MOSES LAKE — Moses Lake High School Athletic Director Loren Sandhop said the new statue outside MLHS was a continuation of school traditions.

“You’re all a part of history, you guys,” Sandhop told MLHS students Monday morning as he stood next to the statue representing the school’s mascot, the Maverick. The district changed its mascot from the Chiefs to the Mavericks in May 2022, and the Maverick statue was revealed as students watched and the MLHS band played the fight song.

The statue of a bull, echoing the skull on the school logo, replaces the arrow and dreamcatcher that stood outside the school for about a dozen years. Clint Scriven, assistant athletic director, said artists at the company Way Out West designed the statue with direction from MLHS administrators.

“They’re known for their spaceship and aliens off I-90,” he said.

The aluminum statue was cast by a foundry in Mexico, Scriven said. It weighs about 700 pounds.

Sandhop said it was a new tradition mixed with old ones. For about 60 years Moses Lake students have celebrated victories in one way or another, Sandhop said, starting with what the students back in the day called the victory bell.

The high school moved to its current site in the late 1950s, and the victory bell was installed outside the gym. Teams rang it when they won a game and posed for pictures with it after coming home with a victory.

For decades the campus consisted of buildings that weren’t connected to each other. That changed during extensive remodeling in the 1990s. The former location of the bell was dismantled

“But the bell remained,” Sandhop said.

It’s still there, not far from its original location outside the gym.

“We ring it when we win,” Sandhop said.

The arrow and dreamcatcher that stood outside the MLHS office were the result of two separate senior projects. But with a new mascot came a new symbol.

The students counted it down and Scriven and Sandhop pulled off the covering; members of the Moses Lake School Board set off confetti cannons. Sandhop told the students it was a good way to start Homecoming Week. The 5-0 Mavericks football team hosts Davis on Friday night in the Homecoming game.

Students stopped to snap selfies with the new mascot before heading back to class. Sandhop did too.

“The dawn of a new era,” Scriven said.

Cheryl Schweizer may be reached via email at cschweizer@columbiabasinherald.com.