Page 65 - Flathead Beacon // 4.30.14

FLATHEADBEACON.COM
SPORTS
APRIL 30, 2014 | 65

Polson softball head
coach Larry Smith
pitches to his players
during warm-ups
before a game against
Libby on April 24.
Smith has led the Lady
Pirates to seven state
championships since
2001.

GREG LINDSTROM | FLATHEAD BEACON

CPO N T I N U E D F R O M B A C K P A G E
33 record and produced several high- was. He organized an adult team and Smith went to work, preaching a
caliber players, including Riley Kenney, played regularly through spring and rapid, athletic style of play that followed
OLSON — ON A RECENT
who is trying out for the University of summer. He jumped at the opportunity the pace of baseball instead of the slower

Montana’s new team, and Shay Duford, to move to Polson in 1978 and got a job as crawl of slowpitch.
afternoon, as a softball game
a star prep player who competes at Spo- an operating engineer for the Montana The Lady Pirates went 13-11 in played in the background, Lar-
kane Community College.
Power Company at Kerr Dam. A year lat- Smith’s irst season at the helm.
ry Smith was right at home, in-
The city of Polson now boasts a top- er he decided to start his own construc- By 1997, Polson was playing for a side a dugout. Neatly manicured ields
notch four-ield complex and a robust tion company, now called Smith Paving Class A state championship. The girls surrounded him, the same ields that
youth program that ofers four ASA and Contracting, which he still owns lost to Butte Central that year but it re- will host the Class A state tournament
summer teams. Generations of Polson and operates with his son, Derek.
lected the early inklings of a dynasty.
at the end of this month and the same
players have picked up the sport and ex- At the time, only adults played fast- “Like I tell the girls every year, those ields that have produced some of the

celled, including this latest squad that is pitch softball and it certainly wasn’t a were the pioneers,” Smith said, describ- best teams Montana has ever seen.
of to an 8-2 overall start and will most sport for high school girls; instead they ing his early teams. “Those were the Not long ago, these ields were no-
likely enjoy homeield advantage at the played slowpitch.
ones you want to give thanks to, because where to be found, and neither was fast-
upcoming state tournament, May 29-31.
One summer night Smith’s daughter they took it on the chin for a few years so pitch softball.
Behind it all is one unifying and in- Robin and her friends came home after a you girls could have what you got today.”
When the state of Montana sanc-
distinguishable factor.
game that their team had lost pretty bad.
In 2001, Polson hosted the state tioned the sport as a high school girls
Since becoming the team’s head “They asked me if I could help them championship tournament at its new event in 1986, Smith, then an engineer at

coach in 1988, Smith has accrued an out. That’s what got me started coaching softball complex. In a remarkable week- Kerr Dam, came aboard as an assistant
overall record of 520-196 as of April 28. girls softball that summer,” he said. “I end of action, the girls rallied through to help build the upstart program. After
He has won regional coach of the year just stayed with it.”
the loser’s bracket and stunned unde- two years of Polson competing against
honors twice. This spring he’s been se- In 1986, the state made a daring move feated Laurel 5-2 in the irst champion- only Class AA schools, he was the lone
lected as a inalist for national high and established the sport of fastpitch ship game and then 2-1 to win the pro- candidate to emerge interested in taking
school coach of the year for the National softball at the high school ranks. Polson gram’s irst title.
over as head coach of the winless pro-
High School Athletic Coaches Associa- decided to start a program. Garth Cox A year later, they won again at home. gram.
tion.
was named the irst head coach of the Then again in 2004, 2007, 2010, 2011 “It was tough convincing the moth-

“It’s been a long haul but well worth team and Smith joined as an assistant.
and 2012.
ers to let their daughters play fastpitch
it,” Smith said.
But gathering players proved chal- Last year’s team barely lost to anoth- softball,” Smith said. “And of course,
lenging, and competing as the only Class er dynastic program, Frenchtown, in the most of the males in the community S
A squad in a ield of Class AA teams was state title game.
said, ‘They can’t play fastpitch.’ It was a MITH GREW UP IN DIXON, PLAY-
diicult.
This spring Polson is a state contend- tough go at irst but I inally got a group ing baseball.
The team went winless the irst two er yet again.
together.”
It was his favorite sport all through
seasons and Cox resigned. Not ready to Even though it’s become common He calls them “the pioneers” and the his teenage years and into college at

give up on the program, Smith applied for fans to see the Lady Pirates battling entire bunch made believers out of this Havre, which still had a team in the late
for the position.
for the trophy, it can still astonish the town and the whole state.
1960s.
He remembers the struggle of trying team’s chief architect to look back at In the course of his 27-year coach- It was during those college years
to convince athletes to play fastpitch, how far the program has come.
ing career, Larry Smith, 72, has seen the when he also discovered the sport of
especially for a losing program. But he “It’s amazing how the girls pro- Polson fastpitch team develop into one fastpitch softball. Some friends in the
found a core group who seemed brave gressed. The transformation from what of Montana’s premier programs for any dormitory asked him to ill in the roster
enough to try.
they were to what they are now, it’s just classiication.
one night. He did, and loved it.
“All of a sudden the girls started amazing to me,” Smith said. “I still smile The Lady Pirates have won seven After college when he moved to Mis-

playing and they loved it and then all the about it.”
state championships, all since 2001. soula to work at the paper mill, baseball
girls wanted to play fastpitch,” he said.
[email protected]
Since 2007, the girls have amassed a 156-
was no longer an option but fastpitch