FAIRFIELD — Through a name, image and likeness collective deal, Montana State football players Colter Petre, Mason Dethman and Cole Taylor ran a two-hour football camp for kids from across central Montana on Monday at Fairfield High School.
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"Teach them what it's like, what you've got to do to take the next step, to that next step in high school," Petre — the Helena native — said of what he hopes to get across to the campers.
"What you've got to do to get to the next level, that next step in nutrition, weightlifting, strength, speed, all that stuff, and just show them the kind of the stepping stones of what they need to do ... to get to that next level."
Petre has an NIL deal with Montana Valley Irrigation, and camp coordinator Helen Music said that was the main reason this was able to come to fruition.
"He's posting for us on social media, but then also we wanted to bring him to our small town community here and put on a clinic for the kids," Music said. "And show them that, you know these Montana boys might be from small towns but they can still go do big things, and now they're playing Bobcat football. We're big Cat fans so we were excited to bring them here."
Petre was of course a part of the MSU team which went all the way to the FCS national championship game last season, and said another thing he wanted to teach the kids about was the togetherness he experienced being on that runner-up team.
"That team last year I feel like, what's so good is we had a lot of things in common," Petre said. "Our camaraderie, our team building ... just a great team to be on for sure, and be a part of because it was a whole family and brotherhood."
All sorts of kids were wearing Cats gear at the camp, two of which are incoming eighth-grader Easton Steiner and sixth-grader Kyler Inabnit.
"I'm pretty excited," Steiner said.
"Really excited, ready to play," Inabnit said. "It's really cool to be able to learn from the best college team."
Music said this camp is very meaningful to the kids who were in attendance.
"They go to Bobcat Stadium and they see all these guys there and now they know their faces," Music said. "They'll recognize them and they'll love it. So it's a pretty cool thing, we've got kids here from towns all over which is the other neat part. It's not just Fairfield. So it was fun to see how far this reached."
The Bobcat camps don't stop there, as Tuesday the women's basketball team is holding a camp at Fairfield High School, as well.
