Griz open 2021 season on Tuesday

When Montana walked off Gillette Field in Wilson, N.C., in April following its 1-0 loss to South Carolina in the opening round of the NCAA women's soccer tournament, it marked the end of an era.

Gone was Claire Howard, the Big Sky Conference career leader in shutouts, the keeper who was in goal for all but 133 minutes the last four seasons.

Departing was Alexa Coyle, who led the Grizzlies in points each of the last four years and was the face and voice of the program since she was a freshman.

Out were Avery Adams, a two-time first-team All-Big Sky Conference midfielder, and Rita Lang, the unheralded one who was better, a lot better and a lot more valuable, than her honorable-mention accolades suggested.

And others graduated out as well.

"With that class, it was players who were featured very early in their careers. I knew about Alexa before I even got here," says fourth-year coach Chris Citowicki, who was an assistant at North Dakota in 2017, when Coyle was in her first year as a Grizzly.

"When you thought of Alexa, you thought of Montana. It just correlated."

As difficult as it will be to replace those players, it's time for some new correlations and fresh faces that come to mind when you hear the words Griz Soccer.

Six starters will be back when Montana holds its first practice of the season on Tuesday afternoon at South Campus Stadium, where the Grizzlies have not played a match since Oct. 20, 2019, a 4-0 victory over Portland State.

Six other letterwinners return, as do six players who were on the team last spring, when Montana, playing its home games on the artificial turf at Missoula County Stadium, went 9-2-0, the program's best winning percentage in its history.

The Grizzlies won the Big Sky's Northwest Division title with a 7-1-0 league record, then claimed the league's tournament championship with a 2-1 overtime victory over Northern Colorado.

It was the program's eighth regular-season championship, its sixth tournament title, its fifth NCAA tournament appearance.

Trying to add to that legacy, a resume that's the envy of every other team in the Big Sky, will be those 18 returners plus 11 newcomers, a group made up of two transfers and nine incoming freshmen.

"It's just the classic collegiate athletics model of birth and renewal, birth and renewal," said Citowicki. "It's time for new people to come in and step up and do their job.

"It's going to be exciting to see who steps up next and who the next faces of the program are going to be."

One of the faces will be -- and has been for some time now -- Taylor Hansen, who plays outside back but has never been one to be boxed into anything so limited as a singular position.

Long part of Montana's lockdown defense, Hansen insinuated herself more and more into the team's attack in the spring, finishing with two goals and three assists, including the helper on Taylor Stoeger's overtime winner against Northern Colorado that sent the Grizzlies to North Carolina.

She is that player, the one who even fans of the opposing team watch and then keep watching, unable to turn away. She is skilled, relentless and never stops.

And she is experienced beyond pretty much every player in program history. She has played four years and will get a fifth because of the blanket waiver offered up by the NCAA due to COVID.

When she is done in November, she'll have played more than 90 matches as a Grizzly. The program record is 85.

"There is just this level of experience and dedication and commitment with Taylor. She lives and breathes this team and this sport," said Citowicki.

"You don't have to ever worry about Tay. She'll get the job done and is just such a positive influence on everybody that's she's around."

The team's most high-profile opening will be at goalkeeper, the position Howard had on lockdown the last four seasons. The shoes she leaves behind, unfilled as the season opens, are quite large.

All she did was end her career with those 32 shutouts and a miniscule 0.83 goals-against average. In 73 matches with Howard in goal the last four seasons, Montana allowed 63 goals.

Whoever wins the position this fall will go into the team's regular-season opener at Creighton in just over two weeks' time with zero minutes of collegiate experience, outside of the team's upcoming exhibition matches.

Vying for the spot will be junior Elizabeth Todd, redshirt freshman Camellia Xu and freshman Sophia Pierce of Missoula.

"We just have to let it play out," said Citowicki. "Putting too much emphasis on it would be the wrong thing to do, so they are going to be eased into it psychologically.

"They were all recruited to play. Now that Claire is gone, let's see who's ready to go. It is Elizabeth? Is it Cam? Is it Sophia? I don't know."

Whoever the starter is against the Bluejays on Aug. 19 will have plenty of help in front of her.

The starting back line in the spring, with Allie Larsen and Molly Quarry at center back, Hansen and Kilpatrick at outside back, returns.

They are a goalkeeper's best friend, allowing as they did last season fewer than eight shots per game and just 42 shots on goal in 11 matches.

And don't forget about fifth-year senior Caitlin Rogers, the Big Sky co-Defensive MVP in 2019 who was limited to 33 minutes in the spring because of a previous injury.

"Luckily for whoever the goalkeeper is, you've got a lot of protection right in front of you," said Citowicki.

Coyle finished her career with 19 goals, which is tied for ninth in program history, but it ranks third among players who have started their careers since 2000, following the conclusion of the high-scoring 90s.

Her loss is a hit in ways more than just producing goals and being the focus of every opposing team's scouting report, but Montana has a number of threats to replace her production.

Stoeger, a fifth-year senior and the MVP of April's Big Sky tournament, scored four goals last season, one off Coyle's team lead.

Sami Siems scored three, all on the same weekend, Hansen two, Larsen one. Junior Jaden Griggs didn't score, but she is one of a number of players who is ready for an increased role, to step into the spotlight.

"How many of them were in the shadow, who wanted to step up but it wasn't their time?" asked Citowicki.

The attack will look different simply because of Coyle's absence. She drew defenders to her like filings to a magnet, and she still managed to produce match after match despite carrying the load of headliner.

"It will be different because Alexa was such a target," said Citowicki. "Give it to Lex, jump on my back everybody, I'll get it done.

"Now you kind of split that between people. If you have Taylor (Stoeger) and Jaden up front, for instance, two people who are always looking for others, you have more of a collaborative environment. It's going to have a different flavor to it."

The season will as well, at least at the start. It's the traditional month to kick off a campaign, but nothing else has been traditional about the last year and a half.

The 2020 spring season was cut short. The team reported to campus last year at this time, only to have the fall season delayed, then postponed to the spring.

It was April 29 when Montana returned from North Carolina, its spring season concluded. That was barely three months ago, which needs to be taken into account. That end usually comes in November, with a less demanding spring season to follow.

"On paper it looks normal, but it's not normal because of the limited time we had off," said Citowicki. "We're still easing our way into it, because you don't want to fall into the trap of going too hard too soon.

"I'm reminding the team of that. I know we're all gung-ho and want to sprint into this, but let's be careful. We still don't know the effect the spring season is going to have on us. We're excited but also preparing to make sure we maximize it while not pushing too hard."

The regular season opens at Creighton on Thursday night, Aug. 19. Montana makes its home debut against Portland on Sunday, Aug. 22.

The Grizzlies also will play nonconference home matches against MSU Billings (Aug. 29), Texas Southern (Sept. 10) and Boise State (Sept. 12).

Montana kicks off its Big Sky schedule with a mark-your-calendar matchup at Northern Arizona on Friday night, Sept. 24, in Flagstaff.

The two teams, likely to be picked near the top of the Big Sky poll that gets released next week, were on a collision course in April, scheduled to meet in the championship match of the Big Sky tournament before COVID issues within the NAU program gave the Grizzlies the title.

"It could be labeled unfinished business for both teams. I'm sure they're looking at it as we took the spot they wanted, and I'd be saying the same thing," said Citowicki.

"They are definitely a program on the up. (Head coach Kylie Louw) is doing a great job. She is this hyper-competitive coach, and you can see that being infused into the team. It's going to be a firecracker of a first game."

Montana will play five of its nine league games on the road. The Grizzlies will face Sacramento State, Portland State, Weber State and Idaho State at South Campus Stadium.

The six-team Big Sky tournament, held the first week of November, will return to Greeley, Colo.

"The league's just complicated. The bottom has lifted itself up and that's closed the gap even more," said Citowicki, who was asked this week to answer the question, Montana will be really good this year if ...

"We score lots of goals. That's it," he said, knowing his team outscored its opponents last season 21-7 while posting shutouts in six of its first seven matches. "We will create chances by the bucketful. Somebody has to score them."

Montana has won four Big Sky titles in three seasons under Citowicki: regular season in 2019 and 2020-21, tournament in 2018 and 2020-21.

If the Grizzlies make it a third consecutive regular-season title, it will be just the third time that's been accomplished in Big Sky history.

Betsy Duerksen's Montana teams from 1997 to 2000 won or shared four straight. Portland State won or shared three straight from 2011 to '13.

"That's just the expectation of being a Griz, always being in contention to win a title every single year," said Citowicki. "Everyone is ready."

University of Montana Athletics

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Players Mentioned

Avery Adams

Alexa Coyle

Jaden Griggs

Taylor Hansen

Claire Howard

Rita Lang

Allie Larsen

Sophia Pierce

Molly Quarry

Caitlin Rogers

Sami Siems

Taylor Stoeger

Elizabeth Todd

Camellia Xu

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