Griz to face tough field in Hawaii

The nonconference tournaments, No. 3 of 6, continue this weekend for the Montana softball team, which will play five games in three days at the Bank of Hawaii Invitational in Honolulu.

The Grizzlies will play No. 5 Oregon in back-to-back games on Friday and Saturday, play consecutive games against UNLV on Saturday and Sunday, then close the tournament with a game against host Hawaii on Sunday.

The schedule:
Friday: vs. Oregon, 4:30 p.m. (MT)
Saturday: vs. Oregon, 1 p.m. (MT)
Saturday: vs. UNLV, 3 p.m. (MT)
Sunday: vs. UNLV, 1 p.m. (MT)
Sunday: at Hawaii, 3 p.m. (MT)

Links to live stats for all five of Montana's games are available at gogriz.com.

The field: Montana is 4-5 after going 2-3 at Northern Iowa's season-opening tournament and 2-2 at last weekend's Bronco Classic in Santa Clara, Calif., with two wins over Santa Clara and two losses to Seattle.

Oregon, with a pair of wins over top-25 teams, is 9-0 and has moved up to No. 5 in the latest National Fastpitch Coaches Association poll. The Ducks went 6-0 at Arizona State's Kajikawa Classic and 3-0 last weekend at the Mary Nutter Collegiate Classic in Cathedral City, Calif.

UNLV, picked sixth in the Mountain West preseason poll, is off to a 7-2 start, with three of those wins coming against Big Sky Conference opponents, including a 6-5 victory over Big Sky preseason favorite Weber State. UNLV also defeated Northern Iowa 8-7, a team that defeated Montana 10-2.

Hawaii, which has had five games either cancelled or rained out, is 4-3 and will be hosting its second tournament of the season. The Rainbow Wahine split their four games at UNLV's tournament last weekend, with wins over San Jose State and Idaho State.

Weekend preview: The highlight of the tournament for Montana, in addition to spending a winter weekend in Hawaii, is getting a chance to face a team ranked No. 5 in this week's national poll.

The Ducks, the highest-ranked of the six Pac-12 teams in this week's NFCA poll, are 9-0, with a team batting average of .351 and team ERA of 1.19.

"Oregon is a World Series-caliber team. They are deep in hitting, deep in pitching, and they have several all-Americans. On paper and in person, this will be the best team we've played since we've been here," said coach Jamie Pinkerton.

This week's matchups against Oregon, the first of three straight weekends Montana will face a ranked opponent, will be the fourth and fifth games in program history against a nationally ranked team.

In its first season of competition, in 2015, Montana lost 5-2 to No. 16 Minnesota at Fresno State. Last year the Grizzlies fell 9-2 at No. 17 Arizona State and 12-2 at No. 8 Washington.

"Washington was very good last year, but Oregon is ranked higher. They do a lot of things well. They are strong, they are fast, they have pitching, and they play good defense," said Pinkerton.

"It's going to be fun to compete against them and see where we're at. It's definitely going to be a challenge, but it's a challenge we shouldn't be afraid of. It's something to embrace. To be able to play a team like Oregon is why you play the sport."

Oregon hasn't scored fewer than three runs in a game this season and three times in nine games the Ducks have run-ruled their opponent.

Seattle, which held Montana's bats in check last weekend, gave Oregon one of its toughest games of the season. Andie Larkins, who one-hit the Grizzlies on Sunday, limited the Ducks to six hits in six innings, but Oregon's pitching was even better in its 4-2 win in Tempe, Ariz.

Freshman Maggie Balint is averaging 11.5 strikeouts per seven innings, the best mark in the Pac-12. Sophomore Megan Kleist has a 0.30 ERA to rank 17th in the nation.

"The spectrum of results when you play a top-10 team is very wide. What we can't do is what we've done in our losses this season," said Pinkerton. "We can't extend innings and give them outs. If you do that against a team like Oregon, it will become ugly in a hurry.

"The main thing is just to compete. No matter what happens, just compete. We need to stay within ourselves and play Montana softball, and see how that matches up."

When Montana plays UNLV, it will at least once face senior Morgan Ettinger, who is 6-0 with a 1.14 ERA. Ettinger earned the win in all four of the Rebels' home victories last weekend, two as a starter, two in relief, to earn Mountain West Pitcher of the Week honors.

Hawaii, picked fifth in the Big West preseason poll, is hosting tournaments the next four weekends. The Rainbow Wahine also opened the season two weeks ago with a home tournament before playing in Las Vegas last weekend.

"UNLV is off to a very good start and has a senior pitcher who is definitely their ace. Hopefully we can get into their bullpen," said Pinkerton. "Hawaii will have a definite home-field advantage with the travel we face going there, but luckily we play them on Sunday.

"This will definitely be the toughest field we've played this year."

Montana will play current No. 17 Utah next week at the Red Desert Classic at St. George, Utah, and California, No. 21 in the ESPN/USA Softball national poll, in two weeks at the Golden Hurricane Classic at Tulsa, Okla.

Montana Notes:

* Two weeks into the season and Montana has collected a pair of Big Sky Conference Player of the Week awards. Last week senior Bethany Olea was honored after batting .625 in five games at Northern Iowa's tournament.

This week is was Sydney Stites. The sophomore batted only .267 in four games at Santa Clara last weekend, going 0 for 7 against Seattle, but she powered Montana to 8-1 and 7-2 wins over the host Broncos.

She had a three-run home run in the top of the seventh on Saturday to break open a game that would turn into an 8-1 win. In the second win, on Sunday, she drove in Montana's first six runs, with a two-run single and her first career grand slam. The six RBIs were a career high and one off the program record.

* Montana batted .339 last weekend in two games against Santa Clara, .146 against Seattle. The Grizzlies will get three more chances against the Redhawks this season when Seattle travels to Missoula next month for the Grizzly Classic.

* While Montana's offense lacked its usual pop last weekend, its pitching staff had a solid showing. The Grizzlies allowed two or fewer runs in three of the four games and had a tournament ERA of 2.59.

Sophomore Sara Stephenson picked up her first win of the season, throwing three innings of hitless relief in Montana's tournament-opening 8-1 win over Santa Clara. She replaced freshman Michaela Hood, who allowed four hits and an unearned run in four effective innings.

In Sunday's 7-2 win over Santa Clara, junior Haley Young earned her first win of the year. Gifted a 6-0 lead by the middle of the third inning, Young cruised through 5.1 innings, with sophomore Colleen Driscoll getting the final five outs in relief.

Stephenson took the tough-luck defeat in Sunday's 2-0 loss to Seattle, the first time Montana had been shut out in 45 games. She gave up six hits and two runs in five innings of work, but her teammates could only generate a single hit against Larkins. Maddy Stensby pitched two hitless innings of relief.

The one hit was the fewest for Montana in a seven-inning game in the program's two-plus-year history.

* Junior Delene Colburn hit a team-best .429 in four games last weekend, going 6 for 14 with a home run and two runs scored. That raised her season average to .344.

Olea, 2 for 8 last weekend with six walks and three runs scored, leads the team with a .500 average.

* Montana went 4 for 21 (.190) against Seattle last weekend with runners on base and had just seven hits over 14 innings in two games against the Redhawks. The Grizzlies had 20 hits against Santa Clara. Sunday's 2-0 loss to Seattle lasted just 94 minutes, Montana's shortest game of the season.

* Stites's grand slam on Sunday against Santa Clara was a rare case of Montana coming through with the bases loaded this season. The Grizzlies are now 2 for 13 (.154) with the bases loaded.

* Olea may have gone hitless in her final three games last weekend, but she also drew six walks, which has put her on base every game this season. Dating back to last season she has reached base in 19 straight games.

Olea had a streak of 32 straight games reaching base last season and has safely reached base in 55 of Montana's last 57 games.

Upcoming: Montana will play Nebraska-Omaha, Utah, UNLV, Utah Valley and Utah State next week at the Red Desert Classic at St. George, Utah.

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Players Mentioned

Delene Colburn

Colleen Driscoll

Michaela Hood

Bethany Olea

Maddy Stensby

Sara Stephenson

Sydney Stites

Haley Young

University of Montana Athletics