Griz host Bears as league play arrives

The Montana women's soccer team will open its five-week Big Sky Conference schedule this weekend when it hosts Northern Colorado at South Campus Stadium.

The match between the Bears and Grizzlies, picked second and third in the preseason coaches' poll, with both teams collecting a first-place vote, will start at noon on Sunday.

As travel partners, it will be the only match of the weekend for both teams. Both will face two-match weekends the remainder of the league schedule.

Coverage: Watch it on Pluto TV or at WatchBigSky.com, with Cole Johnson calling the match, or follow along with live stats.

Happenings: Fans with a ticket from Saturday's home football game against Sacramento State will get in free of charge. ... Sunday is the program's 25-year anniversary game, with alumni on hand for a weekend of activities. Former players will be recognized at halftime of Sunday's match.

The start of league: The Big Sky's 10 soccer-playing schools will all begin their conference schedules this weekend. Sacramento State/Portland State are at Eastern Washington/Idaho and Southern Utah/Northern Arizona are at Weber State/Idaho State.

The final day of league matches will be Sunday, Oct. 21. The Big Sky tournament, this year being hosted by Weber State in Ogden, Utah, will open with quarterfinal matches on Wednesday, Oct. 31.

Montana is the only league team scheduled to play a match between the close of the league's regular season and the tournament. The Grizzlies will play at California Baptist on Friday, Oct. 26.

Montana-Northern Colorado match notes:

* Over the previous seven seasons, from 2011-17, Montana and Northern Colorado both posted a Big Sky Conference record of 35-18-12, the best winning percentage (.631) in the league during that time.

Neither program was able to turn that regular-season success into much postseason success, however. Montana won the Big Sky tournament title just once in those seven years, in 2011. Same for the Bears, who won it in 2015.

* The teams' most recent meeting came last November in the semifinals of the Big Sky tournament in Cheney, Wash., and the way the match played out has stuck with the Grizzlies.

Alexa Coyle opened the scoring with a goal in the 17th minute. Northern Colorado evened it in the 72nd minute on what was maybe the softest goal the Grizzlies allowed all of last season and won it in double overtime, in the 104th minute, to end the No. 2 seed's season.

"We have a lot to play for," said senior Janessa Fowler this week about the next chapter of the two successful teams' shared history. The midfielder was on the field all 104 of those minutes in Cheney in November. After a long pause to consider saying more, she repeated, "We have a lot to play for."

It perhaps balanced out the postseason frustration at 1-1. Montana, the No. 4 seed, upset host and No. 1 seed Northern Colorado at the 2011 Big Sky tournament in Greeley, in a shootout in the semifinals, back when only four teams made the postseason.

* Neither team comes in with a head of steam. Northern Colorado felt like it was on a roll just two weeks ago, when the Bears swept Wyoming and Grand Canyon, a team that took Washington State into overtime, at home by scores of 4-1 and 2-1, but UNC was swept last week by SMU and Texas.

Playing at home against SMU, the Bears allowed four goals on the six shots on goal they faced and lost 4-0. On Sunday in Austin, Northern Colorado lost 3-0 to No. 14 Texas in a match that was statistically closer than the final would suggest.

The SMU match was nothing new for UNC. The Bears lost 2-1 at South Dakota in a match they allowed a total of three shots.

Montana goes into league with just a single win, its final-minute victory at home over Vermont on Aug. 31. It's the fewest wins going into the Big Sky schedule for the Grizzlies since 2010.

The team has scored just three goals through eight matches, just one in its last 400 minutes played, the lowest total in the Big Sky.

"We're creating tons of opportunities, we're just not scoring tons of goals," said first-year coach Chris Citowicki.

"We made a couple of changes between the UNLV game and Washington State, and it's really opened up opportunities a bit more and given more confidence to the players up front. I feel we're in a spot now where the goals are about to come. The team is hungry."

Montana's eight opponents this season have a .929 save percentage against the Grizzlies and a 0.36 goals against average.

* Both teams are coming off losses to ranked opponents. Facing No. 16 Washington State on Friday night in Pullman, the Grizzlies pulled within a goal at 2-1 in the 63rd minute, but the Cougars reestablished their two-goal cushion with an insurance goal in the 70th.

Montana's goal came off the left foot of Alexa Coyle, who was played beautifully into scoring position by Kennedy Yost. It was Coyle's fifth career goal, Yost's second career assist and highlighted a second half that was played on mostly even terms.

"That match for us wasn't about the result. The main focus was about the level of competition we were going to need against a team like that," said Citowicki. "They come out of the gates flying and are so physical and competitive. If you don't show up, they are going to completely run you over.

"For us it was, can we compete with someone at that level? Can we grind? Can we work that hard? Can we compete against one of the best teams in the country? We have some pieces of the puzzle we still have to put together, but at least we showed we're going to fight. We're not going to get steamrolled."

* The player to watch for Northern Colorado on Sunday will be senior midfielder Mariel Gutierrez, first-team All-Big Sky as a freshman, sophomore and junior and the Big Sky's Top Newcomer in 2015. She was voted all-region as both a freshman and a junior.

Gutierrez had nine goals and six assists last season. She has eight points in nine matches this fall, with three goals and two assists. She scored goals in three consecutive matches, against South Dakota, Wyoming and Grand Canyon.

In goal for all but 45 minutes this season has been Taylor Washington, a true freshman from San Diego.

On the sideline for Northern Colorado, now in his 20th season, is Tim Barrera. His teams have gone 6-4-4 against Montana since the Bears joined the Big Sky in 2006.

* That record matches the series history between the two programs, with Northern Colorado leading 6-4-4. Montana hasn't defeated the Bears since that magical season of 2014, when the Grizzlies went 8-0-2 through league. The Grizzlies are 0-2-2 against the Bears in the three seasons since.

* Despite its 1-5-2 record, Montana has been outshot by just one (96-95) through eight matches and has generated more corner kicks (30-29) than its opponents, but the Grizzlies have been outscored 11-3, and that's really the statistic that matters.

* Members of the big-numbers club: sophomore goalkeeper Claire Howard has played every minute this season, as has senior center back Taryn Miller. Redshirt freshman Caitlin Rogers has played 748, sophomore outside back Taylor Hansen 738.

Farther up the field, senior Ellie Otteson has logged 688 minutes, sophomore Kennedy Yost 675.

Around the Big Sky Conference:

* Northern Arizona (4-3-1), Eastern Washington (4-3-2) and Northern Colorado (4-5-0) all won a league-high four nonconference matches.

* Montana (1-5-2), Sacramento State (1-6-2), Idaho State (1-6-0) and Southern Utah (1-8-0) all have just a single win.

* Half of the teams in the Big Sky are averaging less than a goal per match: Idaho and Eastern Washington (0.89), Weber State (0.62), Southern Utah (0.56) and Montana (0.38).

* Only Northern Colorado (1.44) and Sacramento State (1.22) are averaging more than a goal per match.

Pre-league Big Sky Conference awards:

* Best win (1 of 2): Weber State 3, UC Santa Barbara 2 -- The Wildcats scored the game-winner in the 84th minute to defeat a team that is currently 7-2.

* Best win (2 of 2): Idaho 3, Seattle 2 -- The Vandals won on the road against a team that had previously defeated Eastern Washington and Portland State by the same 3-0 margin.

* Most bizarre result (1 of 3): Idaho State 5, Utah State 4 -- In their six losses, the Bengals were outscored 24-2 (checks math, confirms that's correct). This was their lone win and is the most goals scored this season by a Big Sky team.

* Most bizarre result (2 of 3): Southern Utah 2, UNLV 0 -- The Thunderbirds' lone win in nine matches this season. The Rebels are currently 6-2-1. SUU scored twice in the opening 8:19 and held on.

* Most bizarre result (3 of 3): San Francisco 5, Sacramento State 0 -- Sure, the Dons are 7-3, but they led 4-0 less than 18 minutes in against a team expected to contend in the Big Sky this season.

* Best coaching job: Jeremy Clevenger, Idaho -- His team is 3-5-1 and has been shut out five times, but let's remember he was hired on July 11 and took over a team picked seventh in the preseason poll.

* Best individual performance: Morgan Quarnberg, Weber State -- The 7-2 Gauchos of UC Santa Barbara have allowed nine goals through nine matches. Quarnberg has two of them. She opened the scoring in the 15th minute and added the game-winner in the 84th in WSU's 3-2 home victory over UCSB.

Upcoming: Montana will remain at home and face Eastern Washington and Idaho next week at South Campus Stadium.

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Players Mentioned

Alexa Coyle

Janessa Fowler

Taylor Hansen

Claire Howard

Taryn Miller

Ellie Otteson

Caitlin Rogers

Kennedy Yost

University of Montana Athletics