CHICAGO — Marney Gellner may not have achieved her lifelong goal yet — becoming a cast member on “Saturday Night Live” — but if you had told a young Gellner growing up in Minot, North Dakota, that one day she would be announcing her favorite baseball team’s games, well, she probably wouldn’t have believed you.

Gellner has vivid memories of hopping in the family’s Chevy Impala and driving from Minot to the Twin Cities to catch games at the Metrodome.

She wasn’t, as she put it, “laying in the weeds, praying for her chance,” to call Twins games. But when Twins senior broadcast director Andrew Halverson called to ask if she wanted to fill in for Cory Provus this week in Chicago, she jumped at the opportunity.

“If I had ever known that that girl would be sitting, calling the game, that would have blown my mind,” she said of her younger self. “Now it feels like it’s been a natural progression. But from that point, I would have been in complete disbelief.”

When Gellner took the microphone on Monday to call the Twins’ game against the Chicago White Sox, she also made history, becoming the first woman to call play-by-play in the club’s history.

Gellner had previously called three Twins spring training games on the radio in March 2019. It was then when she introduced her home run call, “Better call Mama.”

She broke that out after Trevor Larnach launched a first-inning home run on Monday. And she took her own advice earlier in the day, calling her own mother, Lola, before her history-making first game.

Gellner said she was “super proud” of the trailblazing aspect of the achievement — and also ready to move on from that because this feels like a natural step for her in her career.

“The way that Dan Gladden, Justin Morneau, (Timberwolves analyst) Jim Petersen, the way they treat me is not as a female broadcaster,” Gellner said. “And I forget about the part that it’s kind of rare and the female part. … We have come to a place where it’s so much more normal and accepted, and that’s where I like to be.”

While Gellner has extensive experience covering the Twins, her focus has been primarily on basketball of late. She is currently in her 14th season as the play-by-play announcer for the Minnesota Lynx, and she spent the past week researching the Twins in between calling WNBA games.

In the days leading up to the series, she reached out to Provus and his predecessor, Dick Bremer, going over things like timing with analysts, logistical things and pronunciations to help prepare.

And then, on Monday, she took the microphone and made history.

“Somebody did say something to me about, ‘What a wonderful example for your daughter to be able to see you,’” Gellner said. “And I was like, ‘Yes, that is true. And also for my son to see it, for the boys to be hearing a woman call a baseball game and not go, ‘What?’ So both are true.”

Minnesota Twins left fielder Oswaldo Arcia, center left, and reporter Marney Gellner, center right, are doused during an interview after Arcia drove in the winning run against the Los Angeles Angels in the 12th inning of a baseball game Sunday April 17, 2016 in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Andy Clayton-King)

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