LEWISTOWN — Fall high school sports began Thursday across Montana, with most Week 1 football games taking place Friday. That's the case for the Lewistown Golden Eagles, who are riding in to this new season following four-straight appearances in the Class A semifinals.
"I'm hyped up, I can't wait," senior lineman Rhett Comes said during Wednesday's practice at Fergus High School. "I've been waiting since last year when we ended our season, you know, down in Billings Central, and I can't wait to get out there. I've been waiting for a lot of months."
"I can't tell you how excited I am," senior quarterback and safety McKay Shobe said. "Senior year, it's a big one. But with that, you don't want to leave any regret, and I'm not looking forward to leaving any regrets."
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Lewistown has seen a good deal of success in the prior years, including a 2022 state championship. Although, in the past two years, the Golden Eagles have been upended in the semifinals.
Comes and Shobe are captains of the team, and they said nothing is given this season.
"Our line needs to really come along and dominate," Comes said. "Games are won in the trenches, and just work our butts off and stay together as a family."
"I've told the guys plenty of times that we've got to work, we've got to work our butts off like teams in the past have," Shobe said. "This work right now — especially in the preseason — is going to take us far into the playoffs."
Leading the charge is head coach Derek Lear, who's entering his fifth season at the helm in Lewistown. He said his guys need to know that just because there's been prior success does not mean that it will happen again.
"Each one of those teams are different, from the kids that we had scheme wise throughout the year," Lear said. "Ultimately, they got to be themselves. They got to find their own identity and I think that's big, and they've put in a lot of work in the offseason."
Lear said the team has some big shoes to fill with a big senior class departing after last season.
"It's not just one person stepping into those positions that has to, you know, help with the vacancy of it, it's a whole group," Lear said. "We got a lot of kids, you know sophomores, juniors, that played a lot of (junior varsity) last year, had an undefeated season as (junior varsity)."
Comes and Shobe both know that, and they are confident in what the team has.
"We've been working together really well, and seems like we haven't really skipped a beat since last year," Comes said.
"When you graduate a lot of seniors, leadership is a big part," Shobe said. "The up-and-coming guys kind of got to take some of the slack that's been handed down."
Lewistown opens its season at home Friday at 7 p.m. against fellow returning playoff team Columbia Falls in what should be a marquee non-conference clash in the Class A ranks.
