MISSOULA — The Montana men’s tennis team claimed two of three individual honors, and six players — nearly the entire squad — packed the all-conference teams as the Big Sky announced its year-end awards on Wednesday.
For the second straight year, head coach Jason Brown was voted by his peers as the Big Sky’s coach of the year after another remarkable season.
Grizzly No. 1 Tom Bittner also etched his name among the league’s all-time elite, voted Big Sky MVP for the 2026 season to become just the third player from Montana to ever earn the conference’s top honor.
Bittner and Duncan McCall were also unanimous picks on the All-Big Sky singles first team and both earned doubles honors as well. McCall became the first Grizzly ever to earn unanimous first team honors in both singles and doubles in the same season. Bittner and his partner Eivind Tandberg were an honorable mention doubles team as well.
Freshman Matt Upton also earned two awards, landing on the second team for both singles and doubles with his partner Johnny Wilkinson. Senior Baltazar Wiger-Nordas doubled up as well, picking up second team singles honors and unanimous first team honors with McCall.
In total, four of UM’s top six regulars in the singles lineup earned accolades, as did the entire doubles lineup.
“This makes me very grateful to have such a class act group because these awards are voted on by the coaches in the league, and I think they recognize our guys try to do things the right way and have had another amazing season,” said Brown.
“I’m full of gratitude for that, and I’m really proud of the body of work they’ve put together so far this year.”
Brown led the Griz to a 13-7 overall record and went 6-1 in conference play this season with their lone loss coming to Northern Arizona in a heartbreaker when a Grizzly player fell injured and was unable to finish the match.
He capped his ninth regular season at UM with a 110-74 overall record and at 42-23 in the Big Sky since taking the program over in 2018. He’s also made Missoula one of the most difficult stops on the league circuit for any visiting team with a 50-9 home record in that time.
The native of Conrad earned Big Sky coach of the year honors his first year in 2018, again in 2025, and now in 2026. He is now the first Big Sky coach to win the award in consecutive seasons since Slava Konikov of Sacramento State won three between 2009-11.
“I’m so humbled my peers think I’m doing a great job, but an award like this doesn’t happen without great players and a great support staff around me. (Assistant coach) Ethan Vaughn has been such a vital part of this journey, gets almost zero recognition and volunteers a ton of his time. He probably loves Griz tennis more than anyone. He won a championship as a player, one last year as a coach and hopefully another one this year. He bleeds maroon and silver and the guys feel it.
“Then having Chris Zhang step right in from being a player last year to our Graduate Assistant — he’s a nice bridge with the players and understands what they are going through because he was going through it 365 days ago,” said Brown.
“These guys run so many individual practices, they’re an extra set of eyes and ears on the court and are such a great support system for me. I wish they had an award. Then, having Kris Nord still around and a resource like Tyler Thompson, a former Grizzly who coaches at North Carolina — a lot of our program’s decisions run through those two guys as well. It just takes a village and I’m lucky I have people who care so much about Grizzly tennis and making it better.”
Bittner will graduate from UM in May to cap arguably the best career in program history, culminating in a historic senior year where he battled injury and didn’t even find his form until late in the season.
His senior campaign started in the fall where he earned the Big Sky's lone automatic berth at the ITA Conference Masters Tournament and took down the No. 1 player from the 2024 national champion and last year's NCAA runner-up TCU Horned Frogs. He followed that up with a win over the defending Big East Conference player of the year.
In the spring dual season, he started slow as his health affected his game, losing four of his first five matches to start the year. When it mattered most, however, he found his stride, heading to this year’s conference tournament as a winner of five straight and capping the regular season at 8-7 overall and 5-2 in league play.
Bittner is now just the third Big Sky MVP in program history, joining Ed Pudney in 2022 and Andrew Warren in 2014 as recipients.
It’s a recognition for a stellar junior season as well, where he became Montana’s highest ranked regional player ever, was the Big Sky Tournament MVP and again a unanimous first team all-conference singles pick.
He’s also a star in the classroom as a two-time recipient of UM’s President’s Award, given annually to the student-athlete with the top overall GPA in Grizzly Athletics.
“I think if people understood all the difficulties he’s had to overcome — the medical issues and personal battles he’s had to fight to even see the court — I truly believe he would have been close to undefeated this season,” said Brown.
“There were a lot of very worthy candidates for MVP this year and I love they selected Tom as a bit of a legacy award for what he’s done here. He’s a great competitor, he’s fair, and incredibly hard to beat. But on the rare occasion it does happen, he takes it as well as anyone. He’s a consummate pro, and I think it’s one of my proudest moments as a coach to see him recognized because it’s so well deserved.”
McCall — last year’s Big Sky Freshman of the Year — followed up an impressive debut season with the team’s best record in 2026, piling up a 13-5 singles tally while going 6-1 in league play, primarily on courts two and three.
He and Wiger-Nordas also helped UM build the most dominant doubles unit in the league, with the Griz winning nine of their last 10 opening points. The No. 1 pair put up a 12-4 record overall and went 5-1 in Big Sky play together, leading McCall to a rare unanimous vote for both singles and doubles.
“His awards show they picked the right Freshman of the Year last year, and he’s built on that,” added Brown.
“He’s grown into such a great leader for our program and is ready to step into that role on and off the court. I love the fact he was overlooked coming out of high school. He believes in himself, believes in our program and what we’re doing, embraces adversity, and just gets after it. He competes hard and finds a way, and it’s inspiring for everybody he’s around.”
Upton had Montana’s second-best singles record in his first season in maroon and silver, solidifying the lower order with a 12-6 overall record and a 5-2 conference record, primarily playing on lines three and four.
He also remained unbeaten in conference doubles at 4-0, while compiling a season-long doubles record of 8-5 overall, with a streak of five-straight wins in the leadup to the conference tournament. He’s earned all five of those wins since partnering with Wilkinson on court three partway through the season, who himself went 10-3 on the year in doubles.
Montana heads to Phoenix this week looking to make it back-to-back Big Sky Tournament titles as the No. 2 seed in this year’s bracket. After receiving a first round bye, they will face the highest remaining seed on Friday morning at 9 a.m. Mountain time in the semifinal. A conference championship would send them to the NCAA Tourney for just the third time in program history.
2026 Big Sky Men’s Tennis Award Winners
MVP: Tom Bittner, Montana
Freshman of the Year: Jakub Jedrzejczak, Northern Arizona
Coach of the Year: Jason Brown, Montana
All-Big Sky Singles First Team
Tom Bittner, Montana*
Chetanna Amadike, Idaho*
Jakub Jedrzejczak, Northern Arizona*
Noa Tcherniack, Northern Arizona*
Duncan McCall, Montana*
Valentino De Pellegrin, Idaho State
* - unanimous first-team selection
All-Big Sky Singles Second Team
Jakub Volesky, Northern Arizona
Matt Upton, Montana
Sep de Visser, Idaho State
Gabriel Moroder, Idaho
Aarjun Pandit, Portland State
Baltazar Wiger-Nordas, Montana
All-Big Sky Singles Honorable Mention
Nick Bowles, Sacramento State
Felix Neumeister, Northern Arizona
Ken Dinh, Weber State
Eddie Biss, Montana State
All-Big Sky Doubles First Team
Duncan McCall/Baltazar Wiger-Nordas, Montana*
Takumi Katsuda/Vincent Vohl, Northern Arizona
Jakub Jedrzejczak/Jakub Volesky, Northern Arizona
* - unanimous first-team selection
All-Big Sky Doubles Second Team
Valentino De Pellegrin/Tyler Dalos, Idaho State
Chetanna Amadike/Gabriel Moroder, Idaho
Johnny Wilkinson/Matt Upton, Montana
All-Big Sky Doubles Honorable Mention
Sep de Visser/Quentin Lamothe, Idaho State
Tom Bittner/Eivind Tandberg, Montana
Aarjun Pandit/Maas Schotanus, Portland State
