Montana punched its ticket to the Big Dance by defeating Weber State in the Big Sky championship game on Saturday night. The Grizzlies will be making their 10th appearance all-time in the NCAA Tournament. Here are five things you probably didn’t know about Montana:
1. They kept Damian Lillard out of the tournament last season. If you’re wondering how good Montana is, doesn’t that last statement say it all? Lillard and his Weber State Wildcats lost to Montana twice last season, including an 85-66 drubbing in the Big Sky title game.
2. They’ve got three top-flight scorers. 6-7 senior Mathias Ward (14.8 ppg), 6-5 junior Kareem Jamar (14.5 ppg) and 6-2 senior Will Cherry (13.9 ppg) can all fill it up, and Jamar and Cherry are deadly from outside.
2. They went 19-1 in conference. Montana was the class of the Big Sky this season, as it has been the last two years. The Grizzlies are 30-2 in conference in that span. They’re also heading to the Big Dance for the third time in four years.
3. They don’t have a bad loss this season. Montana has fallen to Colorado State (an NCAA tournament team), South Dakota State (ditto) and Davidson (ditto again). They also lost on the road in back to back games against BYU and San Francisco, and were felled by second-place Big Sky finisher Weber State. Nothing to hang their head in shame about on the entire schedule.
4. They can really stroke it. Montana ranks 23rd in the nation in field goal percentage and boasts one of the best scoring backcourt combos in the country in Cherry and Jamar.
5. The University of Montana considers itself “a city within a city.” Located in tropical Missoula, U of M has its own restaurants, police department, postal services, and zip code.
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NCAA Tournament Teams Five Facts Index
Kels Dayton is a freelance writer whose work has also appeared in SLAM Magazine. You can check out more of his work at RoundballDaily.com. Follow him on Twitter @RoundballDaily.