Griz Tennis and the season that could have been

For full interview with Oisin Shaffrey, click the photo above.

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The Montana men's tennis team was on a roll.

Not long after the Grizzlies had picked up their seventh-straight win on March 8 and were turning their focus to the annual Brawl of the Wild match against Montana State, the rug was pulled out.

On March 13, the Big Sky Conference, like nearly every other conference in the country at that time, made the difficult decision to suspend spring sports due to the COVID-19 crisis and would go on to cancel the spring season a week later.

The cancellation, while understandable, threw the brakes on a Grizzly season that was just getting revved up.

Before the shutdown, Montana was coming off a weekend sweep of its first two conference matches of the season – both convincing wins over Northern Colorado (5-2) and Portland State (6-1) to open the league season at 2-0.

The Griz had rattled off five-straight wins in the leadup to that weekend, and at 8-3 overall, an upset win over Nevada under their belts, and a pair of tight 3-4 losses to Boise State and Gonzaga, the Grizzlies were headed into the Griz/Cat match with a full head of steam.

It was that momentum that made the sudden shutdown of sports worldwide that much more difficult to bear for a Griz team that was starting to realize the sky was the limit in 2020.

"Obviously, it was disappointing across the board for everyone. Around the world, it went from zero to 100 so fast. It was a Wednesday, and we were just finishing practice, preparing to play the Bobcats, and 24 hours later, it was basically over," said UM head coach Jason Brown.

"We were really on to something special this season. It probably makes it worse in some ways. I was looking forward to how the journey of the 2020 season was going to end because I really felt like some good things were happening for us across the board, on and off the court."

In the span of a couple of days, the dreams of student-athletes around the country all came crashing down. And for the young Grizzlies (who had a roster built primarily of sophomores) who were just starting to make strides to the top of the conference ladder, the shutdown was especially tough.

"It was all just so surreal. The whole experience," said sophomore Oisin Shaffrey now completing his semester from his home in Dublin, Ireland.

"They stopped everything, and we couldn't really believe what's going on, and two weeks later, I'm back home in Dublin, Ireland. So, hard luck, but that's the way it is."

Before the shutdown, Griz tennis was just starting to feel good about itself and its prospects for the season. Really good.

The team had just won nine of the last ten doubles points - the first Grizzly team ever to accomplish that feat - and was starting to pile up impressive wins from the youngsters while the two experienced seniors guided the top of the lineup.

"Everyone was improving. Their tennis level was getting better and better. We talk a lot about how your tennis in August doesn't matter much, but your tennis in March and April is where we want to peak, and I felt like it was coming together," said Brown.

In fact, the bottom of the lineup had become almost untouchable.

Sophomore Pontus Hallgren went an undefeated 8-0 to start the season, primarily on courts five and six.

Just ahead of him, Shaffrey was dominating with a 9-2 overall record and nine-straight wins, including big three-set wins against opponents from Gonzaga and Boise State.

He started strong and seemed to be picking up steam, going four sets without dropping a single game, and winning his last five matches by a total game tally of 60-13, all in straight sets.

As the wins at the bottom of the lineup count just as much as the wins at the top in college tennis, the Griz could sense something good was happening.

"Those guys at the bottom of the lineup were just absolutely tearing through people in ways that made me feel like it was going to be really difficult for any Big Sky teams to beat us this year," said Brown.

"We were looking really strong, in particular the last two matches - two tough conference matches against decent teams, and we kind of just put a beating on them," said Shaffrey.

"It was a pretty straight-forward win for us. We were just so excited to see what was going to happen."

With a roaring start in hand, what could have potentially happened next for the Griz would have been historic.

While no schedule is ever a give-in, Montana was heading in the direction of yet another berth at the Big Sky tourney with a conference championship not out of the realm of possibility.

A look at the schedule shows the Griz with the home-court advantage in this year's Brawl of the Wild match. After a spring break trip to California to play Sacramento State, UM then returned home to face perennial contenders Idaho and Eastern Washington.

A pair of tough road trips were waiting at the end of the schedule, but Brown thinks that his team was in a position to be at the top when the dust settled, making for an exciting finish to the regular season.

"I think we were going to put ourselves in a really nice position to get a top-two seed. It was still early. We had eight Big Sky matches left, but looking at how some of the other matches went, I don't think we were going to lose at home. We had a couple of very winnable road matches, and a couple late tough ones at Weber and NAU that probably would have decided where we would have finished.

"I can't imagine us finishing outside of the top four with the talent level, and I think those two matches would have determined that," said Brown.

"I would have loved to see it happen. I don't think there was a limit on what this team could do."

But it's all pie in the sky now as Montana can only look ahead to the 2021 season when the world returns to some semblance of normalcy.

However, with the NCAA granting an extra season of eligibility to student-athletes in spring sports, all of a sudden, the Griz are looking to pick up where they left off with one of the most experienced rosters in the league.

No longer will Montana take the court with a young lineup. On paper, UM will have sophomores up and down the card, but with the extra year Shaffrey and his classmates will be juniors academically and a year older and wiser when they return.

With a pair of highly regarded freshmen set to join the team in the fall, things are looking up for a long time to come for Griz tennis.

"It felt like they all kind of skipped their sophomore year and were all performing like upperclassmen right away this year," said Brown.

"I'm really excited about our two recruits coming in as well, and the idea we can basically have the same team for the next three seasons. We've got great student-athletes. These guys are crushing it in the class and on the court. It's one of the best groups of guys I've ever seen as far as guys who all get along, all root for each other, and all push each other to be better."

University of Montana Athletics

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