Welcome Seattle

Montana has taken a pass -- at least for a while -- so it's welcome to the land of Starbucks -- hey, doesn't that mean just about every corner now?

Go here.

Here's Jon Wilner of the mercury News with a bit of an SJSU perspective.

Montana AD Jim O'Day talks expansion

This is an October 1 reprint from The Missoulian featuring an email sent out by Jim O'Day the Montana AD:

 This is the full text of the Jim O'Day's e-mail

I understand your concerns – you are not alone. This is, perhaps, the most critical decision to ever face the intercollegiate athletic program at The University of Montana.

With state funding flat and student athletic fees holding tight, and with expenses growing year-by-year at a steady pace (at least $250,000 per year alone in just scholarship costs and related room/board costs for out student-athletes), we find ourselves at a cross roads.

With revenues presently capped at about $13 million per year, we are having to find ways to cut expenses… and one option may have to be scholarships to out-of-state student athletes if we cannot find new revenue sources.

We realize this could hurt our competitiveness as we cannot just take out of certain non-revenue generating sports because of Title IX issues.

In addition, our insurance continues to rise, as does rent and travel. We can assume our expenses will jump at least $500,000 annually… and really no new revenue to meet these increases. We have continued to cut our expenses about $250,000 or more per year for the past three years…. But now we are down to the bare bone. Any further cuts will affect programs. You can see that already – our entire budget for recruiting for all 14 sports is $178,000; at Montana State it’s $408,000 per the recently released NCAA audit numbers...

Go here for the remainder. 

San Jose State wins 77-66 over Montana State

With the temperature hovering around 19 degrees outside Montana State's arena, San Jose State shrugged off the frostbite-inducing conditions and caged the Bobcats 77-66 in Bozeman.

Back-to-back three-pointers by Robert Owens put the Spartans up 46-33 in the second half. Later, a Mac Peterson trey put San Jose State ahead by 14 close to the 14-minute mark.

Shortly after that, Montana State cut the difference to eight but SJSU was ahead 64-51 with 7:48 remaining in the game.

Command of the boards was one key as the Spartans were a plus 13 -- 46 to 33 -- tonight in rebounding. The scoring load was also divvied up well with Adrian Oliver leading the way with 18 points. Chris Oakes compiled a double-double of 16 points and 12 rebounds, Owens scored 15 and Peterson totaled 14 points, along with nine boards.

San Jose State's shooting numbers: 43% overall, 41% on three-pointers and 73% at the free throw line. In contrast, the Bobcats finished at 37% overall, 29% (on 28 three-point attempts) and 62% from the foul line.

At the half, it was 40-31 in favor of the Spartans.

San Jose State began the game like a continuation of the pre-game layup line, leading 14-9 at the 15:57 mark. The Bobcats preferred doing damage from long distance, as if behind the line was a safe haven and over it considered a no-man's-land.

But Montana State fought back, taking the lead at 23-22 until the Spartans ran off a streak of points bookended by a pair of Chris Oakes dunks.