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For Kalispell Boys, College Football Lives in Butte and Dillon

By Beacon Staff

When the University of Montana Western travels to Butte on Oct. 10 to take on Montana Tech in a rivalry football game, it will be a Kalispell reunion.

Between the two teams, there are 15 players from Flathead and Glacier high schools on the rosters, and one – Colin Fuller – who is also from Kalispell but played at Whitefish. On Western alone, there are 10 Kalispell kids – eight on the active roster and two redshirts. By comparison, there are no active players from Missoula or Bozeman and only one from Great Falls.

On Oct. 10, the Kalispell boys will grit their teeth, hit hard and play tough football. Then afterwards those of legal age will grab a pitcher of beer together, no matter what uniform they wear during the game. The Flathead bonds run deep.

When Stetson Spooner, a former Flathead Braves’ all-state left guard, arrived in Dillon in 2007, UM-Western didn’t have a single Kalispell player on its roster. The last one had quit playing three years earlier. Spooner liked the atmosphere and enjoyed the opportunity to prolong his playing career, so he spread the word about Western back home.

Fellow Flathead High School graduates Reed Watkins and Coltin Weber joined up with Spooner at Western. Then came a new Kalispell crew, including Pat Hergesheimer, Mike Gallagher and Charlie Dotson. Within a few years Dillon had become the top destination for Kalispell football stars.

“It was a chain reaction,” Spooner said.

Today all but one of the Kalispell boys live in the same apartment complex a few miles out of town. Spooner calls it “a little branch of Kalispell.” They hang out at the apartments together and then catch rides with each other on the way into town.

Over in Butte, Montana Tech wide receiver Jareth Wilson welcomed his little brother Kramer to the program this year. Jareth graduated from Flathead and Kramer wrapped up high school at Glacier. Now the Kramers are beginning to see a similar chain reaction occur at Tech, with kids coming from both Flathead and Glacier. The older Wilson said it’s the Kalispell “pipeline.”

With Kalispell off the interstate and tucked away in the northwest corner of the state, Jareth Wilson said recruiters “almost forget about us a little bit.” He mentioned the state’s two main universities as examples. And not only do coaches from Western and Tech focus recruiting efforts up here, now so do players like Wilson. When he goes back to Kalispell in the summers, he helps out with football camps and promotes Tech.

“It kind of creates an openness that gets kids to come down,” he said.

Montana Tech head coach Bob Green said he was the first coach to begin recruiting at Glacier. He said when he visited the school, the “paint was still wet.” Long before John Frandsen, who is a freshman at Tech, was on any other college’s radar, Green had his eyes on him. The coach said he has been recruiting in Kalispell since 1987.

“We enjoy all our Kalispell players and our players from the valley,” Green said. “Send some more our way.”

Green added: “They’re good students and that’s always a factor.”

Spooner and Wilson were captains together on the Braves in 2006 and remain good friends. They keep in touch and look forward to seeing each other when their teams meet twice a year. They both recommend the Frontier Conference to high school players hoping to continue their playing days in college but might not be big-school material.

“We can come to a school here in the Frontier, get a full-ride scholarship and get all of our school paid for,” Wilson said. “And I’m going to get to play for four solid years.”