of 2015:

■   2. Peninsula College women’s basketball championship.

Nearly any other year, this would probably be the top story of the year. It took international competition to bump it down.

The Pirates claimed the first Northwest Athletic Conference championship in school history in March.

And, for some reason, they kind of came out of nowhere to do it.

The 2014-15 Pirates established their legitimacy early in the season by more than holding their own during a tough nonleague schedule.

Then they finished the season by winning their final 13 games, and the last 12 victories were by 10 points or more — and that includes their four games at the NWAC tournament.

They had some of the NWAC’s best players in sophomores Madison Pilster, Gabi Fenumiai and Miranda Schmillen and freshmen Imani Smith and Zhara Laster, who were complemented by role players such as Whitney Nemelka and Neah Bay sisters Cierra and Cherish Moss.

Still, they were never really considered one of the top-level favorites to win the championship.

As head coach Alison Crumb said, their run to glory was “shocking and not shocking at the same time.”

And, throughout the entire season, no team was having more fun than the Pirates.

■   3. Sequim track state champs.

Sequim’s Miguel Moroles, Jason Springer, Alex Barry and Oscar Herrera came out of nowhere to earn the Class 2A 4×400-meter relay state championship in June.

“You’re not even in the conversation coming into the event as a state champs,” Wolves track and field coach Brad Moore said.

“No one is saying watch out for Sequim. No one thought those guys could win it.”

And that was before Barry suffered an injury while competing in the triple jump the day before.

Barry, who also won the javelin state championship, went to bed that night thinking he wasn’t going to run the relay.

But he did, and ran well enough to help the Wolves break a 28-year-old school record with a time of 3 minutes, 22.53 seconds.

■   4. Peninsula men’s soccer continues championship tradition.

The Peninsula College men’s soccer program has become a powerhouse — if not the powerhouse — in the Northwest Athletic Conference.

The Pirates entered 2015 having claimed three championships in five seasons.

But they struggled — by their own heightened standards, that is — at times throughout the season, the first under new head coach Cale Rodriguez.

But everything came together at the end, and the Pirates were playing their best soccer when the NWAC playoffs came around to claim the program’s fourth championship in six years.

■   5. Four football teams make state.

Port Townsend, Neah Bay, Clallam Bay and Quilcene each made state, which gave the Peninsula four teams at state for the first time since 1996.

■   6. Neah Bay finishes second.

When a team builds a legacy of winning that borders on a dynasty, it’s a big deal when it falls short.

Neah Bay missed playing for its third consecutive Class 1B state football title when it lost in the semifinals to Lummi.

It was the Red Devils’ first loss to the Blackhawks since 2011.

Lummi also defeated Neah Bay in the 1B state basketball championship game.

■   7. Two state wrestling champs.

Port Angeles’ Matt Robbins and Forks’ Miguel Morales each won his school’s first individual wrestling title since 2009.

Robbins won the Class 2A 195-pound title after moving up from 182 pounds for his senior season.

Morales, also a senior, ended a stellar three-year wrestling career with the Class 1A heavyweight title that eluded him when he finished second in 2013 and third in 2014.

The Peninsula also had four state wrestling runner-up finishes: Port Townsend’s Chloe Rogers, Port Angeles’ Roberto Coronel, and Forks’ Sebastian Morales and Brooke Peterson.

■   8. Neah Bay wins two track titles.

Who would have thought that Neah Bay’s only championships in 2015 would come not from football, not from basketball, but from track and field?

Elisha Winck earned the school’s first track and field championship since 1984 by winning the Class 1B triple jump.

The following day, Winck teamed with Cole Svec, Cameron Buzzell and Chris Martinez to take first in the 4×100-meter relay.

“I think Neah Bay’s always obviously had the talent to win [championships], but the interest in track was pretty low,” Red Devils track and field coach Andrew Winck said.

■   9. Cray selected in MLB draft.

In June, Landon Cray became the third Peninsula graduate in three years to be selected in the MLB draft.

Cray, a 2012 Chimacum High School graduate who played three years at Seattle University, was selected in the 18th round by the Tampa Bay Rays with the 538th overall pick.

The outfielder finished his first professional season with a slash line (batting average/on-base percentage/slugging percentage) of .259/.363/.376 for the Princeton Rays, Tampa’s rookie league team.

■   10. Clarke runs to another state title.

Port Townsend’s Ryan Clarke was one of the favorites to win the 3,200-meter state title at the Class 1A meet in early June.

He had placed fourth in the event in 2014, and in the fall he won the classification’s cross country championship.

He ended up getting sick the week of the June’s track and field championships, but still managed to outrun the field in the title race.

■   11. Peninsula men’s hoops makes unexpected run.

The Pirates finished fourth in the Northwest Athletic Conference’s North Region, finishing a game ahead of Shoreline and Skagit Valley to squeeze into the postseason.

Not content to merely sit and watch the Peninsula College women’s team tear through the NWAC tournament, the men won their first two games before falling to Edmonds in the semifinals.

The Pirates then defeated Green River to claim third place with a team made up mostly of freshmen.

■   12. Maxwell wins national title.

Alison Maxwell, a Port Angeles High School graduate, earned a national championship in the women’s mile at the NCAA Division III indoor track and field championships in Winston-Salem, N.C., in March.

Maxwell became Middlebury College’s (Vermont) first female national champion since 2000 by running the mile in 4 minutes, 56.17 seconds.

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Sports Editor Lee Horton can be reached at 360-417-3525 or at lhorton@peninsuladailynews.com.