New Jerseys to be Revealed Saturday
What’s all the hubbub about the new jerseys? See For Yourself
Plus: A new Gameday Kaimin feature
Montana Grizzly Fan of Week One :
Fan of the Week
Fan of the Week – Bill McNulty of Stevensville
Tailgating Since – 1995
Rig – Custom school bus “The Griz Rig”
Favorite Tailgating Food – Custom Bratwurst from Pattee Creek Market or Pulled Pork from Clark Mathison.
Fifteen years ago, the Grizzlies opened their Big Sky championship season against Eastern New Mexico. Fans poured into Washington-Grizzly Stadium and watched Montana beat the Greyhounds 41-14.
In attendance were Bill McNulty and family. McNulty, a six-foot-five chiropractor of Stevensville, tailgated the games during the 1995 season with his friends and family, who flocked to games in his party bus, the Griz Rig.
His school bus tops out at a cruising speed of 55-miles-per-hour and is appropriately painted maroon and silver, with posters for intimidation taped up in the inside windows. He has also covered the top of the rig with local business advertisements, which he says pay for a year’s worth of what I call “Grizzing” and what he calls a great weekend.
“It’s a complete adrenaline rush every Saturday,” McNulty said. “You go there and you expect to win, you expect to have fun and you expect a good game.”
Since the first game, the Griz Rig has been a site for fans to migrate before, during and after games for food and drink. Two trailer hitches don twin barbeques to cook food for about 300 people. His favorite food,
“We’re pros at this now,” he said. “Got this tailgating down to an art.”
The games are more about watching football games to McNulty than hosting a party on Campus Drive every Saturday since the 1995 season. He says fan spirit, noise and excitement are unmatched elsewhere, even after traveling to big-time fields like Nebraska’s Memorial Stadium and the Michigan “Big House” Stadium.
“It’s fun. The tailgating is a ball,” he said. “It’s me and 500 of my closest friends every weekend.”
If today you walk past the Griz Rig, usually located close to the stadium entrance, stop by and grab a beer and a brat and make a new friend in this Saturday’s Fan of the Week.
And
Players to Watch Week One
Who has the potential for changing the game this Saturday? Find out soon.
Coming Wednesday & Saturday
