Just five days before the Bothell High Cougars’ first football game of the season, a big matchup against Mission Viejo (Calif.) on the grandest of football stages — Seattle’s Qwest Field — head coach Tom Bainter watches as 80-plus blue-clad athletes stretch in unison, getting ready for another day of practice.

It’s become old hat now for Bainter, who has one of the top winning percentages in the state during his 10-year tenure at Bothell, 93-21 (.816), but even he knows that the 2010 Cougars will have to prove their worth in the state’s toughest football league, 4A Kingco.

Last year, the Cougars finished 12-1, losing in the state semifinals after being ranked No. 1 for part of the season.

“Our team looks good, we’re just going to be inexperienced,” Bainter said. “We’re not young… but a lot of these guys did not get a lot of Friday night experience. We’re very talented, just lack that experience.”

Last year, Bothell graduated one of the finest senior classes the program has seen, which included a pair of University of Washington signees, Colin Porter and Michael Hartvigson, and a talented quarterback in Mitchell Muller.

This year’s Cougars, perhaps more than teams of the past, needed to develop their work habits from the get-go, and Bainter has been pleasantly surprised.

“This team has fun and laughs a lot… but they are starting to get the Bothell trademark of working hard in practice, running the football, that you work now,” he explained. “It always takes a team a while to get that, and we’re getting there. This team is progressing just like we’d hoped.”

At the helm of the offense this year will be senior quarterback Braden Foley, a player who studied the position under Muller all of last year.

Foley himself said that everything is starting to “come together,” and has made great strides as far as anticipation of plays, according to Bainter.

“He’s got a real strong arm, and his knowledge of the offense now is really good,” he said of Foley, who is listed at 6-foot-4 and 193 pounds. “He’s developing a sense of where the defense is going to be, starting to throw on time, and understanding how things will unfold before the ball is snapped.”

Other impact returners include hefty linemen Dallas Gosselin and Landon Lydig, in addition to Luke Proulx, a speedy all-Kingco running back who will look to weave through opposing defenses and into the end zone. Proulx scored 26 times last year.

“Our line’s going to be strong,” Bainter commented. “We’re athletic, we had a great offseason of lifting, we’re strong and quick. We might not be as big, or as heavy as we were last year, but we’ll be OK.”

Although Bainter may ultimately run the show, he is the first to credit his first-rate coaching staff for getting his players as ready as they can be to take the field every Friday night.

“I get way too much credit for the good things here, I’ll be the first to tell you,” Bainter admitted. “Our staff does an amazing job. If you just look at the amount of time in hours they watch film, if you have one guy that equals you in time, you’re a lucky coach. I got four or five guys who will watch that film.”

Proving there is never rest for the weary, Bainter, along with his staff, attended clinics, read books, watched videos and scouted other teams this summer in an effort to get a leg up on the intense competition found in Kingco.

“It’s a constant evolution of working harder and getting better,” Bainter said. “Our staff is wonderful at that, and they love the kids, they love football, they put in the time, and they deserve the credit.”

As most of the team’s upperclassmen have paid their dues, working their way through the program and earning a spot as a starter this year, they know all about that evolution and are ready to shine bright under the Friday night lights at the refurbished Pop Keeney Field.

“Things are going great, we’re having a really strong set of practices and we’re ready to go,” Proulx said. “But we have to take it one week at a time. We need to come together as a team and embrace that family atmosphere and put all we have into each week, each practice.”