MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — Eli Gillman ran for 89 yards and two touchdowns and Montana held off Missouri State for a 29-24 victory on Saturday night in the season opener for both teams.

Jmariyae Robinson’s 7-yard touchdown run capped a 10-play, 75-yard drive that pulled Missouri State to 26-24 with 4:43 to play. Montana’s Ty Morrison made his third field goal of the game — a 38-yarder— to cap the scoring with 1:38 left.

Back-to-back sacks deep inside Missouri State territory on the Bears’ final possession sealed it for the FCS third-ranked Grizzlies.

Gillman’s 37-yard touchdown run gave the Grizzlies a 7-6 lead late in the first quarter. Morrison’s field goals from 35 and 22 yards stretched the advantage to 12-10 at intermission.

Jayden Becks’ 32-yard run gave the Bears a 17-12 lead early in the third quarter. Montana answered with a Logan Fife 34-yard touchdown pass to Xavier Harris followed by a Gillman 2-yard TD run to take a 26-17 lead with 9:56 to play.

Jacob Clark was 23-of-39 passing for 257 yards with one interception for Missouri State.

Montana advanced to the program’s eighth FCS title game last season but lost to South Dakota State 23-3 and is the reigning Big Sky Conference champions.

Attendance was 26,482, the seventh largest at Washington-Grizzly Stadium.

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REED POINT — All day Sunday, hundreds of people and sheep will flock to Division Street in Reed Point, for the annual Sheep Drive.

Unfortunately, this year will look different than most, as Olen Raisland, the town’s famous sheep shearer, passed away in April.

“It’s left a big hole in the community, losing Olen,” said Lynn Phipps.

Phipps, a Reed Point community member, was friends with Olen for years. He even trained her daughter on sheep shearing for almost two decades.

As Reed Point has a population of about 210 people, Olen’s loss has made a ripple in the townspeople’s pride this year.

“You just have to work around them. It’s the only thing that keeps you going,” says Jerry Friend.

Friend is a member of the Reed Point Community Club and lives in the town. He’s been organizing the event for the past 35 years, only one year after the event began.

Mack Carmack, MTN News

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Though Olen’s loss was devastating to the community, Reed Point is still trying to make this year’s Sheep Drive the best year yet.

RUSSELL NEMETZ – MTN

“I feel like there’s a lot of support for Sheep Drive. Our Community Club is kind of a small organization, but when it gets closer to the date of Sheep Drive and stuff, a lot of people step up and help out,” said Lev Ott.

Lev and Audrey Ott are two of the organizers behind the event, and knowing that Olen loved to shave hundreds of sheep every Labor-Day weekend, they want to honor that activity completely to him.

“Like this year, the newest thing is the Olen Raisland sheep shearing demonstration. I think he was the one that sheep sheared for all of the sheep drive events, and we thought it was really important for him passing away, that we honored him,” says Audrey Ott.

Reed Point Community Club

As time gets closer, residents are becoming more and more excited for the Sheep Drive, and the festival’s biggest event, the Sheep Run.

“The Sheep Run turns into a town-wide event, and it lasts for an hour, instead of the ten minutes it usually does,” said Audrey Ott.

Mack Carmack, MTN News

Even though things have changed in Reed Point, the community is still planning on showing up Sunday, just as Olen would have wanted.

“You’ve still got your factions. You’ve got this branch, and this branch, but they all pull together when times are needed,” says Friend.

“Yeah… We’ll miss him a lot,” said Phipps.

Mack Carmack, MTN News

To learn more about this year’s Sheep Drive, visit Reed Point Community Club’s Facebook page.

JetBlue thinks there might be some skiers who are willing to splurge on its top-notch Mint business-class experience.

The New York-based carrier announced this week that it would start flying its Mint-equipped Airbus A321 to Bozeman, Montana, on a limited run from Feb. 14, 2025, to March 30, 2025.

The airline will offer its business-class cabin on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays on flights to and from Boston and New York during the peak Montana ski season.

Flights will operate with a daytime schedule, departing the Northeast midmorning and arriving in Bozeman in the early afternoon. The plane will then return to the East Coast later in the afternoon and arrive around 9 p.m. back in Boston and New York.

In addition to the special Mint service, the airline will fly its regular all-economy jets from Boston and New York to Bozeman during this period. All-economy service from Boston will operate on Mondays and Wednesdays, while economy flights from New York will operate on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Mint tickets are already available for purchase, and one-way fares start at around $900.

JetBlue says that it’s adding Mint service to Bozeman to “meet the evolving needs of its customers by offering superior travel options with an elevated in-flight experience.”

Back when Mint was introduced in 2014, JetBlue kept its business-class experience limited to a few key bread-and-butter routes. It was originally designed for premium transcontinental flights from New York and Boston to Los Angeles and San Francisco.

But as the airline has added more Mint-equipped jets to its fleet over the years, the carrier has also deployed Mint service to a few other premium-heavy transcontinental markets, such as Seatte and San Diego. JetBlue also flies Mint planes to select Caribbean destinations during peak holiday periods and on weekends when it doesn’t need to operate as many frequencies on transcon routes. (Business travel usually slows down during these periods.)

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Mint is also the premium cabin that JetBlue offers on its transatlantic flights to Europe that debuted in 2021. The airline has two Mint products: the original one that launched in 2014 and primarily flies on domestic and short-haul routes, and a newer product that debuted in 2021 for its European expansion.

These days, however, JetBlue has been scaling back its European expansion — at least, during the winter season, when transatlantic demand typically falls — to refocus its network on profitable routes.

During this time, JetBlue could send some of its business-class-equipped planes to the hangar on less profitable routes, or it could look for other routes with enough premium demand to fill a 16-seat cabin.

JetBlue seems to think it’s found one of the latter with Bozeman, the gateway to the famed Big Sky ski resort and the nearby luxe private Yellowstone Club for deep-pocketed skiers. Bozeman is also the gateway to Yellowstone National Park, but the national park doesn’t get too crowded during the winter.

Bozeman joins other new Mint cities announced recently, including Phoenix; San Juan, Puerto Rico; and Vancouver, British Columbia.

All these moves come as JetBlue doubles down on its JetForward strategy to return to profitability. The airline is tweaking its network to focus on leisure and VFR (visiting friends and relatives) traffic from its Northeast focus cities.

JetBlue’s original Mint product (the one flying to Bozeman) is arranged in an alternating 2-2, 1-1 configuration. Travelers enjoy lie-flat beds, a restaurant-quality dining experience, amenities from Tuft and Needle and much more.

Mint has historically been considered the best domestic business-class product, but the seats are definitely starting to show their age. The airline hasn’t yet announced a retrofit program for these 10-year-old cabins, but one might be coming soon as the airline gears up to possibly launch a more extensive premium cabin experience.

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