Glacier Knights: Home at last

For years, Kalispell's semi-professional football team has practiced in Evergreen and played its home games in Columbia Falls.

Today, the Glacier Knights say they are truly at home for the very first time.

The Knights, of the Rocky Mountain Football League's AA North Division, will kickoff against the Missoula Phoenix at 3 p.m.

It will mark the first time the team has played at Legends Stadium in its eight-year existence in the Flathead Valley.

"We've needed Legends," said Jared Taylor, a team captain, offensive line coach and starting center over the past five years. "We need it really bad."

It has not been a great year for the Glacier Knights.

The team is currently 2-5 in the division. They were thoroughly shellacked by the undefeated division champion Great Falls Gladiators 56-0 last week.

But that doesn't mean the Knights don't see their final game of the season as a great opportunity.

"If we pull this off, if we can beat these guys, it's going to be huge," Taylor said Thursday.

Kalispell Public Schools' board of trustees voted unanimously March 8 to allow the Knights to rent the field for today's contest. Up until then, the team had been met with four years of denials.

General Manager William Wheat said the matchup is essentially a "test game" to see what impact the Knights have on the playing surface.

"To finally get the opportunity to play there is huge," Wheat said. " We are a Kalispell team."

Still, the team almost had to go without a proven starting quarterback for their season finale. Starter Jeff Greenwell - a longtime leader for the Knights - suffered a season-ending neck injury earlier this year.

Taylor didn't want to take the field without an effective QB at the helm, so he called Phil Heimerl. Heimerl remained on the team's roster after recently moving to Baker for work.

He nearly led the Knights back against the Bitterroot Blaze May 7. Heimerl threw for 87 yards and two touchdowns in the 24-18 loss.

"He's got a cannon," Taylor said of the 6-foot-2 quarterback. "Man, can that guy throw a football."

Heimerl has been saving money for an upcoming wedding, and didn't have the funds to splurge on a 20-hour round-trip for a football game, Taylor said.

"So we decided to pass the hat around to get him here," Taylor said. "I said ‘I need you. I need a quarterback.'"

Heimerl's main targets are likely to be wide receivers Levi Walker and Dan Holquin, two players who have caught the majority of Greenwell's passes this season. On the ground, they'll have perennial all-star Mike Kuehne, who led the league in rushing two years ago.

Blocking will be a veritable wall of mammoth linemen, almost all of them over 300 pounds, Taylor said.

"We like to really pound the ball up the middle," said Taylor, himself listed at 350 pounds.

Taylor said he hopes the game gives the community an opportunity to embrace the Knights. Since making the playoffs in 2009, he said the Knights have continued to see few fans in the stands while the number of players on the field has also dwindled.

He says he hopes playing at Legends Stadium will be the beginning of a turnaround.

"We want the fans to be as excited about it as we are," Taylor said.

Admission to the game will be free for children 10 and younger and $5 for everyone else.