BOZEMAN – It’s bent and a little beat-up, but even an explosion couldn’t destroy it.
The goal post that Bobcat fans tore down and carried from Bobcat Stadium to the Rocking R Bar when the football team defeated the University of Montana Grizzlies 16-6 in 2005 has been resurrected from the rubble of the March 5 natural-gas explosion.
During the Music on Main concert on July 9, the goal post was brought up on stage and presented to the crowd, then carried by fans through the street to Mixers Club.
“We got cars honking at us the whole way — people coming out of their homes and clapping — it was pretty cool,” said Ben Fjare, who used to work at the Rocking R and played on the 2005 team.
Recent MSU graduate Anna Laakso helped carry the post to the Rocking R in 2005. That time, she said approximately 100 people carried the goal post from the Montana State University campus to the downtown bar, fueled with Bobcat frenzy.
On Thursday night, she said, she rode on top of it.
“I just hopped on and (the guys) all put it on their shoulders and they carried me,” Laakso said. “They carried it into the bar with me on it.”
For over three years, the goal post hung behind the bar, reminding fans of that 2005 victory against the Bobcats’ arch rival.
The March 5 explosion destroyed the building, the bar and most everything else in it. But the metal memento was apparently made to last.
“It’s a little charred up, but you can still see some of the signatures and some of the yellow is still there,” said Tony Kaber, former manager of the Rocking R Bar.
The crowd got a look at the charred version last Thursday night, when Mike Hope, owner of both the Rocking R and Mixers, and MSU football coach Rob Ash brought it out onto the Music on Main stage.
After that presentation, fans began chanting a familiar anti-Grizzly slogan and set off for Mixers, where the post will be displayed.