GREAT FALLS — With the inaugural Great Falls varsity baseball season now in the rear-view mirror, MTN Sports sat down Wednesday at Don Olson Field with Great Falls High coach Ed McNamee and CMR coach Tony Forster to reflect on how they thought year one went.
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After McNamee and Forster were each named the head coach for the high school they attended, both said it's a feeling they still can't describe.
"To be the guy that they're like, hey, you're the first one still really hasn't sunk in yet for that kind of stuff," McNamee said. "But it was definitely something that was an honor."
"The day after we handed out everything, we showed up for practice and everybody had the 'R' on the hat and the Rustler on the chest," Forster said. "That's kind of where it just hit me like, hey, this is really cool."
Both teams practiced at Great Falls little league fields this spring.
"At first, it was kind of one of those like we weren't really too keen on it," McNamee said. "But as it progressed, you saw a lot of little guys there and stuff like that. It really got our guys on both sides in to the community to get some things going."
"They'll kind of stop and watch you practice a little bit," Forster said. "You don't realize the impact that can have."
They may have been split by the Missouri River, but McNamee and Forster supported each other the whole time — except for two games.
"(Forster) was one of the first phone calls I got after we beat Bozeman (Great Falls High's first win)," McNamee said. "He's one of the first guys that called me that Sunday morning to congratulate me. And that meant a lot."
"When I first got hired on as the head guy here, you know, (McNamee) was my first phone call," Forster said. "He knows how to run a program."
The two are in their eighth year of coaching alongside each other for the Great Falls Chargers Legion program. Forster said the crosstown games, specifically, felt like a flashback.
"Back to the old Stallions, Electrics days where we used to compete across from each other," Forster said. "It just kind of brought back that feel, and that excitement, and that energy. So yeah, it was fun."
But for someone in particular, he hasn't seen the two coach head-to-head.
"I have an 11-year old son that was really distraught about it," McNamee said with a laugh. "He really wasn't happy because he was really worried that we weren't going to be friends again because he's only seen us coach together."
To open the season, CMR started off at home, a day which Forster said was his most fond memory of the spring.
"Had our principal come out, throw the first pitch and kind of a cool moment where our starter, you know, throws the first pitch and that ball gets rolled out," Forster said. "There's a moment of history there."
Now that baseball is here, McNamee said he expects it to surge moving forward.
"The crowds at our Charger games are bigger because of that," McNamee said. "It's more in people's brain about what's going on. So I think the future's really bright."
