19 Spokane sides; 10 others from INW in Seattle for USCS National Cup XI Northwest Regional

US Club Soccer is holding the Northwest Regional tournament at the 60 Acres Soccer Complex in the greater Seattle area this weekend to determine the entrants into the National Cup XI Finals held later this year in Waukegan, Illinois July 27-30. Nearly 30 teams from10 different clubs around the Inland Northwest  are set to compete in the 27 Boys and Girls brackets at the event.

Nineteen clubs are headed to the Puget Sound from Spokane with a platoon of 16 teams representing the Spokane SC Shadow, two from FC Spokane and another from the Spokane Foxes. The Shadow have six teams playing on the boys side and 10 girls teams making the trek to represent the Lilac City. FC Spokane has a boys and girls team each and the Foxes are participating in the U14 Girls Premier tournament.

Montana Grizzlies announce 2012 schedule

The University of Montana Grizzlies have quite a schedule ahead of them in the final third of the calendar year. The defending Big Sky playoff champions will see much of the western United States with eight non-conference games away from home to open the 2012 season. And similar to last year, the Grizzlies will finish with four regular season contests on the road.

In his first year as head coach for the University of Montana, Mark Plakorus used a difficult schedule to forge a team strong enough to win the Big Sky Conference playoff tournament in Colorado, earning a trip to the NCAA tournament, where they fell to top-ranked and eventual champion Stanford, 3-0. The Grizzlies, who finished up the slate with four of five on the road in 2011, shocked many with as the fourth and final seed – earned with one victory on the road in that final stretch – when they won consecutive shootout tiebreakers against both top seed Northern Colorado and Weber State after identical 1-1 draws in the tournament.