I’ve done this each of the past two years and now let’s do it again and grade every single team in the Griz athletic department based on how they performed this year:
Men’s Basketball: A+. What a year for Travis DeCuire and the men. Coming into what was perceived as a pressure packed year for the men with DeCuire in the final year of his contract and the program looking like it had lost all of it’s footing over the last 5 seasons, they completely put that notion to bed. What made it even more impressive was the fact that they had 9 new players join the team in the offseason which is almost two thirds of the roster. The men would finish the regular season going 22-9 and 15-3 in conference play and sharing the Big Sky regular season title with Northern Colorado. They would then go on to win 3 games in 4 days at the Big Sky tournament in Boise to win the tournament title and punch their ticket to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2019. The Griz received a 14 seed and would end their season at the hands of 3 seed Wisconsin 85-66 to finish the season at 25-10. Regardless, it was a fantastic year for the men, they’ll get to hang another banner in Dahlberg and now expectations are sky high going into the 25-26 season with three or maybe even four starters returning (Pridgen, Sawyer, Money, Johnson?). Hats off to men’s basketball on an incredible year!
Men’s Tennis: A. Congratulations to Jason Brown and Men’s Tennis on a historic season. The men finished their season at 19-7 which is a school record for wins! The men finished the regular season tied for 2nd place with Idaho State but would get the 3 seed after losing the tiebreaker. The Griz went on to win 3 matches in 3 days and defeated regular season champions NAU in the title match to punch their ticket to the NCAA Tournament for only the second time in program history before losing to #3 Texas in the opening round. Highlighted by tournament MVP Tom Bittner and Big Sky Freshmen of the Year Duncan McCall, it was a magical season for Men’s Tennis, and I suspect with the Griz returning 5 of their top 6 players next year that they have to be the heavy favorites to repeat as Big Sky champions. Looking forward to following those guys again next season! The only reason Men’s Tennis doesn’t get an A+ from me though is because they failed to win the regular season title too, but as we know tourney titles are much more important than regular season titles lol.
Soccer: A-. Another year, another title for Chris Citowicki and Griz Soccer as they would win the Big Sky regular season title for the second straight year which also guarantees that the Griz will once again host the Big Sky tournament in Missoula after finishing the season 12-2-5. As great as all that is, it’s time to address the elephant in the room which is the fact that the Griz have now choked in the Big Sky tournament the last 2 years with it being especially bad that they lost in the semis at home in Missoula. As I mentioned above, regular season titles are great but it’s the tournament titles that are so important as you need to win the conference tournament if you wanna go to the NCAA tournament. I’m sure this has been eating at Citowicki and the girls all offseason and I’m confident that will be a major point of emphasis this year. Plus, it helps that we’re once again hosting the tournament this upcoming season. Let’s see if the women can right the ship this season and win both the regular season and tournament titles and get back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2021.
Track & Field: B+. What a job that Doug Fraley has done with this program in just three short years. To put this into perspective for you, the year before Fraley took over, we had the second worst program (men’s and women’s) in the conference behind only Portland State. Now three years later and for the first time in program history, the men’s and women’s teams both placed in the top 3 at the conference championships, and both scored 100+ points for the first time since 2002. To make it even more impressive, the men finished with 107 points and did so without getting any individual titles over the weekend. A couple of guys came really close but couldn’t quite pull it out. The women produced four individual titles with Whitney Morrison winning the Heptathlon, Erin Wilde winning her fifth consecutive High Jump title, and Tara Ohlweiler becoming the first Grizzly since 1987 to win both the 100m and 200m to complete the rare double. Plus, this is also a super young team with many of the top athletes returning on both squads. And wait until you see the recruiting class they have coming in next year. The future is bright for the Track & Field program!
Women’s Basketball: B-. What a roller coaster of a season for the Lady Griz. In case you didn’t follow them, Head Coach Brian Holsinger was dismissed from the team in January following an altercation with an assistant during practice. This led to Associate Head Coach Nate Harris becoming the interim head coach for the remainder of the season. He got off to a hot start winning five of his first seven games in January before getting completely off the rails in February. The Lady Griz limped down the stretch and just barely clinched the 6 seed and final first round bye in the Big Sky tournament. In their first game, they drew 3 seed Idaho who swept us in the regular season, but that didn’t matter as the Lady Griz exacted their revenge. Then they got 2 seed NAU in the semis who obliterated us twice in the regular season, that didn’t matter as the Lady Griz pulled off the unthinkable and advanced to the championship game for the first time in 10 years. They would face the cats who were one of the best mid major teams in the country. With 7 seconds to go, Dani Bartsch would hit a three to put the Lady Griz up by one, but unfortunately the cats would hit a buzzer beater to win it. It was an impressive run at the tourney that saw the Lady Griz nearly defeat the top 3 seeds in 3 days. Nate Harris would permanently be named the new head coach, and they look to be one of the favorites going into next year. We got a ton of talent returning next year and I’m excited to see what we can do with a pretty veteran team! Could be an exciting year for the Lady Griz.
Football: C. Coming off a very special 2023 season that included a run to Frisco, it’s safe to say that 2024 was a belly flop for Griz Football. Highlighted by some inexcusable losses to North Dakota that saw us blow a 24-7 halftime lead, a home OT loss to Weber where we gave up 55 points, and then getting run off our own field against Davis. All this led up to a complete drubbing in Bozeman, one playoff win against an inferior Tennessee State squad, and then getting shellacked by South Dakota State in the second round. What was the cause of such a bad season? First, the inability by the staff to choose 1 QB and stick with him which led to a massive game of musical chairs and inconsistency from both guys, but even more important was the fact that perhaps this was the worst defense of my lifetime. There were several games where they couldn’t stop a runny nose and forced our offense at times to have to punch well above their weight. A program that has prided itself on it’s tough, physical defense over the years and this past season was a complete dud, The hope is that the staff, players, and everyone involved with the program learned it’s lesson. Heading into 25, I believe the staff has recruited far superior talent out of the portal then they did last year. The defense can’t possibly be any worse than it was last year, but I believe they will be surprisingly good this year. Add in the fact that we have loaded RB and WR rooms and the potential is there for this team to make a deep playoff run as long as we get good OL play and consistency from whoever the QB ends up being. I’m cautiously optimistic about 2025.
Golf: C-. In the first full year under new head coach Jimmy Mee, we saw lots of inconsistent play from the team. There were times where it looked like wow, we really got something here, and there were other times where it was like oh boy, this is ugly. The girls were in 3rd place after day one of the conference tournament and ended finishing 7th after three days of competition, highlighting the inconsistencies we saw from the team. In their defense though, this is a very young team that returns it’s top 5 golfers next season. I was very impressed by freshmen Kate Bogenschutz who looks to have a very bright future, as does our number one golfer in Elle Higgins, the Ports sisters, and fellow freshmen from Billings Bella Johnson. Plus, they also have a phenom high school girl coming in from Colorado next season that I know they’re very excited about. Mee has said that she is an instant impact player for the team, so expect her to come right in next year and possibly be playing as high as the 1 or 2 spot on the team. The biggest goal for this team though next year is more consistency. Once we see that, better results will follow.
Women’s Tennis: D. After winning a Big Sky championship in 23, it was a tough year for Steve Ascher and the women. They lost their best player to Texas Tech in the offseason, and the void was noticeable. They also battled injuries all season and could never really get into any kind of a rhythm. They would finish 4-14 overall and 2-6 in conference play and miss the conference tournament after finishing in 7th place. Really the only silver lining for the team this season was that they beat the cats for the third consecutive season, so good for them for pulling that off in what was otherwise a really tough year. Not sure what to expect from the team next season. Seems to me it could be kind of tough going. Time will tell though.
Cross Country: D-. If we wanna really take our Track & Field program to the next level, then this is the area we gotta improve in. The men finished 7th and the women were dead last at 10th place at the conference championships. We have never really had any good distance runners, at least in my lifetime any way. There is hope though as it appears there are some good young distance runners joining the program next year. As I’ve mentioned, Fraley has a great recruiting class coming in next year which includes some good young distance runners from Montana. I’ll be keeping a close eye on both squads this fall to see how much they improve. If we get some major improvement out of this group, then things could get really exciting on the track next year. This is how we take the next step as a program.
Softball: D-. Kind of hard to give softball a fair grade after we all knew it was pretty much going to be a massive re-building year. The results really weren’t there at all this year, but I still don’t feel good about giving them an F as I think we kind of expected this. In new head coach Stef Ewing’s first season, the struggles from the previous coaching staff lurked into the new regimes first chance. Ewing opted not to really use the portal last summer and instead decided to build a foundation for this program with high school kids and also retained all of the players from last seasons team. In some ways I admire this, especially in the transfer portal era where you can just completely clean house and bring in a completely new team. She decided not to do that and played a lot of freshmen and underclassmen in her first season. You could see the potential of this team with young players like Anna Cockhill and others. This offseason, I’m hopeful that Ewing opts to use the portal a little bit as we could use some older players, some more pitching, and a couple of big bats. If they address those needs, then I think we will have a pretty competitive team next year. For now, she gets a pass as she needs time to build up her program, but we need to see improvement next year, and I believe we will.
Volleyball: F. It’s time for Allison Lawrence to go. She’s been here what a decade now? And we’ve never even come close to competing for a Big Sky championship. 8 out of 10 Big Sky teams make the conference tournament, and we failed to make it last season. That’s absolutely inexcusable and that should never happen at UM ever! This is a big year for Lawrence IMO. If this season goes bad like I’m fully expecting it to, then it’s time for her to go. There’s been no signs of this team making any kind of improvement and it almost seems like we’re ok with the idea of this program just not being very good. Pull the trigger Haslam! Please, pull the trigger!
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Overall Athletic Department Grade: B. If Football would have had a better year, I would’ve been inclined to give us an A. Football needs to carry the torch for the entire department. It’s our front porch program and when they do good, the whole department does good. Despite the struggles from Football, I felt like this was actually a pretty solid year for athletics. We won 4 conference championships which was the second most in the Big Sky behind only NAU. It was great to see Men’s Basketball get back on track, Men’s Tennis finally get over the hump, and see the Lady Griz perhaps turn the corner. Should be an exciting 25-26 sports season at UM! Have a great summer everyone! Go Griz!
Men’s Basketball: A+. What a year for Travis DeCuire and the men. Coming into what was perceived as a pressure packed year for the men with DeCuire in the final year of his contract and the program looking like it had lost all of it’s footing over the last 5 seasons, they completely put that notion to bed. What made it even more impressive was the fact that they had 9 new players join the team in the offseason which is almost two thirds of the roster. The men would finish the regular season going 22-9 and 15-3 in conference play and sharing the Big Sky regular season title with Northern Colorado. They would then go on to win 3 games in 4 days at the Big Sky tournament in Boise to win the tournament title and punch their ticket to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2019. The Griz received a 14 seed and would end their season at the hands of 3 seed Wisconsin 85-66 to finish the season at 25-10. Regardless, it was a fantastic year for the men, they’ll get to hang another banner in Dahlberg and now expectations are sky high going into the 25-26 season with three or maybe even four starters returning (Pridgen, Sawyer, Money, Johnson?). Hats off to men’s basketball on an incredible year!
Men’s Tennis: A. Congratulations to Jason Brown and Men’s Tennis on a historic season. The men finished their season at 19-7 which is a school record for wins! The men finished the regular season tied for 2nd place with Idaho State but would get the 3 seed after losing the tiebreaker. The Griz went on to win 3 matches in 3 days and defeated regular season champions NAU in the title match to punch their ticket to the NCAA Tournament for only the second time in program history before losing to #3 Texas in the opening round. Highlighted by tournament MVP Tom Bittner and Big Sky Freshmen of the Year Duncan McCall, it was a magical season for Men’s Tennis, and I suspect with the Griz returning 5 of their top 6 players next year that they have to be the heavy favorites to repeat as Big Sky champions. Looking forward to following those guys again next season! The only reason Men’s Tennis doesn’t get an A+ from me though is because they failed to win the regular season title too, but as we know tourney titles are much more important than regular season titles lol.
Soccer: A-. Another year, another title for Chris Citowicki and Griz Soccer as they would win the Big Sky regular season title for the second straight year which also guarantees that the Griz will once again host the Big Sky tournament in Missoula after finishing the season 12-2-5. As great as all that is, it’s time to address the elephant in the room which is the fact that the Griz have now choked in the Big Sky tournament the last 2 years with it being especially bad that they lost in the semis at home in Missoula. As I mentioned above, regular season titles are great but it’s the tournament titles that are so important as you need to win the conference tournament if you wanna go to the NCAA tournament. I’m sure this has been eating at Citowicki and the girls all offseason and I’m confident that will be a major point of emphasis this year. Plus, it helps that we’re once again hosting the tournament this upcoming season. Let’s see if the women can right the ship this season and win both the regular season and tournament titles and get back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2021.
Track & Field: B+. What a job that Doug Fraley has done with this program in just three short years. To put this into perspective for you, the year before Fraley took over, we had the second worst program (men’s and women’s) in the conference behind only Portland State. Now three years later and for the first time in program history, the men’s and women’s teams both placed in the top 3 at the conference championships, and both scored 100+ points for the first time since 2002. To make it even more impressive, the men finished with 107 points and did so without getting any individual titles over the weekend. A couple of guys came really close but couldn’t quite pull it out. The women produced four individual titles with Whitney Morrison winning the Heptathlon, Erin Wilde winning her fifth consecutive High Jump title, and Tara Ohlweiler becoming the first Grizzly since 1987 to win both the 100m and 200m to complete the rare double. Plus, this is also a super young team with many of the top athletes returning on both squads. And wait until you see the recruiting class they have coming in next year. The future is bright for the Track & Field program!
Women’s Basketball: B-. What a roller coaster of a season for the Lady Griz. In case you didn’t follow them, Head Coach Brian Holsinger was dismissed from the team in January following an altercation with an assistant during practice. This led to Associate Head Coach Nate Harris becoming the interim head coach for the remainder of the season. He got off to a hot start winning five of his first seven games in January before getting completely off the rails in February. The Lady Griz limped down the stretch and just barely clinched the 6 seed and final first round bye in the Big Sky tournament. In their first game, they drew 3 seed Idaho who swept us in the regular season, but that didn’t matter as the Lady Griz exacted their revenge. Then they got 2 seed NAU in the semis who obliterated us twice in the regular season, that didn’t matter as the Lady Griz pulled off the unthinkable and advanced to the championship game for the first time in 10 years. They would face the cats who were one of the best mid major teams in the country. With 7 seconds to go, Dani Bartsch would hit a three to put the Lady Griz up by one, but unfortunately the cats would hit a buzzer beater to win it. It was an impressive run at the tourney that saw the Lady Griz nearly defeat the top 3 seeds in 3 days. Nate Harris would permanently be named the new head coach, and they look to be one of the favorites going into next year. We got a ton of talent returning next year and I’m excited to see what we can do with a pretty veteran team! Could be an exciting year for the Lady Griz.
Football: C. Coming off a very special 2023 season that included a run to Frisco, it’s safe to say that 2024 was a belly flop for Griz Football. Highlighted by some inexcusable losses to North Dakota that saw us blow a 24-7 halftime lead, a home OT loss to Weber where we gave up 55 points, and then getting run off our own field against Davis. All this led up to a complete drubbing in Bozeman, one playoff win against an inferior Tennessee State squad, and then getting shellacked by South Dakota State in the second round. What was the cause of such a bad season? First, the inability by the staff to choose 1 QB and stick with him which led to a massive game of musical chairs and inconsistency from both guys, but even more important was the fact that perhaps this was the worst defense of my lifetime. There were several games where they couldn’t stop a runny nose and forced our offense at times to have to punch well above their weight. A program that has prided itself on it’s tough, physical defense over the years and this past season was a complete dud, The hope is that the staff, players, and everyone involved with the program learned it’s lesson. Heading into 25, I believe the staff has recruited far superior talent out of the portal then they did last year. The defense can’t possibly be any worse than it was last year, but I believe they will be surprisingly good this year. Add in the fact that we have loaded RB and WR rooms and the potential is there for this team to make a deep playoff run as long as we get good OL play and consistency from whoever the QB ends up being. I’m cautiously optimistic about 2025.
Golf: C-. In the first full year under new head coach Jimmy Mee, we saw lots of inconsistent play from the team. There were times where it looked like wow, we really got something here, and there were other times where it was like oh boy, this is ugly. The girls were in 3rd place after day one of the conference tournament and ended finishing 7th after three days of competition, highlighting the inconsistencies we saw from the team. In their defense though, this is a very young team that returns it’s top 5 golfers next season. I was very impressed by freshmen Kate Bogenschutz who looks to have a very bright future, as does our number one golfer in Elle Higgins, the Ports sisters, and fellow freshmen from Billings Bella Johnson. Plus, they also have a phenom high school girl coming in from Colorado next season that I know they’re very excited about. Mee has said that she is an instant impact player for the team, so expect her to come right in next year and possibly be playing as high as the 1 or 2 spot on the team. The biggest goal for this team though next year is more consistency. Once we see that, better results will follow.
Women’s Tennis: D. After winning a Big Sky championship in 23, it was a tough year for Steve Ascher and the women. They lost their best player to Texas Tech in the offseason, and the void was noticeable. They also battled injuries all season and could never really get into any kind of a rhythm. They would finish 4-14 overall and 2-6 in conference play and miss the conference tournament after finishing in 7th place. Really the only silver lining for the team this season was that they beat the cats for the third consecutive season, so good for them for pulling that off in what was otherwise a really tough year. Not sure what to expect from the team next season. Seems to me it could be kind of tough going. Time will tell though.
Cross Country: D-. If we wanna really take our Track & Field program to the next level, then this is the area we gotta improve in. The men finished 7th and the women were dead last at 10th place at the conference championships. We have never really had any good distance runners, at least in my lifetime any way. There is hope though as it appears there are some good young distance runners joining the program next year. As I’ve mentioned, Fraley has a great recruiting class coming in next year which includes some good young distance runners from Montana. I’ll be keeping a close eye on both squads this fall to see how much they improve. If we get some major improvement out of this group, then things could get really exciting on the track next year. This is how we take the next step as a program.
Softball: D-. Kind of hard to give softball a fair grade after we all knew it was pretty much going to be a massive re-building year. The results really weren’t there at all this year, but I still don’t feel good about giving them an F as I think we kind of expected this. In new head coach Stef Ewing’s first season, the struggles from the previous coaching staff lurked into the new regimes first chance. Ewing opted not to really use the portal last summer and instead decided to build a foundation for this program with high school kids and also retained all of the players from last seasons team. In some ways I admire this, especially in the transfer portal era where you can just completely clean house and bring in a completely new team. She decided not to do that and played a lot of freshmen and underclassmen in her first season. You could see the potential of this team with young players like Anna Cockhill and others. This offseason, I’m hopeful that Ewing opts to use the portal a little bit as we could use some older players, some more pitching, and a couple of big bats. If they address those needs, then I think we will have a pretty competitive team next year. For now, she gets a pass as she needs time to build up her program, but we need to see improvement next year, and I believe we will.
Volleyball: F. It’s time for Allison Lawrence to go. She’s been here what a decade now? And we’ve never even come close to competing for a Big Sky championship. 8 out of 10 Big Sky teams make the conference tournament, and we failed to make it last season. That’s absolutely inexcusable and that should never happen at UM ever! This is a big year for Lawrence IMO. If this season goes bad like I’m fully expecting it to, then it’s time for her to go. There’s been no signs of this team making any kind of improvement and it almost seems like we’re ok with the idea of this program just not being very good. Pull the trigger Haslam! Please, pull the trigger!
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Overall Athletic Department Grade: B. If Football would have had a better year, I would’ve been inclined to give us an A. Football needs to carry the torch for the entire department. It’s our front porch program and when they do good, the whole department does good. Despite the struggles from Football, I felt like this was actually a pretty solid year for athletics. We won 4 conference championships which was the second most in the Big Sky behind only NAU. It was great to see Men’s Basketball get back on track, Men’s Tennis finally get over the hump, and see the Lady Griz perhaps turn the corner. Should be an exciting 25-26 sports season at UM! Have a great summer everyone! Go Griz!
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