BIGFORK — There's no place like home field, and for the first time the Bigfork Vikings baseball team played on its own diamond built by the local community.
From the first pitch to the final handshake, it was a historic day as the Vikings on Friday played their first baseball game at the new Flathead Beacon Field.
With a short opening ceremony and a tribute to those who donated funds to make the field a reality, Bigfork coach Dave Romano got his team settled into its new home with a 13-3 win over Troy.
“It was just a very emotional moment for me personally,” Romano said. “But seeing this opportunity for the kids to be able to play on a field like this was something I would have loved to do as a kid. We didn't have this nice of a field, but it was really exciting, and (it was) exciting that we were able to pull out a win for the first victory.”
Flathead Beacon Field was designed for the optimal fan experience with high areas of visibility from any spot in the stands.
With the bleachers filled with hometown fans, shortstop Grady Campbell said this game had a different feel.
“The community behind us it just made this whole thing feel surreal,” Campbell said. “Our crowd just really showed up and they showed out. I mean, there's people here who probably never watched a baseball game in their life or cared about a baseball game. But they just came to support the community of Bigfork, and I think that is awesome.”
With no designated field crew, it is the community's and players’ responsibility to keep the diamond in good shape.
It's a responsibility Vikings catcher Sam Plummer does not take lightly.
“It means that much more, anything wrong with it, you know, it you kind of take it on yourself to be like we gotta fix this in a couple of years being like I built this field, you know, I did, I took part in doing some of this it's really nice, you know, and you wanna keep it nice for as long as you can,” he said.
Romano hopes keeping this field in good shape will inspire the younger ballplayers to continue growing Bigfork’s newest high school sport.
“Just to have the interest in baseball within the community, you know, there's not a better sport that represents life to me,” Romano said. “It's a game of failure, you know, there's a lot to overcome and adapt to and and you learn that between those lines, so it's exciting to have the youth there.”
