Montana to play at UC Davis on Sunday

The Montana women's soccer team, on a season-best two-match winning streak, will play a single game this week, facing UC Davis on the road on Sunday.

The Grizzlies (3-2-1) and Aggies (1-3-2) will kick off at 1 p.m. (MT) at Aggie Soccer Field in Davis, Calif. UC Davis plays at Loyola Marymount on Thursday evening.

It's the second consecutive single-match week for Montana, which hosted and defeated MSU Billings 5-0 on Sunday at South Campus Stadium.

The Grizzlies will close out their non-conference schedule hosting Gonzaga and Washington State next week. Montana opens its Big Sky Conference schedule at Northern Arizona on Thursday, Sept. 25.

Coverage: Sunday's match will stream on ESPN+.

At a glance (Montana): The Grizzlies, who rallied late to defeat Nevada 2-1 on Aug. 31, made it two straight wins with a 5-0 shutout of MSU Billings on Sunday.

Montana led 3-0 at the half and out-shot the Yellowjackets 27-4 for the match, holding MSUB without a shot on goal.

It was an afternoon of firsts for a number of Grizzlies, starting with Makena Smith, who made it 1-0 in the fifth minute with her first goal as a Grizzly after previously playing at Purdue and Miami (Ohio).

Maddie Ditta made it 2-0 in the 25th minute off a corner kick from Chloe Seelhoff. Ditta scored again in the 36th minute off an assist from Maycen Slater, the freshman's first collegiate point.

It was Ditta's first two-goal match of her career and earned her Big Sky Offensive Player of the Week honors on Tuesday.

Her two goals gave Ditta a dozen for her career, moving her into a tie for 18th in program history with Taylor Stoeger and Hallie Widner.

Seelhoff made it a three-point match with a penalty-kick goal in the 50th minute, giving her a goal in each of Montana's last three matches.

Slater scored her first collegiate goal in the 88th minute, redirecting a cross from Kendel Johnson, who collected the assist and her first collegiate point.

Senior Emma Pascoe made her season debut in the match, while Johnson and Addison Stendera, both freshmen, saw their first minutes as Grizzlies.

Ashlyn Dvorak got the start in goal and the win, her first victory of the season. Bayliss Flynn played the second half. Neither had to make a save as Montana got its first shutout since opening the season with a 3-0 home win over Southern Utah.

It was Montana's largest margin of victory since 2022 and the 18th time in program history the Grizzlies have had a shutout victory by a score of 5-0 or larger.

Seelhoff's second-half goal was her fifth of the season, a total that leads the Big Sky. She also ranks first in the Big Sky in shots on goal (2.00/g) and is second in shots (3.83/g).

Ditta's two goals gave her four on the season. She is tied for second in the Big Sky with Eastern Washington's Chloe Pattison, the Big Sky Preseason MVP.

Reagan Brisendine played the ball into the box that Smith headed in to make it 1-0 on Sunday. Brisendine is tied for first in the Big Sky with three assists this season.

Montana leads the Big Sky with 12 goals scored and is tied for the league lead with six goals allowed.

At a glance (UC Davis): The Aggies won 29 matches over three seasons, from 2021 to '23, then went 13-5-2 a year ago, their most wins in a season since 1998.

That run of success landed coach Tracy Joyner the head job at Oregon in December. In January, UC Davis announced the hiring of new coach Kat Mertz, previously at NCAA Division II MSU Denver.

UC Davis had five players voted all-region last season. Three graduated, one went with Joyner to Oregon. Only redshirt senior midfielder Genavieve Fontes is back in 2025.

Fontes led the team last season with 11 goals. She has 16 for her career.

The Aggies saw their 2024 season come to a stomach-punch finish, falling 3-2 to UC Santa Barbara in the semifinals of the Big West tournament on a penalty-kick goal in the final minute of the second overtime.

Fontes was named to the 11-player Preseason All-Big West Team, while UC Davis was picked eighth out of 11 teams in the league's preseason poll.

The Aggies opened the season with a 1-1 home draw with Fresno State, then went on the road and won at Pacific 2-1. That win is UC Davis's only victory of the season.

UCD lost 1-0 at home to Saint Mary's in its most recent match, falling to a team that is 4-1-1 and ranked No. 9 in this week's West Region poll.

Fontes has scored two of the Aggies' six goals this season, with four players scoring one goal each.

Series history: Montana and UC Davis have met twice before, playing a home-and-home series in 2009 and '10.

In the teams' match-up in Missoula in 2009, the Aggies won 5-1, one of the two most one-sided home losses for the Grizzlies in the last two decades.

In 2010, the teams played at Davis with the Aggies winning 3-0 while out-shooting the Grizzlies 29-3.

Upcoming: A delightful home stand next week against Gonzaga and Washington State. Montana is 1-13-1 against the Bulldogs since 2003, 0-12-1 against the Cougars since 2005.

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Players Mentioned

Reagan Brisendine

Maddie Ditta

Ashlyn Dvorak

Bayliss Flynn

Kendel Johnson

Emma Pascoe

Chloe Seelhoff

Maycen Slater

Makena Smith

Addison Stendera

University of Montana Athletics