MISSOULA— With the smoke from the most fierce wildfire season in recent memory replacing the air, a few of the glaring weaknesses that sparked last season’s free fall shown through the haze in front of a stadium smattered in open seats.
In their first chance to resurrect after losing four of their final five games in 2016, the unranked Montanan Grizzlies hosted a non-scholarship team from the Pioneer Football League. Despite the afternoon marking senior quarterback Reese Phillips’ first start since high school, most of the announced 23,160 in attendance expected the hosts to dispatch of the visiting Valparaiso Crusaders in short order.
Instead, 12 minutes into the third quarter, the Griz clung to a 17-13 lead. Montana gave up three pass plays of more than 50 yards because of miscommunication and mis-execution of the UM secondary, a key weakness in Montana’s otherwise stiff defensive unit last season.
The Grizzlies had a hard time controlling the line of scrimmage on both sides of the football for most of the game. Phillips completed 27-of-38 passes for 381 yards and four touchdowns in his solid debut but Montana’s offense missed more opportunities than it capitalized on for the first 40 minutes of action.
Then Montana turned it on, even though a good portion of the crowd had already returned to the tailgates or gone home.
The Griz exploded during a two-minute, 28-second span, turning a four-point advantage into a four-possession game. Montana scored three touchdowns on six offensive plays, consistently connecting after a first half worth of misses opportunities with downfield kill strikes. UM scored 28 points in the final 16:24 of the contest to emerge with a 45-23 victory to open the 2017 football season.
Montana quarterback Reese Phillips threw for 381 yards and four touchdowns in his first career start/ by Brooks Nuanez
The win is Montana’s 15th straight dating back to 2003. The last time the Griz lost a home opener came in 2003 when Chris Snyder missed a field goal at the buzzer to ensure UM fell to Division II North Dakota State.
“Valpo is an improving football team that came in here very prepared and posed some problems,” third-year head coach Bob Stitt said. “This will be great tape for our guys to watch. We had some issues early but we came out in the second half and played really well defensively and the offense caught fire.”
Saturday, Montana took awhile to get on track but when the Griz got hot, Phillips sighted in on some of his new favorite weapons, throwing scoring strikes to redshirt freshman Samori Toure and junior Keenan Curran and his favorite target on the 97-degree day, sophomore Jerry Louie-McGee.
Phillips, a native of Tennessee who spent three seasons at Kentucky before transferring to Montana, waited behind Brady Gustafson a year ago. In his Washington-Grizzly Stadium debut, Phillips turned the ball over twice. Inopportune turnovers turned out to be deadly for UM last season as well.
But Phillips rallied instead of crumbling. He threw all four of his touchdowns in the game’s final 16 minutes. He hooked up with Toure on a 14-yard strike for the first touchdown of the Portland native’s career to push the lead to double digits.
Montana sophomore wide receiver Jerry Louie-McGee catches one of his two touchdowns on Saturday/ by Brooks Nuanez
Last season in UM’s season opener against Saint Francis, the Griz struggled to find offensive flow and looked disjointed before pulling out a 41-31 victory. Curran’s 75-yard touchdown in that one proved to be a crucial dagger. Curran’s 45-yard touchdown on the third play of the fourth quarter helped break the game open.
Louie-McGee ripped off a 63-yard gain on a short dump pass that coupled as Philips’ first career completion to set up the first of two rushing touchdowns for junior running back Jeremy Calhoun. He caught a 25-yard touchdown less than 90 seconds after Curran’s long TD, pushing the lead to 38-13.
“That’s just Jerry being Jerry,” Phillips said. “He’s a guy we want to get touches because that’s what he does. We have a lot of weapons though. We want all of our guys to get touches.”
Valparaiso backup redshirt quarterback Chris Duncan hit Montana’s defense for long gains in the first half as the underdog Crusaders exploited both man coverage and failed breaks when Montana ran Cover 3. Starting sophomore quarterback Jimmy Seewald hit true freshman Donny Navorro for a 50-yard gain on the first play of Valpo’s second possession.
Duncan hit senior Frank Catrine for a 61-yard gain. Both long plays led to Crusader field goals. Duncan hit Navarro, who made a leaping catch in the end-zone for a 33-yard touchdown to give Valparaiso the lead with 8:20 left in the first half.
“Early in the game, we are calling Cover 3 and we are getting run by,” Stitt said. “It’s a flashback to last year. They had to play tough coverage. They should’ve been bailing out of there and it’s one of those teaching things, have to correct it. It’s a very conservative call and we get a deep ball thrown over the top of us. We are going to learn from that.”
That lead did not last long. Phillips engineered a 13-play, 70-yard drive capped by Calhoun’s second touchdown run. Valpo threatened before halftime, driving into the red-zone before sophomore safety Josh Sandry snared his first career interception with less than two minutes until halftime.
Montana sophomore safety Josh Sandry/ by Brooks Nuanez
“The first half didn’t go exactly the way you’d want it to, but it was almost a blessing in disguise because we started pretty fast offensively, and then we got behind,” Stitt said. “It was great to see our guys calm, cool and collected on the sidelines. They stuck together and kept grinding.”
Following Louie-McGee’s first touchdown with 12:17 left to push the lead to 25, Duncan found junior Griffin Norberg for a 66-yard touchdown to cut the lead to 38-20. Louie-McGee, who finished with nine catches for 159 yards, caught a 17-yard score from Phillips to put the game away.
“His first step, it’s a static step but it’s a quick step,” Valpo senior safety J.J. Nunes said after notching 10 tackles and snaring a pick in his first game back after missing all of last season with an injury. “It’s weird to explain but his zero to 100 speed is like a Percy Harvin, a Tavon Austin. He gets to 100 very, very quickly. His routes are concise. He’s going to make a lot of Big Sky defenses cringe.”
Montana has 63 full scholarships that can be split in varying fashions. Washington-Grizzly is a pristine venue that holds nearly 27,000 fans. The Griz consistently rank in top five in the FCS in attendance every year. Montana has won two national championships, advanced to seven national championship games, own 18 Big Sky titles and qualified for the postseason a record streak of 20 times in 22 seasons.The Griz may be coming off a 6-5 season and missing the playoffs for the third time since 1993, but take one look at the newly erected Champions Center to the south of the stadium and you can see the advantages Montana football enjoys.
Valparaiso is a 4,500-student private Lutheran school in northern Indiana that does not offer football scholarships. The Crusaders came to Missoula as a team that has won 12 games this decade, four of them last season. Yet the Crusaders hung for most of the first three quarters against the favored hosts.
Valparaiso freshman wide receiver Donny Navarro catches a 33-yard touchdown/by Brooks Nuanez
“I’m awfully proud of how we did today,” Valpo fourth-year head coach Dave Cecchini said after falling to 9-25 in his career. “I think we competed very well for most of the football game. It was nice to see some of the plays in all three phases.
“Physically, that was a tough football game. That showed in the second half. Unfortunately for us, we lost control — I don’t know if we ever had control of the line of scrimmage on offense but we had at least fought it to a stand still, were hanging in there — but as the third quarter progressed, we lost control and our defense started to get worn out.”
“There’s really no moral victory,” Cecchini continued in passionate fashion. “I’m proud of how we played but a little pissed off to be honest. I feel like things really could have gone our way had we gotten over the hump late in that third quarter.
Montana’s defense again showed it can put pressure on opposing offenses against the pass and the run but also proved vulnerable to big plays. Seewald and Duncan combined to throw for 327 yards while the running back managed 123 yards.
“It was pretty obvious to anybody: they are the opposite of the bend but don’t break,” Cecchini said. “They are in your face, they force a lot of three-and-outs. They got after a lot of teams. When you put that many people up on the line of scrimmage and you are that aggressive, you have single coverage. There’s a lot of really good wide receivers in the Big Sky and they did take advantage. It was obvious to everyone how many big plays they can give up and that’s what we tried to exploit.”
The Griz offense rolled up 538 yards of total offense. Redshirt freshman Gresch Jensen completed his first three passes for 18 yards to help UM get to 399 yards passing. Calhoun rushed 20 time for 77 yards as Montana had 139 yards rushing. UM struggled to manufacture points the firs 40 minutes but found a flow and buried Valparaiso for the final 20.
“I don’t know what we are figuring out on offense and defense. We just scored 45 points, we were 5-of-5 in the red-zone, we had a tipped pass that should’ve been a touchdown, a few things that didn’t go right. But it was a pretty good day offensively,” Stitt said. “Defensively, we missed a couple calls. The guys were having a tough time communicating but those are quick fixes. Until we had the long one late in the game in the second half, they really had nothing on our defense. We weren’t figuring anything out. We had it figured out.”
Montana senior Tucker Schye chases down Valparaiso quarterback Chris Duncan
Montana’s defense gave up 450 yards, including five plays of more than 33 yards and four of more than 50. But a few players had standout days. Senior James Banks notched a career-high 12 tackles, including a tackle for loss on an option play that helped force a Valpo field goal after Catrine’s long catch.
In his first career start, Montana’s new No. 37 Tucker Schye forced and recovered a fumble while also notching a third-down sack late in the third quarter to swing the momentum But overall, the Griz left plenty of room for improvement in the Missoula Valley smoke on Saturday afternoon.
“This is a resilient team,” Phillips said. “We never felt like we were down. We were fine. We were ok. We were just shooting ourselves sin the foot. That’s a first game type of thing that happens a lot. When we got rolling, that’s what we are. Wen we score quick like that, that’s what we can do. It’s exciting because we can play so much better and that’s encouraging.”
The attention for UM now turns to Washington, the No. 8 team in the FBS. The Huskies play in pristine Husky Stadium, a recently renovated venue that holds 72,500, more than any other stadium in the Pacific Northwest. It’s the 23rd largest stadium in college football. Yet Stitt did not seem deterred at the prospect of playing in Seattle.
“Same way we play on a big stage,” Stitt said. “There’s a lot of people that think our stage is better than theirs. You prepare the exact same way for any stage we are going to play for our league that may not have as many people in there. It may not be as big a stadium but you just have to focus on your job. Our guys will be fine. They will be excited to play against a great football team. It’s a great opportunity for our to play a Top 10 football team in a sold out stadium.”
Photos by Brooks Nuanez and Jason Bacaj. All Rights Reserved.
