THE FRONT ROW WITH MARK NELKE: Sunday, December 13, 2015

Jeff Choate has a lot on his plate these days.

He’s already started on his new job as head football coach at Montana State — his first head coaching job at the collegiate level.

And he’s still following through on his duties with the job he’s had the past two seasons — as special teams coordinator and defensive line coach for the bowl-bound Washington Huskies.

So you can forgive him a minor slip up, like in his introductory press conference Monday in Bozeman, when he mentioned going back to Seattle for the weekend to help coach “Boise State” in the bowl game.

His wife, Janet, caught that one too.

“I have an excuse,” Choate explained the other day, while on the road between Helena and Bozeman, getting ready to catch a flight to Seattle. “I’m bringing half the guys I coached at Boise State over here.”

One of those guys is Byron Hout, the former Lake City High standout who played for Choate at BSU, who was hired this past week by Choate to coach the defensive line at Montana State.

LONGTIME ASSISTANT coaches pining for a head coaching job never know when the next opportunity will come up — but they do know to be ready when it does.

Last month, news surfaced that Montana State had fired football coach Rob Ash.

“Coach Ash has done an excellent job here, so it wasn’t something that was necessarily on the radar,” Choate said. “It kind of came out of nowhere.”

Choate didn’t know anybody in the Montana State hierarchy, but he had some contacts from his days playing at Montana Western in the early 1990s, so they helped get his name out to those doing the hiring.

Two Sundays ago, while in Seattle, Choate got a call from MSU AD Peter Fields, asking him to come to Bozeman to interview. He flew to Bozeman the following day, and interviewed the next day.

Then, while he waited to hear back from the Bobcats, Choate continued recruiting for the Huskies “literally all over the country, from the Bay Area to Dallas to Louisiana.”

Then a week ago last Friday, Choate was offered the job by MSU president Dr. Waded Cruzado and he accepted. Husky coach Chris Petersen asked Choate if he would stay on and coach the bowl game, and he agreed.

Since then, it’s been a whirlwind for Choate, 45 — putting together a new coaching staff at Montana State, contacting returning Bobcat players, and doing a little recruiting around Montana.

This weekend, he’s back in Seattle, coaching and game planning with the Huskies. Then it’ll be double duty — coaching the Huskies, but also recruiting for Montana State.

The Huskies play Southern Miss in the Heart of Dallas Bowl on Dec. 26.

“I’ll get over here (to Bozeman) right after the first of the year, ready to hit the ground running,” Choate said.

CHOATE HAS bounced around as a college assistant since 2001 — at Utah State, Eastern Illinois, Boise State, Washington State, Florida and Washington.

Because of that, he says he’s “way more ready now” to be a college head coach, because of all the different coaches he’s worked for, and learned from. At the FCS level, with smaller coaching staffs, head coaches have to be a little more hands-on, and that’s just fine with Choate said he may continue to coach special teams — his calling card at most of his collegiate stops.

“And that’s one of the things that actually appeals to me, too — I still get a chance to have a hands-on in the coaching,” he said. “That’s who I am, kind of a roll-your-sleeves-up, blue-collar guy. Let’s go to work.”

Though Ash was 70-38 in nine seasons in Bozeman, and the winningest coach in Bobcat history, he was just 2-7 vs. Montana — which might tell you how important it is to win the Cat-Griz game.

Though Montana gets most of the attention in this neck of the woods, Choate says that’s mostly a proximity issue, with Missoula in western Montana and Bozeman in eastern Montana.

And, he notes, Montana State has had its share of success as well.

“We don’t take a back seat to anybody in this state,” Choate said. “No, there’s no inferiority complex.”

DESPITE HIS bouncing around the country, Choate maintains some North Idaho roots. Born in Columbus, Ohio, he also lived in Germany, Austin, Texas, and Lewiston before moving to St. Maries as a high school sophomore. He later was head football coach and athletic director at Post Falls High, and his family has a house on the east side of Lake Coeur d’Alene.

As fate — and the schedule — would have it, Choate and Montana State open the 2016 season at Idaho — a place where, coming out of high school, “I would have loved to have had a chance to play, and I didn’t get that opportunity,” he said.

When the Idaho head coaching job came open most recently, at the end of the 2012 season, he said he “had some conversations about it, but I didn’t formally apply. And I knew that wasn’t the right time or the right fit for me. (Athletic director) Rob Spear and I talked about that. It’s worked out for Paul (Petrino, who recently completed his third season as Vandals coach); I think he’s done a nice job getting that program back on solid footing.”

When Choate said at his press conference that he’ll have a chip on his shoulder about that game, he said later in the week it was because “I don’t want to get embarrassed in my own back yard. I don’t want to go back to the lake and hear how I got beat by the Vandals.”

CHOATE WEIGHED in on Curt Carr, his football coach at St. Maries:

“One thing I learned from him is toughness,” Choate said. “That guy was a hard-nosed football coach, and he demanded a certain level of intensity and toughness, to be able to play for him. I took a lot of pride in that. That’s something that I’ve definitely tried to carry with me throughout my coaching career, and be able to push kids in a respectful way, (so they believe) you’re not attacking them as a person, you’re trying to make them better. That was always Curt’s deal — he knew how to push the buttons and get the best out of you. But he demanded a physical brand of football, and I think his St. Maries teams always had that.”

On Hout, whom he helped recruit to Boise State, on what makes him a good football coach:

“I think he gets the big picture. He’s really smart. And I think that linebackers and tough-guy football players get this jock reputation, and that’s not really who Byron is. He’s a really intelligent, cerebral guy. he can figure things out on his own. He’s a self-starter. He’s a person you can relate to, and kids feel comfortable with, and I think that’ll help him in recruiting … and he’s extremely loyal as well.”

Choate said he tries to touch base with Jeff Hinz, the current Post Falls High head football coach who has been battling cancer for two years, at least once or twice a month. Hinz was an assistant when Choate was Post Falls head coach.

“And the thing that’s so awesome about Jeff is, we’ll lose a game and he’ll call and give me a pep talk — that’s the kind of guy that guy is,” Choate said. “I just appreciate that about him — just the type of person that he is, and the character he’s exhibited through the struggle that he’s had. We got beat by Oregon or somebody, and (he said) “keep your head up, you guys are going to be just fine.” That keeps things in perspective, doesn’t it?

“There’s no self-pity there,” Choate added. “He’s awesome. … I told him a long time ago, I never thought of you as a tough guy, and come to find out, you’re the toughest son-of-a-gun I know.”

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.