Stretch run opens Saturday

The Montana women's basketball team will host Montana State and turn around and play a road game two days later at Northern Colorado as the hectic end of the Big Sky Conference regular season commences later this week.

The Lady Griz will face the Bobcats at 2 p.m. on Saturday at Dahlberg Arena in Missoula, then travel to Colorado on Sunday for a game on Monday at 7 p.m. in Greeley against the Bears, who will have had nine days between games when Montana rolls into town.

That's only the start of six games in 15 days for the Lady Griz, who will return from Colorado next Tuesday, only to leave on Friday for Saturday-Monday games at Southern Utah and Northern Arizona.

After arriving home that Tuesday, the Lady Griz will have a short turnaround before closing out the regular season by hosting Portland State and Sacramento State on Thursday, March 7, and Saturday, March 9.

Montana will travel to Boise on Sunday, March 10, for the Big Sky Conference tournament. The Lady Griz will play either a first-round game on Monday of tournament week or get a bye to Tuesday's quarterfinals.

Whew.

Coverage: All of Montana's games can be heard on KMPT 930 AM/99.7 FM in Missoula or viewed anywhere at WatchBigSky.com or Pluto TV.

Saturday's game will have the added bonus of SWX coverage, with Riley Corcoran returning to his roots and calling a women's basketball game. He'll be joined by Krista Redpath.

Since Corcoran has been covering the Montana men's basketball team all winter, let's get him up to speed on all things women's basketball for the benefit of the broadcast and its spectators.

The 25 things people will expect Corcoran to speak knowledgably about:

1. The Big Sky Conference has started to cleanly stratify. The regular-season champion is coming from one of these teams: Portland State (11-3 BSC), Idaho (11-3), Idaho State (11-4) and Northern Colorado (11-4).

Four teams within half a game of each other with three weeks to go? Delightful. And all four have at least one game remaining against another team from that group, three with multiple games? Giddy-up.

2. Those four teams will make up four of the five that will be receiving a bye to Tuesday's quarterfinals in Boise. The fifth team will likely come from a group of three teams: Montana State (8-7 BSC), Montana (7-7) and Eastern Washington (6-8).

It's not a desirable place to be, sitting outside the top five at regular season's end, not as it follows immediately on the heels of the demanding schedule above.

If Montana does not finish in the top five, the Lady Griz would have to play on Monday in Boise to escape the first round, turn around and play again on Tuesday to make it through the quarterfinals and again on Wednesday to make it through the semifinals.

If that's how it played out, that would make it nine games in 18 days for Montana in five different locations. Plus all the travel between those locations. That's NBA-level scheduling, and the pros aren't prepping for that upcoming organic chemistry exam.

"We'll really try to pay attention to how our bodies are feeling. We'll try to get the kids rested and recovered as best as possible," said Lady Griz coach Shannon Schweyen. "At this point of the season, having energy heading into games is the No. 1 priority."

3. Which leads to the conundrum Schweyen finds herself in. She has five starters who are playing heavy minutes and providing a bulk of the scoring, and will through Boise.

The four active Lady Griz on the bench are all first-year players: one redshirt freshman and three true freshmen. Montana needs those players to continue to develop, which comes through practice.

But she also wants to limit practice time for her starters. But her team's success over the next four weeks might depend on how much support that bench can provide, which would require long practices, which Schweyen doesn't want because the team's success also depends on keeping her starters fresh.

Follow?

"That's kind of the catch-22. You want those kids who don't get a lot of minutes to be progressing," said Schweyen. "You don't want to overwork the starters but you still want the other ones getting some good stuff done. We're trying to balance all that."

4. Corcoran should definitely lead off Saturday's broadcast declaring that the game is a must-win for the Lady Griz should they hope to finish in the top five. Mathematically that's not the case, but from a practical perspective it mostly is.

A loss would not only put Montana a game behind Montana State in that column, it would give the Bobcats a season sweep, the most important tiebreaker there is should teams end up tied.

Not to be overlooked: Eastern Washington, lurking one game back, already owns the head-to-head tiebreaker over Montana with its season sweep of the Lady Griz.

And with Montana facing Northern Colorado on Monday, with the Bears being maybe eight-point favorites after having been home since Feb. 12? Yes, he should go all in and declare it must-win. It ups the drama, which broadcasters love to do in their lead-in.

5. After going 1-4 on a stretch of five consecutive road games, Montana opened its current three-game home stand with a 64-56 victory over Weber State on Thursday night.

Yes, the Wildcats are in last place in the Big Sky standings, but that team would beat the last-place team from most previous seasons, which signals the overall improvement of the Big Sky.

Weber State could have helped itself by going better than 5 for 25 from the arc. But Montana also did its best to allow the Wildcats to hang around, going 10 for 25 from the line -- not the 3-point line, the free throw line -- and turning the ball over 18 times.

6. On Saturday afternoon, Montana got revenge on a team, Idaho State, which handed Montana a 50-34 setback in Pocatello last month, winning 60-59.

Montana was hot early, making nine of its first 12 shots to open the game, this against a team it went 14 for 54 against at Reed Gym. But it wouldn't last.

Over the final 1:39 of the first quarter and the entirety of the second, the Lady Griz went 1 for 20, which turned a 22-10 lead after one quarter into a 24-24 game at the half.

Montana scored the opening nine points of the third quarter and led the rest of the way, but the Lady Griz had to hold on for dear life.

Saylair Grandon, an 80-percent shooter at the line this season, had two free throws with 5.2 seconds left that could have tied the game. She made one of two.

Montana connected on a pair of free throws with 4.5 seconds remaining, and everyone looked on in confusion, and some delight, as the Bengals -- or: a Bengal -- made a full-court dash to the basket with her team trailing by three points. Her lay-in at the buzzer cut Montana's lead to one, which didn't help.

Montana shot 34.5 percent. In the team's eight other games this season shooting less than 40 percent, the Lady Griz were 0-8.

They prevailed this time because they turned the ball over 10 times, 11 fewer than they did against Idaho State on the road, and because they limited the Bengals to five second-chance points.

In other words, Montana found a new way to win, when the shots weren't falling. It gave the game a postseason feel, when it doesn't have to be pretty, it just has to lead to one more point than the opponent.

"We got off to a good start, which allowed us to weather that second quarter a little bit easier," said Schweyen. "That certainly helped.

"We talk all the time about how we've got to play good D and be able to get stops when we need them. When it comes down to it in big games, that's how you win. That's very important for our kids to understand.

"And then having those kind of experiences and feelings of stepping up to the line when you need to make two free throws, like Emma (Stockholm) did. Those are all good things."

7. The victories give Montana its first winning streak since taking four in a row against Saint Francis, Northern Arizona, Southern Utah and Sacramento State in December and early January.

"It was huge for us, morale-wise," said Schweyen. "To beat a team that's up at the top is always a good feeling, and Weber is better than their record from the way they've been playing people.

"It was nice to come home and get a couple and feel like you have a little momentum again."

8. In case Corcoran hasn't been paying attention, Montana has four players on the bench for the rest of the season, players who would be four-fifths of a pretty salty unit if the Big Sky wanted to add a 12th team in Boise. (Give them Lundberg and make them all healthy and they might win the thing.)

Sophia Stiles was injured 12 months ago. She could play, which she's doing in practice, but her return to green-light status did not arrive until late December. When Sammy Fatkin was declared eligible at the same time, it made sense for Stiles to sit the remainder of the year, with three full seasons to come.

Madi Schoening, who had 18 points, 14 rebounds and six assists the last time Montana State visited Dahlberg Arena, played the season-opening game at Gonzaga before developing a foot injury that's sidelined her for the season.

Taylor Goligoski developed a knee-related injury last month. She hasn't played since Montana hosted Northern Colorado on Jan. 12. Katie Mayhue has a torn tendon in her foot and other tendons that are damaged, which is why she is in a walking boot. She has been sidelined since Feb. 2.

9. Of course Montana isn't the only program down a player(s).Montana State lost its leading scorer, Claire Lundberg, to a season-ending knee injury on Feb. 4.

10. One player Montana did not see when the Lady Griz faced Montana State earlier this month was Martha Kuderer. She'll be back after missing a pair of games earlier this month with a concussion. Among MSU's active players, she ranks second in both scoring (10.0/g) and rebounding (5.1/g).

11. Northern Colorado has Savannah Smith, who has scored 30 or more points in four of the Bears' last six games, which means she must sense the postseason is approaching. She's dialed in. And Ali Meyer has grabbed 10 or more rebounds six of the last seven games. Neither one is hurt. Both are thriving.

12. When Montana played at Montana State earlier this month, the Lady Griz would have won ... if it had been a 10-minute game.

Montana held the Bobcats without a point for nearly five minutes to start the game and led 20-13 at the first-quarter break.

Then the Bobcats pretty much had their way, especially offensively, scoring 21 points in the second quarter, 21 in the third and 19 in the fourth to blow the game open.

Montana looked passive on defense. Reactive, a step slow, out of sync and sorts. Corcoran could use any of those descriptors. Or all of them.

"Our lack of communication with what we were supposed to be doing was horrible," said Schweyen. "We had too many mental errors, where somebody just didn't have somebody and because of it they got wide-open threes and layups. We just weren't into it at all."

With Montana focused on slowing down Lundberg, point guard Oliana Squires took over and brought everybody else along with her, finishing with 20 points and nine assists.

13. The defining play, which seemed to run on loop, was Squires coming off a high screen near the top of the key, then feasting on whatever mistake Montana made when trying to stop the simple but effective action.

Blaire Braxton (who said about Montana's defenders after the game, "I think they were confused") and Madeline Smith scored 24 points on 11-of-14 shooting, part of MSU's 34 points in the paint -- to go along with their nine 3-pointers. It was a balanced, inside-out attack that Montana couldn't slow.

14. Even with an early nine-point head start, Montana couldn't keep up offensively for the full 40 minutes. The Lady Griz scored just seven points in the second quarter, 11 in the third. By that point the deficit was 17 and the game was over.

Montana shot 28.8 percent for the game, its second-lowest output of the season (behind the 25.9 percent the Lady Griz shot at Idaho State).

"On the offensive end, we got plenty of good shots. We just didn't make them," said Schweyen, whose team missed 52 shots but only turned those into 15 offensive rebounds and 11 second-chance points, which didn't help matters.

15. Corcoran was around the Montana-Montana State games last year, so he can probably sense at least the first part of a repeat from last season, when the Bobcats outscored the Lady Griz by 16 over the second and third quarters in Bozeman to pull away for an 81-64 victory.

When the teams met up in Missoula a few weeks later, Montana led 34-30 at the half, then pulled away in the third quarter, outscoring MSU 27-11. The Lady Griz shot 60.7 percent in the second half to win 87-63 behind Schoening's big game.

We'll find out Saturday if history truly repeats itself, on both legs of the series.

16. Montana may lead the series 78-28, but Montana State has won six of the last eight meetings.

Things have even changed in Missoula, where the Lady Griz lead 46-7. Of those seven MSU wins in Missoula, more than half (four) have come in the last decade. In the teams' last nine matchups at Dahlberg Arena, Montana has won five times, Montana State four.

17. Let's pause here to give Corcoran an update on some Lady Griz:

18. Jace Henderson, the team's lone senior, leads the Big Sky in field goal percentage (.591). She ranks third in rebounding (8.5/g) and seventh in assists (3.9/g). She leads the team in that last category by eight over point guard McKenzie Johnston, which speaks to her vision and passing out of the post.

Note to Corcoran: Henderson had an assist last week when she caught the ball in the air on the right-side post. Before she landed, she twisted and fired a cross-court pass to Emma Stockholm, who hit the open jumper. It was sweet.

Since she took 17 shots against Idaho (and made 13), defenses have turned more of their focus on Henderson. In the seven games since, she is averaging just seven attempts per game. But they are quality. She went 5 for 5 at Weber State and was 9 for 13 in two home games last week.

I suppose we should fill Corcoran in on this as well, in case Saturday is a close game that comes down to free throw shooting. Henderson went 1 for 11 from the line against Weber State, 4 for 8 against Idaho State, and is shooting 51.1 percent from the line this season, well below her field goal percentage.

19. Gabi Harrington is turning into a monster. If we could give her one more rebound in six of Montana's recent games when she had nine boards, she would have nine double-doubles in the last 13 games.

She is leading Montana in scoring in league at 13.6 points.

20. Speaking of players Schweyen needs to keep an eye on as it relates to how much energy she is putting into non-game activities, McKenzie Johnston has played all but four minutes over Montana's last eight games.

She is coming off a quintessential McKenzie Johnston game, with 12 points, 11 rebounds and five steals. Do that against Idaho State without leaving the floor and it will take its toll, unless steps are taken to recover.

21. Sammy Fatkin transferred to Montana from Arizona last spring. She was declared eligible by the NCAA in late December to begin playing immediately.

Since moving into the starting lineup for Montana's home win over Idaho, she is averaging 11.9 points and has become Montana's top threat from the arc, shooting 43.2 percent in her starts.

22. Two days after Montana hosts Montana State, the Lady Griz will be playing at Northern Colorado. The Bears defeated the Lady Griz in Missoula last month 73-62, jumping out to a 22-7 lead and never looking back.

Savannah Smith scored 15 points in the first quarter and the Bears connected on seven 3-pointers in the first half to lead by 12 at the break.

The lead was 17 early in the fourth quarter before Montana made a run to cut it to six, 68-62, with 2:54 to go. From that point, the Lady Griz went 0 for 5 with three turnovers as Northern Colorado held on.

Portland State limited Smith to five points in 38 minutes, which doesn't seem possible, in the Vikings' 85-66 home win over the Bears on Feb. 9.

"They're the only ones who have halfway held her down. Nobody else has really been able to. She's pretty automatic," said Schweyen.

23. One oddity about Northern Colorado is how vulnerable the Bears have been on their home floor during league. While UNC is 6-1 in Big Sky road games, it is just 5-3 at home, with losses to Montana State, Weber State and Eastern Washington.

And Idaho State continues to stew about losing in Greeley, in a game the Bengals had the ball in the closing seconds of a tie game. That it didn't even go to overtime -- and that Northern Colorado won by four in regulation -- tells you everything you need to know how those final few seconds played out.

24. Northern Colorado is coming off a 77-72 home victory over Idaho on Saturday. The Bears trailed by three going into the fourth quarter but did to the Vandals what they did in winning earlier this season in Moscow: outscore the Big Sky's highest-scoring team.

UNC hit four of its first five shots to open the final period. That gave the Bears, who put up 30 points in the fourth quarter, a lead they would never give back.

In a head-to-head battle of the Big Sky's top two players, Savannah Smith put up 35 points to out-do Mikayla Ferenz, who had 26.

25. Northern Colorado has won five consecutive games in the series. Montana holds the overall lead at 17-11 and has gone 7-5 against the Bears in Greeley.

Bonus notes: Montana ranks first in the Big Sky and 11th nationally in fewest fouls committed per game at 13.7. ... The Lady Griz are 8-3 at home this season. The Bobcats are a decent 6-7 away from Bozeman. ... Montana's two points in the second quarter on Saturday against Idaho State was, not surprisingly, its lowest-scoring period of the season. The previous low was the six points the Lady Griz scored at Gonzaga in the second quarter in the opening game of the season.

Around the Big Sky Conference:

Here is what each team has left prior to Boise:

Portland State (11-3) (2 home, 4 away): at ISU, at SAC, UI, EWU, at UM, at MSU
Idaho (11-3) (4 home, 2 away): NAU, SUU, at PSU, at SAC , WSU, ISU
Idaho State (11-4) (3 home, 2 away): PSU, WSU, UNC, at EWU, at UI
Northern Colorado (11-4) (2 home, 3 away): UM, at ISU, at WSU, SUU, at NAU
Montana State (8-7) (2 home, 3 away): at UM, at NAU, at SUU, SAC, PSU
Montana (7-7) (3 home, 3 away): MSU, at UNC, at SUU, at NAU, PSU, SAC
Eastern Washington (6-8) (4 home, 2 away): SUU, NAU, at SAC, at PSU, ISU, WSU
Sacramento State (6-9) (3 home, 2 away): PSU, EWU, UI, at MSU, at UM
Northern Arizona (5-10) (3 home, 2 away): at UI, at EWU, MSU, UM, UNC
Southern Utah (3-12) (2 home, 3 away): at EWU, at UI, UM, MSU, at UNC
Weber State (2-14) (1 home, 3 away): at ISU, UNC, at UI, at EWU

Thursday's schedule: NAU at UI, SUU at EWU, PSU at ISU

Game to monitor: Portland State at Idaho State -- The Bengals downed the Vikings 58-57 in Portland earlier this month when Estefania Ors drained a 3-pointer with five seconds left. PSU will take a four-game winning streak into Reed Gym, where ISU is 8-2, with losses to Idaho and Northern Arizona.

Saturday's schedule: MSU at UM, WSU at ISU, NAU at EWU, SUU at UI, PSU at SAC

Game to monitor: Northern Arizona at Eastern Washington -- The Eagles lost a heartbreaker at home to Idaho on Monday night. They'll be favored in their other two home games this week. Wins in both would keep the pressure on Montana and Montana State. EWU won by two in the matchup in Flagstaff.

Monday's schedule: UM at UNC

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Players Mentioned

Sammy Fatkin

Taylor Goligoski

Gabi Harrington

Jace Henderson

McKenzie Johnston

Katie Mayhue

Madi Schoening

Sophia Stiles

Emma Stockholm

University of Montana Athletics