Griz open season this week in Indiana

The Montana soccer team kicks off its 2016 season this week with a pair of matches at West Lafayette, Ind. The Grizzlies will face Oakland in a neutral-site match on Friday at 2 p.m. (MT) and Purdue on Sunday at 11 a.m. (MT).

Coverage: Both matches can be tracked through live stats. Sunday's match will have free audio coverage through Purdue and pay-per-view video coverage through the Big Ten. All available links can be found at gogriz.com.

Upcoming: Montana will be on the road next week as well, playing matches at Wyoming and Denver.

Five things to know about Oakland:

1. The Golden Grizzlies went 8-6-7 last season and finished second in the Horizon League with a 6-1-2 conference record. The team went on an 11-match unbeaten streak late in the season that sent them to their eighth NCAA tournament in program history. Oakland lost 5-0 to Notre Dame in the first round.

2. Then freshman goalkeeper Emily Zweng took over duties in net midway through the season and sparked the team's late-season run. She went 7-1-3 with a 0.54 goals-against average, the ninth-best mark in the nation. She finished with more shutouts (8) than goals allowed (7).

3. Oakland, located in Rochester, Mich., returns six starters, including senior forward Alice Palmer, who led the Golden Grizzlies in goals last fall with five.

4. Oakland was picked first in the Horizon League preseason coaches' poll, ahead of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Northern Kentucky, which also picked up first-place votes.

5. The Golden Grizzlies lost an exhibition match to Eastern Michigan 3-1 last Friday, getting limited to a single shot on goal. Behind a pair of goals from sophomore Sydnye Gagner, Oakland bounced back with a 3-1 victory over Fort Wayne on Sunday.

Bonus note: Oakland lost 2-1 at Northern Arizona last season, allowing both the game-tying and game-winning goals in the final four minutes of regulation. First-year Montana assistant coach Vijay Dias coached at NAU last fall, though that's not the advantage it would appear to be.

"Vijay was coaching with a different team last year and not with us," said sixth-year coach Mark Plakorus. "How they approach games and what they look for in a scouting report is going to be different than what we look for and what we do. So I don't think it makes much of a difference."

Five things to know about Purdue:

1. The Boilermakers went 2-0 in their exhibition matches, defeating Loyola 3-0 and Miami (Ohio) 2-0. They outshot their two opponents 34-13. Purdue opens its season Friday night by hosting Marshall after Montana faces Oakland.

2. Under first-year coach Drew Roff, Purdue went 9-8-1 last season and finished 11th out of 14 teams in the Big Ten with a 4-6-1 league record.

3. The Boilermakers, with 21 letterwinners back, same as Montana, return their top three scorers from last season and all three keepers. Maddy Williams had eight goals and six assists last fall, Hannah Leinert added seven goals and five assists.

4. Purdue was picked 11th in the Big Ten preseason poll (Penn State, Rutgers and Wisconsin topped the poll). Williams, Leinert and junior defender Vanessa Korolas were named to the Big Ten preseason honors list.

5. Indiana and Purdue, both members of the Big Ten for more than 100 years, have one of the nation's top rivalries. This is somewhat relevant because Montana assistant coach Vijay Dias played soccer at Indiana, a program with eight national championships. Alas, Purdue does not have a men's soccer team. Dias knows well the rivalry. He just never got to have firsthand experience of playing the Boilermakers.

Bonus note: Montana lost 3-1 to Purdue last September in Missoula. The Grizzlies allowed goals on three of the Boilermakers' first eight shots to fall behind 3-0 at the half. Montana outshot Purdue 9-4 in the second half, but only found the net once, when Ashlee Pedersen scored in the 56th minute.

"We didn't have a great first half when we played them. And when you play a quality team like Purdue, if you don't come ready to play, they'll punish you," said Plakorus.

"I was proud of the way we came back in the second half and at least competed. It was a big lesson for us that you have to come out and play hard all the time. Hopefully we learned that and can give them a better game this time."

More on Montana: The Grizzlies opened their season on Wednesday, Aug. 3, moved their training camp north to Kalispell a few days later, returned to Missoula last week and hosted the University of Alberta in an exhibition game at South Campus Stadium on Saturday.

After 89 minutes of scoreless action, Montana pulled out a 1-0 victory when junior outside back Chanelle Pederson scored with 57 seconds left in regulation.

It doesn't show up in the box score, but sophomore Hallie Widner played a key role in the goal. Her attempted header in front of goal distracted the Alberta keeper enough that Pederson's ball made it into the net untouched.

Montana will travel to Indiana on Thursday.

"Like every coach, I'd like to have a few more weeks to get ready, but I think we're as ready as we're going to be at this point of the year," said Plakorus. "We still haven't installed everything we're going to use this year, but we've got enough that now it's time to see how it works against an opponent.

"I'm pleased with the way we've been training, with the attitude of the players and how hard they've been working. It's a great group of young ladies that wants to be good. They want to do whatever it takes to make their team better, and it's always fun to be around players like that."

All but four players on Montana's active roster saw considerable time in Saturday's exhibition win. Those four were out for medical reasons, a minor number compared to previous seasons.

"The girls did a great job during the summer of taking care of themselves and preparing themselves physically for the season," Plakorus said. "Our athletic trainer, Krista Allen, is doing a great job as well. She's been fantastic with the girls, taking care of things as they pop up and keeping them going.

"And it helps having as many returners as we do. They understand how to prepare themselves and understand how to take care of themselves during the preseason. They've been very mature about handling their bodies and being on top of things."

Bonus notes:

* The team's leading career scorer entering the season is sophomore Hallie Widner, who totaled 17 points as a true freshman in 2014 before missing last season with a broken leg. Junior Allie Lucas has 14 points through two seasons, with three goals and four assists.

* Kailey Norman, who should start in goal Friday in the season opener, has 21 career wins, the third-most in program history. With six or more this season, she'll end her career No. 2 on the list behind Railene Thorson's 45 wins from 1994-97.

Norman ranks second with 16 shutouts. Thorson is first with 28.

* After scoring 10, 20, 15 and 8 goals the four years prior to Plakorus's arrival in 2011, Montana has scored between 25 and 32 each season under Plakorus.

* Plakorus enters the season with a record at Montana of 46-43-15 (.514). Betsy Duerksen (1994-2003) and Neil Sedgwick (2004-10), the only other coaches in program history, had career records of 117-69-7 (.624) and 37-77-13 (.343), respectively.

* Montana's 2-0 victory over Weber State in the quarterfinals of last season's Big Sky tournament at Moscow, Idaho, was the 200th in program history.

* This year's Big Sky tournament will include the league's top six teams playing at the site of the regular-season champion and be contested over five days instead of four, with a nod toward player safety and recovery. Quarterfinals will be played on Wednesday, Nov. 2, semifinals on Friday, Nov. 4, the championship on Sunday, Nov. 6.

* Six players on this year's team have received postseason recognition from the Big Sky Conference:

Tess Brenneman (senior, center back): Second-team All-BSC as a sophomore, first team as a junior
Mary Gintz (senior, outside back): Honorable mention All-BSC as a sophomore
Kailey Norman (senior, goalkeeper): Second-team All-BSC as a sophomore and junior
Ashlee Pedersen (junior, athlete): Honorable mention All-BSC as a sophomore
Chanelle Pederson (junior, outside back): Honorable mention All-BSC as a freshman
Hallie Widner (sophomore, midfielder): First-team All-BSC, Newcomer of the Year as a freshman

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Players Mentioned

Tess Brenneman

Mary Gintz

Allie Lucas

Kailey Norman

Ashlee Pedersen

Chanelle Pederson

Hallie Widner

University of Montana Athletics