THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: For the love of moms

Sports moms are a different breed.

In addition to raising their own children, they are often de-facto moms to other kids.

They travel the Northwest — and sometimes the country — to watch their kids play sports.

They often volunteer as “team moms.”

They often help out at their children’s school.

All to make their kids’ experience the best it can be.

And they wouldn’t trade it for the world.

TODAY, THE spotlight is on four area “sports moms” from different angles — one as told from their husband/coach’s point of view, one from the mom’s perspective, and two as told by their children.

JESSICA McLEAN is the activities secretary at Post Falls High School. Her husband, Mike McLean, has been head boys basketball coach at Post Falls for the past 16 seasons. They have three sons — Blake, a 2016 Post Falls High graduate; Caden, a 2021 grad; and Trenton, a sophomore. All three boys played varsity basketball for their father with the Trojans.

MARIAH MARTINDALE, a social worker, helps out with many facets of Lake City High athletics — from concessions to fundraising to making sure the game-day appearance at Lake City is just right. Her husband, Cory, also helps out. They have two sons — Camdyn, a 2022 Lake City grad, and Michael, a sophomore at LCHS.

CAROLYN MUNDAY and her husband, Rob, have three children — including one Division I athlete and another future D-I athlete. Allie, who graduated from Post Falls High in 2018, last fall completed her volleyball career at the University of Idaho. She recently moved to Dallas, where she’s completing her master’s online. Kylie, a junior at Post Falls, has verbally committed to play volleyball at the University of San Diego. Their son, Carson, 13, is a basketball player who is in seventh grade at River City Middle School.

JAMIE SOUMAS is activities secretary at Timberlake High. Before that, she subbed for a few years at Timberlake — as a teacher, sometimes as an administrator. Before that, she homeschooled her four daughters — Kylie, Taryn, Ciara and Sophia — for most of their younger years. All four played or are still playing basketball. Her husband, Rob, has often been a coach for their daughters’ basketball teams.

Jessica McLean graduated from Lakeland High in 1996.

As Jessica Corsi, she played volleyball, basketball and softball, and was a member of the Hawks’ 1996 state championship softball team.

“Not only is she busy as a mom to our three boys, but she’s also very involved in our program as kind of a mom to everything we do,” Mike McLean said. “She’s probably the secret to our sauce, for me. For all the success that I’ve had in my career, she would be as important as all my assistant coaches. I’ve been very blessed with some amazing assistant coaches, many who have gone on and become head coaches. Jessica has always given me a very honest (assessment); she’s always been able to tell me her feelings as a former athlete, as a coach’s wife, but more importantly as a mom. She’s always been the voice that I have trusted and leaned on the most.”

Jessica is in her fourth year as activities secretary at Post Falls — a job which requires a lot of organization, making sure athletes are properly registered for their sports, making sure buses and hotels are secured, ticket takers and other support staff are lined up.

When the kids were young, she worked one day a week at an eye surgery center in Spokane, so she could focus on being a mom.

Then the boys got older, and the activities secretary job came open at Post Falls …

“It was perfect, because it’s a job where she gets to work with lots of athletes,” Mike said. “She works just as hard for our music and our band kids, our DECA kids, everybody … that was a perfect role for her.”

As for those ticket takers at games …

“She’s a big believer in, as our district says, Disneyland customer service,” Mike said. “She’s the one that tries to align it so, when the public comes into our games, the first person they see is a smiling face.”

Jessica’s is a very important job — but one done out of the limelight.

“Jessica is very organized; she is very much a task accomplisher,” Mike said. “Every day she has a list of tasks that she feels like she needs to get done, and she takes a lot of pride in getting those tasks done very efficiently. She’s so much more efficient than I am. … She’s the most organized and task-oriented person that I’ve ever been around, yet still has the inter-personal skills that she gets along with everybody. I think she’s the best around for taking things off the plate of others so they can focus on what they want to be focused on.”

Being a former athlete also helps in dealing with current athletes.

“I think the fact she’s a former athlete, she understands that young people, they just want to play. They just want to practice, they just want to participate,” Mike said. “As a mom, having boys, she’s going to deal with parents who are emotional, and she does a good job relating to that. She holds her composure much better than I do. You never see her get animated. She holds it together, and she’s pretty much a calming influence. And I think she builds confidence in the kids and the families because of that.”

As often happens in families with multiple “sports kids,” the parents often have to decide who is taking who to which game or tournament.

“When Jessica’s going off with one of the boys to a basketball tournament in Yakima or the Tri-Cities, and I’m going a different way with my team … Jessica knew exactly what to tell the boys,” Mike said. “In parenting, a mother and father may love their kids equally, but they maybe express it differently after a game. Where I may be more frustrated, she’s always there for the boys, no matter how frustrated they are. Win or lose, she was always the rock for the three boys — way more so than me. She is the better sports parent than me. She’s always been the rock, the foundation for our three boys.”

You’d think being a sports mom at home, and a sports advocate for kids at work would be enough.

But Jessica and Mike are also owners of the McLean Cattle Co., where they raise steers and sell cattle — each of the boys own cattle.

Jessica handles the business portion of the company.

“Once it goes from a cow to beef, that’s her part of our business,” Mike said.

Jessica and Mike are sixth-generation farmers — their family homesteaded in the 1890s.

The McLeans live on a little over 5 acres on the prairie, some 2 miles from Mike’s parents, who still live on the family farm.

“Growing up, we raised wheat, oats, barley, peppermint, bluegrass … still raise hay. We have tractors and combines,” Mike said. “We’re now more cattle. Jessica and I are the first generation that are not only farming, we have another job off the farm.”

Jessica often travels with Mike’s teams, and he said his players are probably just as comfortable coming to her with an issue as they would be coming to him.

“Another thing the players have loved,” Mike said. “In any husband/wife dynamic, there’s numerous times she would correct a bad decision, such as a place to go eat or do something. And I know our players love seeing maybe the head coach being re-routed by a wife. I think that makes me as a coach seem more human to them … and the players typically like her ideas.”

Mariah Martindale does a little bit of everything for Lake City High athletics.

She plays a major role in the school’s booster club.

She helps run concessions at games, and is also in charge of Timberwolf apparel that is sold at games.

On days of football games, she’s at the field, making sure the place looks nice, making sure the posters of the players are arranged just so.

When her boys, Camdyn and Michael, were younger, she helped with Hayden Little League. Now, she helps with all of Idaho District 1 Little League.

Oh yeah. And her “day job” is as a social worker for the state of Idaho.

“It's crazy to me,” said her youngest son Michael, who plays football and lacrosse. “She’s a social worker, and deals with everything there, and then comes and deals with everything during sports. Whatever I’ve been a part of, she’s been running it. So she always has a big role, and is always helping out whenever she can.”

Camdyn, who also played football for the T-Wolves, is now playing baseball at Centralia College in Centralia, Wash.

When both kids played on the same day when they were younger …

“If they were at different times, she would definitely make it,” Michael said. “If Camdyn was a pitcher and got taken out, she would hustle over to my game. Or vice versa. But she would definitely try her best to make it, and if she couldn’t make it, she’d send my dad.”

Mariah and her husband, Cory, grew up in Newport, Wash., and the family relocated to Spokane before ending up in North Idaho.

Cory spray-paints the Wolf head in the middle of the football field before games, and lines the fields — not just before varsity games, but before junior varsity and freshman games as well.

Mariah made signs for homecoming, and helped out with the senior after-party.

“It’s just really nice when kids ask, ‘Who did all this?’, and I can always say, ‘My mom,’ and it’s always nice to say that,” Michael said.

“Last year we went to Vandal Camp for the first time since COVID, and she did everything to get the paperwork ready and the money ready (through fundraising), and everything set up.”

Michael said he will sometimes help his mom when he can, just to lighten the load.

Not that she needs the help, apparently.

“She just kinda shrugs it off like it’s no big deal, but she’s probably happy inside, proud of what she does,” Michael said. “Even when I was in Junior Tackle, she would help out, and when I was in Little League, she would do everything. It’s just nice to know your mom is the one behind it.”

Michael said another benefit to having mom at his games was her capturing videos “so I can go look at them 100 times.”

When Camdyn and Michael both played for Hayden Little League, if Camdyn, say, was on the Majors field, and Michael was playing on another field elsewhere at Croffoot Park, Mariah would sit near the outfield on one field so she could watch both boys play.

“It’s just nice to know she’s there and doing everything she can — and also watching me,” Michael said.

Sometimes her social worker duties would take her to places like Lewiston and Moscow, but if she could, she’d find a way to watch her kids play.

Every weekend she can, she’ll make the five-hour drive to Centralia to watch Camdyn play in college.

On Wednesday earlier this week, Mariah worked her “day job,” then it was off to Post Falls to watch Michael play in a lacrosse game.

After that, they headed up to Rathdrum to watch Michael’s cousin play in a Lakeland Little League game at the Lions Club fields.

That enough for a weekday night?

Nope.

Then, they were off to a birthday dinner for Mariah’s sister and brother.

“So she’s just always everywhere she can be,” Michael said. “Even with a full-time job, she just finds time for everything … it’s just really nice.”

Carolyn Munday has been fortunate enough to be a stay-at-home mom for most of her adult life.

Though she’s rarely at home.

“Busy, busy, busy, busy,” is how Carolyn describes the life of a sports mom. “To be honest, it has literally been our whole world. I would not change it for anything. To be able to watch your kids work hard and do something that they’re passionate about, and have it pay off … Allie got to have her education paid for … Kylie has committed to USD, and they just finished second in the nation. Carson is putting in all this time on the weekends and after school to train for basketball. “The people that we have gotten to meet because of these sports that we would have never gotten to meet. The places that we’ve gotten to go … it’s just amazing. It is a lot of money, a lot of time … our weekends and nights have been mostly volleyball for years … but it’s so much fun. And it goes so fast.”

Carolyn Phipps played middle blocker in volleyball at University High in Spokane Valley, graduating in 1995.

Rob Munday was an athlete at Lakeside High in Nine Mile Falls, Wash.

They’ve been married almost 24 years.

Early on, when they started a construction company, they moved to the Tri-Cities, because the area was starting to boom, Carolyn said. They moved back to Post Falls some 18 years ago.

Much of their time has been spent in gymnasiums or fieldhouses watching volleyball matches or tournaments. They used to attend their kids’ practices, until that got to be a bit much.

In March, the entire family went to Maui for spring break — their first vacation that wasn’t connected with volleyball.

Of course …

“We still brought a volleyball, so we could play on the beach,” Carolyn said. “But no getting up early, or running around and looking for food to feed the kids in the hotel.

What was that like?

“I’m not going to lie — it was amazing,” she said.

Kylie was selected for the USA Volleyball national training development program, which has taken her to Anaheim and Washington, D.C.

Her club team, the Renovators, is headed to Orlando, Fla., for a big tournament, so the family will be back in the volleyball vacation business.

“Like I said, wouldn’t change it for the world,” Carolyn said. “It’s been so fun. There is the money part, and the stress, but it’s such a blessing, just to watch them work so hard at something they’re so passionate about. As a parent, that’s all you could hope for for your kids, right?”

Getting the kids to and from events was a challenge in the early years.

These days, Kylie has her drivers license. Also, Rob helps out with Kylie’s club team, so they can ride together to practice, and Carolyn can accompany Carson to basketball.

“There was one time Allie was playing for Renovators, and she was at (Central Valley), and Kylie was playing for T3 at the HUB, and I was driving, taking off my Renovators sweatshirt to put on my T3 sweatshirt so I could support the other one.

“I should just have it be reversible, you know?”

When Allie was playing at Idaho, and Kylie at Post Falls, often their matches were on the same nights. In that case, one parent headed to Moscow and the other went wherever Kylie was playing.

And with grandparents, brothers, best friends, etc., in the gym, there was usually plenty of family in the Post Falls gym to support Kylie.

The advent of live-streaming in recent years has certainly helped.

Especially during 2020 and the COVID-19 outbreak, where in some cases no fans were allowed in the gym, and in other cases, only a limited number of fans were allowed.

“My best friend and I went to see Michael Buble in Seattle this last fall,” Carolyn recalled. “We were up at the top of the Space Needle, and we found a little table (before the concert), and so we hung out at the Space Needle for about an hour and a half and watched Post Falls play (volleyball) on our phones.

“So to say it’s our life is an understatement, right?”

And it was not uncommon for Carolyn and Rob to be, say, in Moscow, watching Allie’s volleyball match at Memorial Gym, but also have their phones out to watch Kylie’s match.

“People probably think we’re being so rude and not watching Allie, but we’re trying to watch both kids,” Carolyn said. “So we’d be on our phone … I swear we’re being involved parents, we’re not being rude, or on Instagram,

“You know how many times I accidentally, when we were at the U of I, would say, ‘Let’s go, PF’?”

One time, Carolyn recalled, Kylie was in Lewiston for a match, and Allie was playing in Moscow, so Rob and Carolyn watched the first couple sets of Allie’s match, then jumped in the car and drove to Lewiston to watch Kylie. And when that match was over — back in the car to Moscow, to catch the end of Allie’s match.

“So we’re nuts,” Carolyn concluded. “What are we going to do when they all finish with sports? I don’t know.

“And you know what? And a lot of parents do it. It’s not like we’re these crazy, out-of-the-ordinary parents. So many parents just do it for their kids.”

Carolyn thanks her mom, who was a “club mom,” and said the love her mom had for her and her volleyball teammates rubbed off.

“My mom was always the one making sure all the girls had everything they needed,” Carolyn said. “Snacks and treats, and she would load us in the car and drive us to Seattle for a tournament, or down to Davis. My favorite thing is to be the team mom, and make sure everyone is taken care of when we’re out of town. I love spoiling the girls, and treating them all to Top Golf … making sure the girls are making memories.”

On the outside, it may look like a lot of money spent on a kid to play club sports with the hope the money will be recouped through a full-ride college scholarship.

“Some people say, ‘Why do you spend so much money on club?’” Carolyn said. “It’s so much more than just a sport. It’s the life lessons that these kids learn … the people that we’ve met that we would have probably never met that are friends forever because of sports. … it’s pretty cool.”

Is the expense worth the potential reward?

“I would say absolutely, yes,” Carolyn said.

Even, she said, for kids who may have started out playing club, then decided just to finish up playing high school volleyball.

“I think those parents would even say they wouldn’t change all the money and everything,” Carolyn said.

One thing you won’t see often is Carolyn and Rob sitting together at matches.

Too stressful.

So Carolyn sits with family and friends, and Rob is … elsewhere in the gym.

“Because we know each other so well, if I start getting stressed, and I feel him getting stressed … it’s just too much,” Carolyn explained. “Rob, I love him to death, but I can’t sit by him.”

Carson plays AAU for the Coeur d’Alene Heat, and his tournaments are mostly local.

“One time Kylie was at Riverside High School (in Chattaroy, north of Spokane) for a tournament, and Carson was at The Warehouse (in downtown Spokane), so it was a good 40 minutes apart,” Carolyn recalled. “So as soon as Kylie got done with her match, Rob and I jumped in the car, grabbed Carson’s coach from his house, took him to the Warehouse … and then raced back up to Riverside and watched Kylie … and they won the championship. So it all paid off.”

Jamie Soumas is a “school mom” to many kids at Timberlake High.

She lived on Lopez Island in Western Washington growing up, and she and Rob eventually moved to North Idaho because he had family in the area.

Kylie, now 25, played basketball a couple of years at Post Falls High, then a couple of years for Christian Center School. She’s married to Seth McLeod, the former Post Falls wrestler.

Taryn helped Timberlake High win a pair of state basketball titles, and is now playing at NAIA College of Idaho in Caldwell, where she had her sophomore season cut short by a torn ACL in her right knee. She is married to Christian Riley, a 2019 Timberlake grad.

Ciara, a senior, recently completed her basketball career by helping the Tigers finish second at state. Sophia, a freshman, was a “floater” who saw some time on the varsity this season.

Taryn said her mom subbed a lot at the high school before she got the job of activities secretary a couple of years ago, “and the kids just loved her. She would even sub for some of the administrators in the office, and so kids would just go sit with her in the office when they could. She’s been working in the office since I was a junior in high school. My husband loved her even before he and I even knew each other very well … and he would go sit with her in the office.”

Just to chat.

About anything.

“Honestly it was kind of awesome,” Taryn said. “Sometimes people would be like, oh that’s kind of embarrassing that my mom’s going to be at school all the time, but I loved it. It was super fun. And everyone loved her … I knew most of the people in the school, but the people I didn’t know knew my mom, and then they would know me … it was really fun to see my friends go in and sit with her, and I’d want to come in and sit with her.”

Didn’t these kids have class to be in?

“They found their ways,” Taryn said. “Sometimes they needed to go to the bathroom, or run a note to the office. Honestly a lot of times it would be when kids would get called to the office to speak with the principal, or an administrator, and then they would just end up hanging out for a little while with her.”

Taryn said she didn’t mind sharing her mom, because her mom was so popular. As a senior, when Taryn was a teacher’s aide, and she would head to the office and see if they needed help — and if not, she’d hang out with her mom.

“She always brought snacks, too,” Taryn said.

Kylie and Taryn both married right out of high school.

As it turns out, so did their mom.

“I guess the one thing my parents have always said was, ‘When you know, you know,’ and you’re going to figure it out as you go,” Taryn said. “My family has always preached that you have to work through it. There’s going to be hardships. When you know you want to marry someone, you know, you don’t need to wait just for the sake of being older.”

Ciara will graduate from high school in a few weeks.

So …

“She might break the tradition, but that’s OK,” Taryn said with a laugh. “She makes jokes about it more than we do.”

When Jamie was subbing, sometimes she would have to deal with students who had to serve an in-school suspension, or preside over an out-of-control class looking to take advantage of the sub.

“The thing that I’m probably most impressed with is, she’s had to deal with a lot of kids that aren’t so nice to her, and even adults that aren’t so nice to her,” Taryn said. “And the one thing that I’m probably the most impressed with is just how kind and composed she’s always stayed. Especially with the kids, she always seems like she wants what’s best for them — even the ones that scream at her, and aren’t always the kindest back. She’s somebody that looks out for everyone, and wants everyone to do well.

“I know I would struggle with that. She’s very kind all the time.”

When Taryn was at Timberlake, one of her friends referred to Jamie as her “school mom.”

“If they were going through something with friends, or whatever, she would give them some advice,” Taryn said. “It’s funny, you would see these kids that would have one conversation with her and they would come back the next day, because maybe they want some more advice, or it’s just comfortable now.”

Didn’t the teachers wonder where their students were during class?

“She would have a little chat and then be like, ‘OK, go back to class,’” Taryn said. “Most of the kids were in their TA period, where they would be running notes around, or doing tasks for teachers … or they were just office aides that would sit in the office and run notes to the classes. So instead of sitting in their spot they would sit next to my mom and talk to her.”

The Soumas family lived in Post Falls until Taryn’s freshman year, and raised horses and pigs on other people’s property. They moved north to Athol in part so they had more property to raise the animals at their own place.

Kylie was home-schooled most of her elementary years. She spent a couple of years at Post Falls High, then finished up high school back at home.

Taryn and Ciara were home-schooled through the eighth grade, as was Sophia, before all attended Timberlake.

“It’s not for everybody, but I loved it,” Taryn said of being home-schooled. “Of course sisters fight, but we are like best friends … we grew up and were together all the time. I’m very thankful I decided to go to high school, but being home-schooled those first eight years was awesome. I think it helped my relationship with my sisters be what it is today.”

At one point, when Kylie was finishing up high school at home, Jamie was home-schooling all four children.

“It was a little bit of a mix, because as a mom, she’s always teaching you,” Jamie said. “The first half of the day, she’s going from one kid to the other, helping us with whatever questions we have.

“It definitely didn’t feel weird at all. It felt very comfortable … she didn’t really feel like our teacher, then our mom; she was like both during the day. She was caring, and tried to do what’s best for you, and she was like that the rest of the day.”

Taryn said she definitely doesn’t take for granted that her mom (or dad, or both) have been at nearly all of her games.

“It meant so much,” she said. “I don’t think I even realized how blessed I was, sometimes, to have her there all the time. She loved being at our games. She didn’t play, but as the years went on and on she knew more about basketball, and now you’d think she actually played when she was younger.

“I was very, very blessed to have her at everything, and for her to want to be at everything.”

Even hundreds of miles away in Caldwell, her parents come down and see her play whenever possible. If not, well, there’s always that live-streaming thing.

“I’ll have a game and check my phone afterward and I will have texts from both of them,” Taryn said. “If I don’t have that text from them, that means they didn’t get to watch that game (likely because Timberlake was playing).”

And now that Jamie is no longer home-schooling her children, and as her daughters grow up and move away, she can still be a “mom” — just to other people’s kids.

“I think that’s why she loves her job so much; the impact she gets to have on kids that she hardly knows,” Taryn said. “She’s amazing.

“I hope to be like her someday.”

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 208-664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @CdAPressSports.