{"id":138133,"date":"2025-08-11T23:10:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T23:10:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/138133\/"},"modified":"2025-08-11T23:10:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T23:10:14","slug":"unc-womens-basketball-opens-big-sky-schedule-with-montana-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/138133\/","title":{"rendered":"UNC women’s basketball opens Big Sky schedule with Montana State"},"content":{"rendered":"

What are your plans for New Year\u2019s Day in Greeley?<\/p>\n

Wait. What? You mean to say you don\u2019t yet have anything to do Jan. 1, 2026?<\/p>\n

Well, how about taking in a women\u2019s basketball game at Bank of Colorado Arena in Greeley?<\/p>\n

The University of Northern Colorado tips off its Big Sky Conference schedule for the 2025-26 season Thursday, Jan. 1 against defending conference regular-season and tournament champion Montana State.<\/p>\n

The Bears\u2019 full 2025-26 schedule with game times will be released at a later date.<\/p>\n

The Big Sky Conference released its men\u2019s and women\u2019s conference schedules earlier this month. All 20 teams \u2014 10 men and 10 women \u2014 will each play 18 conference games home and away against its nine opponents.<\/p>\n

\"UniversityUniversity of Northern Colorado forward Tatum West, left, fights for the rebound during a December 2024 nonconference game against North Dakota at Bank of Colorado in Greeley. (Greeley Tribune file)<\/p>\n

The women\u2019s and men\u2019s conference tournaments will be March 7-11 at Idaho Central Arena in Boise, Idaho.<\/p>\n

While the UNC men open their Big Sky schedule on the road in Montana, the UNC women host the Montana schools at Bank of Colorado Arena.\u00a0After Montana State in the opener, the UNC women finish off the weekend Saturday, Jan. 3 against the University of Montana.<\/p>\n

Montana State, 17-1 in the Big Sky last year and 30-4 overall, has been a top team in the conference for the last few years. The Bobcats also won regular-season titles in 2019-20 and 2022-23. MSU also won a tournament title in 2022.<\/p>\n

\"UniversityUniversity of Northern Colorado head women’s basketball coach Kristen Mattio draws up a play during a December 2024 game at Bank of Colorado Arena in Greeley. (Greeley Tribune file).<\/p>\n

UNC finished 6-12 in the Big Sky last season and 14-17 overall. The Bears went to Boise for the conference tournament as the No. 9 seed and defeated 10th-seeded Portland State in the first round.<\/p>\n

UNC lost in the second round the next day to Montana State, 92-60.<\/p>\n

Bears head coach Kristen Mattio received a contract extension<\/a> in December 2024. The team reached the postseason after the 2023-24 season for the first\u00a0 time since 2019.<\/p>\n

The rest of the women\u2019s Big Sky schedule is below.<\/p>\n

Jan. 1 vs. Montana State<\/p>\n

Jan. 3 vs. Montana<\/p>\n

Jan. 8 at Idaho State<\/p>\n

Jan. 10 at Weber State<\/p>\n

Jan. 15 vs. Portland State<\/p>\n

Jan. 17 vs. Sacramento State<\/p>\n

Jan. 19 at Montana State<\/p>\n

Jan. 24 vs. Northern Arizona<\/p>\n

Jan. 29 vs. Idaho<\/p>\n

Jan. 31 at Eastern Washington<\/p>\n

Feb. 5 vs. Weber State<\/p>\n

Feb. 7 vs. Idaho State<\/p>\n

Feb. 12 at Sacramento State<\/p>\n

Feb. 14 at Portland State<\/p>\n

Feb. 21 at Northern Arizona<\/p>\n

Feb. 26 vs. Eastern Washington<\/p>\n

Feb. 28 at Idaho<\/p>\n

March 2 at Montana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What are your plans for New Year\u2019s Day in Greeley? Wait. What? You mean to say you don\u2019t…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":138134,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[1339,82783,82784,1317,1337,1338,62,66524,67,132,82782,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-138133","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-big-sky-conference-womens-basketball","10":"tag-kristen-mattio","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-basketball","13":"tag-ncaabasketball","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-unc-womens-basketball","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-university-of-northern-colorado-womens-basketball","19":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115012660342157172","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138133\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/138134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}