Lady Griz to universe: We good?

McKenzie Johnston is scarred.

Note the double r's please, because she's not scared, she's scarred, and nobody can fault her for that, not with the way she plays, sticking her nose into everyone else's business on the court. In a good way.

Call her hard-nosed -- and you'd be right in doing so -- but it's still flesh and soft bone, and it's been broken. Then broken again. And probably re-broken. No one is really keeping track anymore.

It looks pretty good these days, that nose does. Of course that's only after it snaps back into place each morning, a daily ritual now as routine as brushing her teeth.

Get up, get dressed, fix hair, straighten nose, eat breakfast ... READY.

It will probably get broken again this winter, during her final season as a Lady Griz. Her eyes will water, her nose will take on an odd new shape, and she'll move on with life. Maybe even miss a play or two.

She's able to joke about it now, how she has the perfect introductory line should she ever be given a spot on The Bachelor. "I may have broken my nose a few times, but I won't break your heart."

She laughs at the absurdity of it all, but she does so after talking about the last few years as a member of the Lady Griz, so it feels like she might be laughing about that as well, the what-can-you-do? laugh of resignation.

It's almost all that's left to do, given the feeling that the universe has been toying with the program ever since Shannon Schweyen took over in July 2016.

For nearly four decades the Lady Griz program sailed along in smooth waters. It was as repeatable and predictable as anything that's ever been in the Big Sky Conference.

Win league by a wide margin, host tournament, win tournament in front of a passionate fan base, go to NCAA tournament. And repeat and repeat and repeat. Everyone tried, nobody could keep up.

Going from Robin Selvig to Schweyen wasn't supposed to change anything, the greatest coach in Big Sky history simply passing his playbook to the greatest female athlete in Big Sky history.

August 10, 2016, was the day Schweyen was named head coach, but that's not the date that led to this.

That would be Oct. 10, exactly two months later, when Kayleigh Valley, the best player in the Big Sky at the time, went down with a season-ending knee injury.

A young, mostly inexperienced team that couldn't afford to lose its bellwether had been sucker punched.

And the hits have kept coming. Stop us when you've had enough: Kayleigh Valley, again, Alycia Harris, Sophia Stiles, Madi Schoening, Taylor Goligoski. Others.

Yes, McKenzie Johnston, who's been the point guard through all of it, going from redshirt in Selvig's final year to being asked to help carry the team before she'd played her first collegiate game, has been battered and bruised. And that nose: broken.

It's the expected wear and tear from having more than 3,100 minutes played on her odometer, with only one way known how to compete: all out, all the time.

But seeing all those teammates go down, all the promising signs that things were becoming right again, only to watch the team suffer another setback, has left a mark, this one going much more than skin deep.

McKenzie Johnston is scarred. Deep-down scarred. So much so that she can only laugh about it, hope for the best but ready, always ready, for the next lightning strike to land upon the program.

The team has been practicing, on a limited basis, since school started in late August. Things start for real on Wednesday afternoon, the countdown then on to the Maroon-Silver scrimmage, the first exhibition game, the regular-season opener.

Johnston is ready, but like so many of her teammates she's had to reset what winning the day actually means.

"If there are no injuries in practice, it's a good thing at this point," she said. "I do think about that. Everything went smooth? Nobody got hurt? That's a good practice for us.

"Every practice you go into it hoping for the best and getting through it. When someone goes down, for whatever reason, everyone's face goes ghost. Everyone is expecting the worst."

It's no way for the leader of what might be the best collection of talent in the Big Sky -- assuming everyone is somewhat healthy -- to talk, no vibe for a program to give off. But that's the reality.

There is the sense of a fog lingering over the program, and not by anyone's doing mind you. It's just the result of the way things have gone down, players mostly, due to injury. It's the understandable end result, a reflex at this point, an assumption.

What's needed now is a refreshing wind to arrive, something that will clear the air of the daily dread, the fog, the feeling that if a day has passed when everything went well, then trouble must be lurking around here somewhere.

Yes, there is anticipation for the year ahead -- Sophie's back! Jamie's here! -- but it's always muted. There has been preseason excitement before, and we all know where that's led. Wait, who's hurt now?

So what say you, universe? We all good here? Finally?

"I think it's all connected," said Johnston. "A lot of the girls are looking at the season with that mindset. I think we've been through enough at this point. We don't need to go through any more of the bad stuff.

"It's time for us to have a good season and have everything go smoothly and be able to play without those other factors."

The loss of Valley was the most noticeable blow (x2), but March 11 had to be the low point.

Stiles, Schoening, Goligoski and Katie Mayhue -- who could be 4/5's of a pretty salty team -- were already sitting, limiting Montana's numbers. Then, on the opening day of the Big Sky tournament in Boise, Gabi Harrington and Emma Stockholm came down with the flu.

Both gave it a go. Harrington, so ready to play in her hometown, was dehydrated despite taking an earlier IV. She gutted out 15 minutes on a tank showing empty.

Stockholm tried as well. Something, somewhere, wasn't having it. Hmmm, concussion is a new one. It arrives in the second quarter, ending her night after her head hits the floor at CenturyLink Arena, probably after taking another charge, something that's become her selfless specialty.

And don't forget about Carmen Gfeller. Zero minutes played: illness.

And Montana falls to Southern Utah, the proud Lady Griz program, which owned this tournament for so long, not even sticking around for the QUARTERFINALS.

Again: Hasn't this just about been enough now? Where is the balance?

"I don't necessarily think you're ever owed anything in life, but we would be hoping that this would be a year when some good fortune would fall our way a little bit," said Schweyen.

"This group has been through a lot together and shown some toughness through some really difficult times. We're keeping our fingers crossed that this is our year."

So we keep our fingers crossed for them, with them, knowing the Big Sky Conference is wide, wide, wide open, the dominant storyline for the upcoming season not what's back but what's been lost: maybe the best graduating class in league history.

Savannah Smith at Northern Colorado? Off to play in Spain. Idaho's Mikayla Ferenz and Taylor Pierce? Their 3,156 made 3-pointers now a part of history. Sidney Rielly, Ashley Bolston and Courtney West, last seen playing for Portland State in the NCAA tournament: gone.

It's doubtful Montana will land atop the Big Sky preseason poll next month, but you could make a solid argument for it.

What other team has this much depth? Who else has this level of guard play? Did any other program add an ESPN Top 100 recruit? Of course no one has seen it all together, at one time, so there will be doubters. And rightfully so. We'll all believe it when we can actually see it. Our faith has been tested.

Should things turn favorable, it might lead to a new issue: where are all the minutes going to come to keep everyone happy and satisfied? "I'll take that over the end of last season," says Johnston, who will have to live those words. Stiles and Sammy Fatkin would love some time at the point.

"Finding the balance with that will be tough, but if we all stay together, we have a lot of talent and can be pretty deep."

Of course Lady Griz basketball is still Lady Griz basketball. The crowds still come out, unwavering in their support. The banners still hang overhead in Dahlberg Arena, a warning to visiting teams what lies before them.

But that mystique has taken a hit as well. Montana has lost 18 games at home the last three seasons, almost more than the decades of the 80s and 90s put together.

It's what Johnston most wants as her Lady Griz epitaph, that she helped return Montana to being Montana, that quality that is hard to define but easy to quantify: wins, championships, etc.

Because of the history of the program -- 24 regular-season conference titles, 21 NCAA tournament appearances -- she knows there is only one true outcome that is acceptable to make it so.

"For me, to be successful, I think we have to win it all," she said. "I think we have to win the conference. I don't want to have anything less than that.

"My goal growing up was always to play in the (NCAA) tournament. I hope to be able to fulfill that this year."

But that's still six months away, time for all sorts of calamity and mayhem to strike. See, we're doing it again, assuming the worst. It's going to take us all some time.

Johnston as well. She's been hardened by it while still holding out hope for the best. That's all she can wish for. Each day that goes by, each healthy practice, is another step in the right direction.

Those scars? They've toughened McKenzie Johnston. They've prepared her to handle defeat, in life or on the court, not that she will ever be accepting of it.

Nothing would salve them like a net draped around her neck in March in Boise, her team celebrating with her, Montana back where Montana belongs. Let the journey commence.

University of Montana Athletics

Players Mentioned

Sammy Fatkin

Carmen Gfeller

Taylor Goligoski

Gabi Harrington

Alycia Harris

McKenzie Johnston

Katie Mayhue

Madi Schoening

Sophia Stiles

Emma Stockholm

Kayleigh Valley

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