The No. 3 Montana Grizzlies look ahead to their Big Sky Conference football showdown with No. 21 Eastern Washington and see a lot to fix.

The defense ranks 112th in the Football Championship Subdivision in passing yards allowed. The special teams had its problems in a 35-23 win over No. 19 Cal Poly last Saturday, as did an offense that had three turnovers.

The Griz turned it over five times total, the same number Eastern had last week in its 31-13 home loss to Weber State. The difference is Montana won, with big plays, a resurgent second-half ground game and some sturdy defense.

That can make a coach feel pretty good about his team's resilience.

"Yes, but we're in the business of correcting, not accepting," seventh-year Griz coach Bobby Hauck said Tuesday, during UM's weekly press conference. "And there's no one here - the folks on either side of me or in the locker room or the meeting rooms - who is going to accept the fact that we turned the ball over four or five times."

That would spell big problems against the program that has had as much recent success against the Griz as anyone in the current Big Sky. The Eastern Eagles beat Montana in 2002 and 2005, the latter at Washington-Grizzly Stadium by a 34-20 score.

The 2001 and 2007 games in Missoula were classics: The Griz needed double overtime to prevail 29-26 in '01, and a fourth-down diving catch by Ryan Bagley and last-minute field goal from Dan Carpenter to win 24-23 in '07.

Last season the Grizzlies headed to Cheney, Wash., coming off a sobering 45-28 loss at Weber State. They rebounded with a 19-3 win forged on special teams, defense and ball control.

That's a sound formula against a squad playing sound defense (particularly linebacker J.C. Sherritt) and that has as much offensive talent as any team in the league.

"I think they're better than a year ago because they're better at running back," Hauck said of the 4-2 Eagles, who boast 200-pound speedster Taiwan Jones, a former cornerback, on offense. "The Jones kid - I've seen his track times from high school, and I would estimate that he's the fastest player in the league."

Jones had 64 yards and a critical fumble inside the 3-yard line last week, and fell to No. 2 in the Big Sky rushing rankings behind Weber State's Trevyn Smith. Jones' miscue was one of four turnovers Eastern made after falling behind 22-7 at the half. Quarterback Matt Nichols had two interceptions and a fumble.

"They did some good things," Hauck said. "But it goes back to the same thing, and we say it all the time here: Turnovers kill you. They're a relevant statistic."

Montana spent extra time on special teams at Tuesday's practice, with place-kicker Brody McKnight chipping "pooch" kicks of the sort that vexed the Griz against Cal Poly (one was fumbled, another kicked around but covered).

"The short kicks gave us problems," said Hauck, the Griz special teams coach. "Leading up to it I thought we'd given it due diligence, but obviously not."

Hauck said Cal Poly's special teams approach wasn't unexpected. With freshman Peter Nguyen leading the way (29.2-yard average), the Griz are 12th in the FCS in kickoff returns. Thursdays are the day they spend a little extra time dealing with short kickoffs. Now it's a lot of extra time.

"That's something we talk about in August; if we get any good at this stuff, we're going to see it," said Hauck. "We spent the whole day on it today, and we'll spend more time on it tomorrow and more time Thursday. I assume we're going to see it."

Griz receiver Marc Mariani's career-long 84-yard touchdown pass against Cal Poly was made possible by a big block he didn't see.

"When you're running away, you can hear just chaos behind you," said Mariani, who shared Big Sky offensive player of the week honors. "I knew I didn't want to be a part of that, so I just kept running."

Mariani's two TDs Saturday give him 21 for his career - that ties him with Jimmy Farris and Raul Pacheco at No. 6 in Griz history - and he had plenty of blocking on both. He can thank Dan Beaudin on the 84-yarder, after the tight end broke off his sideline route and took out corner Asa Jackson and another Mustang.

"A lot of times we don't necessarily get the opportunity when a guy like Marc gets the ball, because he's so fast," said Beaudin, a 250-pound senior out of Noxon. "That time, he was coming across. It was kind of nice to come back and help spring him loose.

"It's a good feeling to be able to get into those smaller guys. As a bigger fellow, you can definitely do some damage."

QUICK KICKS: Eastern's Jones (nine TDs) and Montana RB Chase Reynolds (8) are 1-2 in the Big Sky in scoring. ... Montana is 1-0 in Big Sky home games. The rest of the league is 4-10 at home against Big Sky opponents, including 1-10 the last three weeks. ... Since that 2005 home loss to EWU the Griz are 24-3 at Washington-Grizzly Stadium, with all three losses in the FCS playoffs. ... UM is now No. 2 among FCS teams in the Sagarin ratings. Richmond is No. 1, and No. 53 overall. Eastern is No. 22 among FCS teams. ... Eastern LB Sherritt, a junior, had a school-record 24 tackles and an interception return for a score against Weber. ... Griz QB Andrew Selle (167.6 rating) is fifth in the FCS in passing efficiency, and EWU's Matt Nichols is No. 22 (145.3).