Griz back home, host Bengals, Wildcats

The Montana soccer team will continue its Big Sky Conference schedule this week when it hosts Idaho State and Weber State at South Campus Stadium.

The Grizzlies (3-7-0, 1-1-0 BSC) will host the Bengals (2-7-4, 0-2-2 BSC) at 3 p.m. on Thursday, the preseason-favorite Wildcats (7-5-2, 3-0-1 BSC) at 1 p.m. on Sunday.

Montana will be playing its first home matches in more than a month, since hosting Wyoming on Sept. 11. The match against the Cowgirls was the Grizzlies' lone home match in the month of September.

Montana will close out its regular-season schedule playing five of its final seven matches at home.

The Grizzlies will play at Northern Arizona and Northern Colorado next week before welcoming Eastern Washington (Oct. 29), Idaho (Nov. 1) and Portland State (Nov. 5) to Missoula.

The top six teams in the final standings will qualify for the Big Sky Conference Championship, which will be held at South Campus Stadium on Nov. 11, 13 and 15.

Coverage: This week's matches will stream on ESPN+ with Ace Sauerwein calling the action.

Happenings: Thursday will feature half-priced tickets for both soccer (3 p.m.) and volleyball (7 p.m. vs. Southern Utah) as Montana hosts an afternoon-evening doubleheader.

Tickets for both Thursday's and Sunday's matches are free for anyone in town for Family Weekend. A Family Weekend badge must be presented at the box office to take advantage of the offer.

Sunday is Youth Day. Children 12 and under who wear a soccer jersey will get free admittance.

What's at stake: Through two weeks of league matches, the standings continue to take shape as teams accumulate points in an attempt to be above the cut line when matches conclude on Nov. 5.

Weber State, the preseason favorite, enters the week on a five-match unbeaten streak (4-0-1) and sits atop the standings with 10 points. The Wildcats play at last-place Portland State on Thursday.

Montana (7th) and Idaho State (8th) were both picked outside of the top six in the preseason poll and both are below sixth now but the standings will continue to fluctuate as teams have off weeks.

The Big Sky had 10 teams, as it does now, from 2018 to '21. The sixth-place team had 13 points in 2018, nine in 2019 and nine in '21. In 2012 and '13, with 10 teams, the sixth-place teams had 12 and 10 points.

Nine, then, is probably the minimum number of points a team will need to collect to be in contention for the Big Sky Championship.

At a glance (Montana): The Grizzlies won their league opener two weeks ago in dramatic fashion, scoring late in the 86th minute to pick up three points with a 1-0 win at Southern Utah.

Megan Wilson-Sofield scored the game-winner, her second goal of the season, while Avery Heeb posted her second shutout of the season, her first against a Division I opponent, with five saves.

Three days later, Montana lost 2-0 at Utah Tech, with the Trailblazers going up 1-0 in the 17th minute on an own goal, then scoring an insurance goal in the 38th. Heeb made six saves in the loss.

Through 10 matches, Wilson-Sofield and Elli Lewis lead the team with two goals each. Liv Thorne-Thomsen and Grace Morton have each scored one goal.

Heeb is 3-6-0 with a 1.94 goals-against average and .691 save percentage.

Montana is 73-20-19 all-time at home in league matches and has gone 37-5-11 at home in league since the start of the 2014 season.

At a glance (Idaho State): The Bengals went 5-8-4 last season and tied for seventh in the Big Sky at 2-4-2 to miss the league tournament by a point.

Idaho State was picked eighth in this year's preseason poll, one spot behind Montana.

Both of the Bengals' wins this season came early, both on the road, 2-0 at CSU Bakersfield and 2-0 at Nebraska-Omaha.

Idaho State's 2-2-1 start to the season also included a 3-3 home draw with UNLV, but ISU has not won since Sept. 3.

After scoring eight goals through their first five matches, the Bengals have scored only twice through their last eight games, in a 3-1 home loss to UC Santa Barbara and in a 1-1 draw at New Mexico.

Idaho State has two points through four league matches without having scored a goal, playing to 0-0 draws at Eastern Washington and at home last week against Southern Utah.

ISU was out-scored 8-0 in its other two league matches, falling 3-0 at Idaho and 5-0 at home to Utah Tech on Sunday.

The Bengals took 6-0 losses this season at SMU and at home against Utah State.

Idaho State has been out-scored 31-10 this season, with three goalkeepers holding a 2.38 goals-against average and .656 save percentage.

Saydree Cooke played one season at Weber State (2022) before transferring back to her hometown Bengals. The fifth-year leads the Bengals with seven points, on two goals and three assists.

Coach Dustin Downey is in his fifth season. He guided Idaho State to the Big Sky tournament in 2023, the Bengals' first appearance since 2014.

Series history:

* Montana leads the all-time series 19-8-4 and has gone 13-2-1 at home against Idaho State.

* The Grizzlies have won the last seven meetings between the two teams, allowing three goals.

* Idaho State has scored 22 goals in 31 all-time match-ups against Montana (0.71/g), only twice (2009 and '14) scoring multiple goals.

* Montana has won five straight at home over Idaho State.

At a glance (Weber State): The Wildcats, who played top-seeded Montana to a 0-0 draw in last year's Big Sky title match before falling in a memorable shootout, was picked to win the league in 2026.

Weber State placed four on the 13-player preseason All-Big Sky team: senior midfielder Lily Blum, junior midfielder Oakley Anderson, junior defender Isabella Sackett and sophomore keeper Lauren Butorac.

Blum and Sackett were both first-team All-Big Sky last season. Anderson was honorable mention, Butorac the Big Sky Freshman of the Year.

Then first-year coach Kyle Christensen was voted the Big Sky Coach of the Year after taking a team that went 3-22-10 in 2023 and '24 and leading the Wildcats to a 12-6-2 finish and Big Sky runner-up spot.

Weber State opened its season with a 0-0 draw at Utah but then lost five of its next eight, with three-goal losses against Boise State, Long Beach State and Utah Valley.

The Wildcats got right with a 3-1 home win over Colorado State in their final match before league and haven't lost since.

That included a 1-1 draw at Idaho in the WSU's Big Sky opener, preseason No. 1 pulling even with preseason No. 2 with an equalizing goal in the 86th minute in Moscow.

The Wildcats followed that with a 3-2 win at Eastern Washington, holding on after going up 3-0 in the opening 32 minutes, then winning last week at home over Utah Tech (5-0) and Southern Utah (1-0).

Blum leads Weber State and the Big Sky in goals with seven, Butorac has played all but 27 minutes in goal. She has a 1.53 goals-against average, a .747 save percentage with three shutouts.

Eleven players have accounted for Weber State's 22 goals this season.

Series history:

* Montana leads the all-time series with Weber State 21-14-4 and has gone 14-3-2 at home against the Wildcats.

* Weber State has not defeated Montana in Missoula since the 2010 season, with the Grizzlies going 7-0-1 against the Wildcats in Missoula since.

* Montana defeated eventual runner-up Weber State 4-0 when the teams played in Missoula last October.

* In November's Big Sky championship match, played in front of a program-record 2,227 fans, the teams played 110 minutes of tense scoreless soccer before Montana won the shootout 4-2.

Around the Big Sky Conference:

* Three teams are unbeaten through two weeks: Weber State (3-0-1), Northern Arizona (2-0-0) and Northern Colorado (1-0-1).

* The Wildcats are atop the standings, with Utah Tech (3-1-0) one point behind. Idaho (1-1-2) is 7-3-4 but had a winless road trip last week to Northern Colorado (0-0 draw) and Northern Arizona (3-0 loss).

* Weber State, Idaho, Utah Tech and Northern Arizona made up the top four teams in the preseason poll. They are the current point leaders in the standings.

* Northern Colorado and Southern Utah were picked ninth and 10th, next to last and last, in the poll. They are a combined 2-2-2 in league and tied for fifth.

* Idaho and Eastern Washington are the two teams off from matches this week.

* Thursday's schedule: ISU at UM, WSU at PSU, NAU at SUU, UNC at UT

* Sunday's schedule: WSU at UM, ISU at PSU, UNC at SUU, NAU at UT

Upcoming: Montana will undergo the Big Sky's most challenging road trip next week, playing at Northern Arizona on Thursday night, at Northern Colorado at noon on Sunday.

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Players Mentioned

Avery Heeb

Elli Lewis

Grace Morton

Liv Thorne-Thomsen

Megan Wilson-Sofield

University of Montana Athletics