For Jerry and Royaune Jasinski, raising a family of athletes wasn't a matter of if, but when.

The couple met while attending Northern State University on athletic scholarships - Jerry as a defensive back on the football team and Royaune as a basketball and track athlete - and it was a match right from the get-go.

"We were both gym rats," Royaune said. "That's where we met, in the gym. If we weren't going to have competitive kids there was something wrong."

The Jasinskis moved to Clark where Royaune was the girls' basketball coach after college before making the move back to Rapid City.

Royaune's maiden name is Riss and you can still find it on the record board outside the gym at Rapid City Central for her 5-foot, 6-1/2-inch high jump, a school record.

Raising a family of athletes isn't something that they really tried to do, but they knew they had one when they started their oldest of three in soccer. Jade is 22 years old and currently a heptathlete at the University of South Dakota. Little brother Ben, 20, is a jumper at South Dakota State and baby sister Jacqee, 16, is making her own mark at Rapid City Central as a standout in soccer, basketball and track.

"We called it swarm ball," Jerry said of their first inkling that they had an athlete on their hands. "We'd never played soccer, we didn't really know anything about it, but we took Jade and she broke out of that pack the first time and was gone. We kind of thought after that that she might kind of like it."

It was Jade that really kicked things off for her younger siblings, introducing them to the beauty of competition.

"I knew probably in the first or second grade that I wanted to be in sports," Jade said. "At first I just loved running with my parents, and then it was soccer and basketball."

The dynamic between Jade and Ben is very unique.

"It was always a little frustrating for me when I was younger," Ben said. "She (Jade) got moved up to run with the high school when she was a seventh-grader. That never happened to me, so I spent some time thinking that I was no good because I never really did anything that was that amazing."

Jade, who is recognized by all the members of the family as the talkative and most competitive one, remembers all too well wanting to keep her brother down for as long as possible.

"At first, when I was younger and I was bigger I always wanted to beat him, and if I didn't, I'd throw a total fit," Jade said. "When he finally passed me up I was in high school, but he was bigger and stronger than me by then, so it was OK. I was always the only one that would throw fits though, and my parents would try to show me how ridiculous I was being."

Jade, who is going to graduate this weekend with a degree in psychology, knows that her competitive sports life is coming to a close. But she thinks she'll still be able to figure out some way to quench it.

"When I work out with friends or something I'll keep it going when I'm exercising or jogging," she said. "I still like to come out on top. I've been golfing lately with my boyfriend (Will Wasserburger) and I hate losing to him in that, too. All aspects of life, it's just embedded in me."

And now the two oldest have what Ben calls a "laid-back rivalry" that has its roots in where they decided to go to college.

"I make fun of her and she can't make fun of me because State's better," Ben said with a laugh.

Now the two oldest spend a lot of their time encouraging Jacqee to become even better than they were and are. It's something that took a little time for Jade.

"I'm very proud of Jacqee," Jade said. "She's such a great basketball player. At first I was scared that she was going to break some of my records, but now it's OK. I'm over it and I think it's pretty cool."

Ben feels that encouragement is the best thing he can do for his sister.

"I just tell her to keep going," Ben said. "Sometimes she thinks she has a shadow over her because of me and my sister, but she doesn't. I'm always claiming that she has the best potential of everyone in our family - soccer, track and basketball - I never was as good as she is."

And now it's Jacqee's time.

"She kind of got gypped," Royaune said of her youngest having to deal with Jade's and Ben's high school accomplishments. "But we always told her, 'You're going to have the house to yourself some day and we'll be here to listen to all of your stories too.'"

Jerry was even more direct.

"She was playing 6-year-old 'swarm ball' and her older sister was running varsity track," he said. "Sometimes one just ends up getting a little more attention than the other. The baby always kind of gets kicked around."

Jacqee wouldn't seem to have it any other way.

"They definitely gave me my competitive spirit," Jacqee said of Jade and Ben. "They made me want to do sports all the time. I always wanted to play with them, but they would kind of exclude me because I was so small, but that made me toughen up and just be a part of the game."

And that's what the Jasinski family has learned above all else in raising three standout athletes - let them play, even if gets a little rough sometimes.

"Competition is good," Royaune said. "Life is competition and the sooner they learn that, the better off they are."