MSUB SPORTS – Few individuals are more associated with Montana baseball than Matt Schoonover.
 
"My earliest memory is me and my dad walking over to Legion Field – now Centene Stadium – to watch a Great Falls Dodgers game," the Great Falls native commented from the modest conference room inside the Billings Mustangs' main offices. "I'm too young to remember, but Pedro (Martinez) was there in '88, and Eric Karros in the late '80s."
 
A lifelong Dodgers fan, the 31-year-old Schoonover reflected on having premium access to future big league all-stars.
 
Baseball has always been his favorite sport. "I could do it by myself," Schoonover said. "I could throw a ball off the wall to myself. I wore out the side of my garage; I would throw all day and field grounders. I basically played entire games by myself."
 
Schoonover manifested himself into an infielder, idolizing MLB hall of famers like Ozzie Smith each time he reached out to snag a self-generated short hop. "Watching Omar Vizquel and Robbie Alomar turn double plays – that was like Nirvana," he said.  
 
On February 15, Schoonover will become the first modern-era baseball player inducted into the Montana State University Billings Hall of Fame and Distinction. Little remains intact from the early years of Yellowjacket baseball, with no trace of records from the first stint in the mid-20th century. Ten names associated with baseball are among MSUB's athletics hall of famers, and they include playing careers spanning from 1947-75.
 
But after the mid '70s Yellowjacket baseball was lost for nearly three decades. On February 9, 2005 MSUB announced that it would add baseball as an NCAA sport, making it the only four-year university in Montana to do so. "Once MSUB announced it was starting a program, it became my focus more than anything else," said Schoonover. "I saw potential for the program. There were enough good high school players in Montana, and if we could get the best of those guys then we had a chance to build something."
 
Just over 12 years later, the Yellowjackets have become one of the premier teams in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference and the NCAA D2 west region. Last spring MSUB won the regular-season title for the third time in the last four seasons, and broke dozens of records along the way.
 
"It has always been a deep passion of mine," said Schoonover. "If you look back at the history of baseball in Montana it is very rich. The Mustangs have been here for almost 70 years, and now that the college team is playing well we are getting more recognition. We wanted to make Billings a destination for guys who were thinking that college baseball in Montana was not a viable option. Now we are starting to get that success, and it is starting to show that there is good baseball here."
 
Now as Schoonover watches the program he helped build contend for championships year-in and year-out, he feels a sense of accomplishment and pride. He knew it wasn't going to be easy, and he knew that the early Yellowjacket teams were not going to win very much. He even knew that at times it was going to be hard to be motivated to play the game he had always loved.
 
But MSUB needed ballplayers. Schoonover played, and he was really good.
 
GROUND ZERO
"I take pride in those things we went through to start the program from scratch. Even if our on-field results were nothing to write home about, we set some kind of foundation for the program to build upon moving forward." – Matt Schoonover on being part of MSUB's inaugural roster in 2006.
 
Among the 36 players on the inaugural 2006 baseball roster, 28 were transfers who already had collegiate experience. Only two of the eight freshmen on the roster saw action that season, while Schoonover took a redshirt year under newly appointed head coach Chris Brown. "The year I redshirted I got to know a lot of people, and then my first year playing in '07 we were actually pretty decent," Schoonover recalled.

The second team in modern history finished in second place in the Heartland Conference, going 24-26 overall and 16-20 in league play in 2007. Though the team was painstakingly close to a landmark .500 record, it would be almost another decade before the 2015 squad (27-23, 22-10 GNAC) finally broke through with the first winning record in program history.
 
Schoonover led the team with a .378 batting average that season, which still stands as the third-best single-season mark in MSUB history. He started 39 games, while racking up 10 doubles and four home runs, and slugging at .563. "I thought we were on the way up (after '07), but a lot of guys graduated and we brought in a whole new crop of JC guys," Schoonover said.
 
His optimism was not met with results, as the 2008 team struggled through a 14-38 campaign and went 5-25 in its first year in the GNAC. Relocating to Pirtz Park, the American Legion field in Billings' west end, complicated the season as the 'Jackets waited patiently for the transformation of Cobb Field into Dehler Park. "We regressed a lot that year, and nothing went right," Schoonover said on the only season of his career his batting average dipped below .300 (.293). "Leaders like Kyle Pryor, Pat Smith, and Jake Samuelson were all seniors in '07, and we lost Seth Moir who was my friend and a good, vocal leader, to an injury. There was potential in our region, but we weren't getting the best freshmen to come to our program."
 
Things got better in 2009, when Schoonover led his team to a 24-28 record and an even mark of 16-16 in the GNAC to take second place. He batted .345 that season and tied for second in the conference with 61 base hits. But the 'Jackets slipped into the same two-year cycle and Schoonover ended his career with a bitter taste after an 11-35 campaign in 2010. "It is rewarding to see their success now, but I'm also a little envious," Schoonover said with a wry smile. "It would have been nice to have played at this (current) level of college baseball."
 
BY THE NUMBERS
"The thing I have enjoyed most over the years is that each coach who has come in – from Rob Bishop to Aaron Sutton – has made the program better." – Matt Schoonover on witnessing the progression of MSUB's baseball team into a perennial championship contender.
 
The team results during Schoonover's career were lackluster, but what he contributed in five years at MSUB is what makes him a hall of famer. Schoonover's career average of .335 is No. 7 in MSUB history, he is No. 2 in hits, at-bats (635), and sacrifice flies (12), No. 3 in doubles (39), and total bases (282), No. 5 in RBIs (90), and No. 6 in runs scored (90).
 
He recorded the first hit of his career in his first at-bat, singling during a three-run third inning in MSUB's game at Incarnate Word on February 16, 2007. Four years later on May 8, 2010 in his final career at bat, he punched a base hit through the left side of the infield at Central Washington University. It was the 213th and final hit of his career, as he bookended his tenure with hits.

Rank	Player	Hits	Seasons
1.	Brody Miller	249	2012-15
2.	Matt Schoonover	213	2006-10
3.	Luke Reinschmidt	192	2014-16
4.	Colby Robison	168	2011-13
5.	Casey Merritt	145	2014-17
6.	Kevin Toon	134	2014-16
7.	Jeff Ridgeway	131	2008-11
	Colter Sternhagen	131	2013-16
9.	Jalen Garcia	119	2017-18
10.	Kyle Durbin	111	2015-16

It is perhaps his most profound achievement, and is a stat that best reflects what he meant to the program. The plateau of 200 hits rules out virtually any two-year player. While do-able in three seasons, it is most often a testament to individuals who played and started over a four-year career.
 
Accordingly, the 200-hit mark is a credit to Schoonover's commitment and longevity within the program. It is a function of his legacy that is still recognized today, and it is a figure that will stand the test of time. "Matt was an impact guy for four years, and that is one of the toughest things to do in any sport," commented current MSUB head coach Aaron Sutton. "He is one of the best guys to come through this program, and his records are going to stand for a long time. Matt is one of the guys who has continued to help our program, and we see him on a regular basis during the spring. To have guys who played here remain involved has a big impact on our players, and it is really important."
 
 
Schoonover's hit record held until Brody Miller, another four-year player, notched 249 from 2012-15. Miller was a pillar on MSUB's first-ever GNAC championship team in 2015, kicking off the current run of team success with a cumulative record of 113-90 (.557) and 95-53 (.642) in league play since then. Schoonover has witnessed the progression of constructing teams around top local talent, like current senior all-region outfielder Jalen Garcia, and feels a sense of achievement in the fruits of his labor now paying off.
 
"The biggest thing is that we knew we were setting a foundation," said Schoonover. "We knew we had to go through those hard times early in order to build a program that could compete for championships."
 
BASEBALL IN BILLINGS
 
Surrounding Schoonover on a chilly December morning as he dictates his story are boxes of Mustangs merchandise, stacked on the conference room table mid-hibernation with a June 14 opening day nothing more than an afterthought.
 
Among the promos and giveaways are packs of Mustangs baseball cards – full team sets from the last few years. Hunter Greene sits atop the 2017 set, the No. 2 overall pick in the MLB Amateur Draft and a 100-mile-per-hour pitcher projected to one day be a major league star.
 
"Each year that goes by that you're away from your playing career, you feel a little less connected to them," Schoonover said on his perspective being around elite collegiate and professional players today compared to his childhood days in Great Falls. "My first few years it seemed like I got to know the guys better, but as you get older it is more of a professional relationship."
 
Now in his fifth year as the assistant general manager and director of stadium operations for the Mustangs, Schoonover has never known a season without some kind of involvement in baseball. He started out running the scoreboard at Cobb Field as a student in the summer of 2007, and worked his way into a full-time position with the club over the course of seven seasons.
 
Today he handles everything from customer relations to season ticket packages, to ballpark maintenance and gameday operations. His desk is lined with Cincinnati Reds media guides and during games he is responsible for relaying every detail of a game from the official scorer to Minor League Baseball's hub in New York City via proprietary software in the press box.
 
"We do a little bit of everything," Schoonover said referring to a team of just three full-time employees including fellow MSUB alumnus Chris Marshall and Mustangs general manager Gary Roller.
 
"Matt was an outstanding player, respected teammate, and a model student-athlete during his Yellowjacket baseball career," Roller said. "For him to be recognized for his accomplishments is something very special. It is a tremendous honor to be inducted into any formal hall of fame, including one's alma mater. Personally and professionally, we are thrilled for Matt and his family. We are extremely proud of him."

THE HOUSE SCHOON BUILT
"Knowing where the program was and that we started from scratch to seeing where it is now is what I take a lot of pride in." – Matt Schoonover on Yellowjacket baseball.
 
At 10 a.m. on March 15, the crunch of trotting spikes on concrete and a repeated, echoing ping will fill the atmosphere at Dehler Park as the Yellowjackets take batting practice before their 2019 home opener against Central Washington University. The team won a school-record 33 games last spring, and was in the hunt for an NCAA D2 regional playoff berth for the first time in team history.
 
The familiar sounds are sure to lure Schoonover from his desk onto the concourse to peer out at the ballpark's first inhabitants of the calendar year. "I was somewhat surprised," Schoonover said when asked to reflect on being inducted into the hall of fame. "I felt proud when I was told I was the first one inducted since baseball was reinstated in 2006. It's really cool."
 
Schoonover's parents Dick and Karen Schoonover instilled a passion for baseball since before their son could walk, and it has stuck. Championship programs aren't established overnight, and tumultuous, forgettable seasons line the bumpy path towards building a winner.
 
What lasts however is the legacy of those who were most dedicated towards realizing an opportunity larger than their own four-year playing career. Matt Schoonover trusted that every ounce of work he put into Yellowjacket baseball was for the good of the program.
 
Now, as a hall of famer, he gets to witness it thrive.