By CHRIS WALTERSKIRCHEN
Saturday loss to Northern Arizona was UM’s first homecoming loss since 1992 when they fell to Eastern Washington. Has Monte’s magic faded as this was the first homecoming loss for the Griz since the lovable bear mascot debut in 1993.
The last time the Lumberjacks won in Missoula was September 27, 1986 when Don Read and his first year coaching staff, including Jerome Sourers, made their home debut at Dornblaser stadium.
It is extremely rare for a college to have three successive football coaches win 40 games during their tenure, but that is the case at Montana State University. Rob Ash is the third straight Bobcat head coach to win at least 40 games in Bozeman. Cliff Hysell (1992-1999) won 41 while Mike Kramer (2000-2006) won 40 games including 3 over the Griz, and now Ash has 43 in the midst of his 6th season with the Cats.
Has Monte’s magic faded? This was the first homecoming loss for the Griz since Monte’s debut in 1993. Photo by Austin Smith.
As the Grizzlies head to Cheney this week to face the Eastern Washington Eagles the Griz one very important stat going for them. Montana has beaten the Eagles in 8 of their last 10 visits to Cheney. On the other hand the Griz are 0-4 at Eastern when coming off a loss the week before.
The Sentinel Spartans put a “hurtin” on the Flathead Braves Friday night with a 48-14 win. It was the Spartans largest Margin of victory against Flathead since a 48-0 pounding in October of 1975.
Wednesday (September 26th the Houston Astros will play their home finale hosting the St. Louis Cardinals. This will not be your run of the mill home finale for it will be the Astros final home game as a member of the National League as they are moving to the American League for the 2013 season. It is appropriate that the Cardinals are in for that last NL home game as it was St. Louis who was the opponent in the National League Championship series as the Astros claimed their only National League pennant.
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Chris Walterskirchen has been an observer of Montana sports for nearly half a century. A Kalispell native, Chris has worked in various capacities for professional and college sports organization of at various times: ranging from announcing and statistical work to the concessions and even a stint as a costumed mascot.
Chris has academic degrees in communications and elementary education. His style of sports trivia involves more than just who won and who lost, but also focuses on the obscure or human side of sports. In this blog you will learn things like the Grizzly football team has won 210 games over the 19 seasons since they have had Monte as their mascot or that UNLV is the only school that both the Griz and Lady Griz have both faced in the NCAA basketball tournament
When not following sports Chris enjoys taking care of animals of all kinds (a peacock rescue?) and reading to pre-schoolers.