Maybe Zags should consider going East
As the Zags continue to beat up on the mostly inferior competition in the West Coast Conference, you start to wonder ...
Maybe that talk of Gonzaga joining the Big East doesn’t sound so crazy after all.
No matter what kind of shine people want to put on this, the hierarchy of WCC men’s basketball still doesn’t appear to be changing.
It starts with Gonzaga at the top, followed by Saint Mary’s, followed by BYU, followed by a bunch of other interchangeable teams that could beat each other on a given night.
Ho hum.
Yes, one of those other interchangeable teams sometimes rise up and stun the Zags, usually at home, followed by a court storming by their fans.
BUT IT doesn’t happen very often.
Yes, BYU handed the Zags their lone regular-season loss last year — at Gonzaga, no less. But the Zags routinely win in Provo, and it’s also as likely BYU will stumble against one of those interchangeable teams.
Saint Mary’s? Nice team, nice campus. But it has to be a little bit galling to the Gaels that, for all their success in recent years, they can’t beat the Zags very often — even at home.
Saint Mary’s visits Spokane on Thursday, and no doubt the Zags will be ready. In fact, Gonzaga seems to look forward to beating the Gaels more than any other team in the league — well, OK, maybe BYU too.
They beat Saint Mary’s at home, beat ‘em in Moraga, then for good measure, beat ‘em in Las Vegas at the WCC tournament just to remind them who’s in charge here.
I’m sure the Zags noticed when Saint Mary’s was picked to win the West Coast Conference — ahead of the Zags, who only played for the national title last year. The Gaels went out in the second round.
AS FOR the others ...
The Zags have beaten Pepperdine an astonishing 32 times in a row, and 47 times in their last 52 meetings.
The Zags have beaten Loyola Marymount 17 straight times, have won 30 of the last 33, 46 of the last 50 ...
The Zags have beaten Portland nine straight times, and more telling, 43 times in the last 45 meetings.
The Zags have beaten Santa Clara 16 straight times, and have won 39 of the last 41.
The Zags have beaten San Diego 39 times in the last 42 meetings.
Heading into Saturday night, the Zags had won 11 in a row over San Francisco, and 36 of the last 39.
The Zags have won 11 in a row vs. Pacific, which joined the WCC in 2013.
Since 1999, Gonzaga is 43-9 vs. Saint Mary’s. And the Gaels are considered the Zags’ closest rival.
Gonzaga is 11-6 vs. BYU since the first meeting in 2011, a loss in an NCAA tournament game. The Cougars joined the WCC the following year.
THE BIG East isn’t what it once was. But it’s still a pretty good league.
Gone are the powerhouses from Syracuse, UConn, Georgetown and St. John’s.
(Sure, Georgetown and St. John’s are still in the league, albeit in watered-down versions).
Villanova is still around, and even better now — as the Zags painfully found out last month.
Seton Hall and Providence are also still around from the good ol’ days.
Newbies in the league include Creighton, Xavier, Marquette, Butler and DePaul.
The Big East, top to bottom, would provide more competition for the Zags.
Sure, it’s a far-flung league. It’s almost like when Idaho was in the Sun Belt for football, when the closest league team was New Mexico State, and the rest of the teams were in the South. Each road game was a long, long ways away. But, competition-wise, it wasn’t a bad fit for the Vandals, who were no longer needed for the league after this past season.
In the Big East, Gonzaga’s shortest road trip would be to Creighton in Omaha, Neb., roughly 1,380 miles one-way.
But the Zags have the bucks to travel by charter to road games, so transportation shouldn’t be as much of an issue. It’s not like they’re sprawled out in the “C” concourse at the airport at oh-dark-thirty, hoping the de-icer works so their Horizon flight can get off the ground in time.
The Zags in the Big East would also make the WCC more interesting. Saint Mary’s and BYU have been known to stub their toes against lesser conference foes, so there would at least be some intrigue as to who will actually end up winning the thing. And if those two teams left the league, who knows who would be the favorite.
Then again, Zag fans would have to trade in their trips to Las Vegas in early March for a longer jaunt to Madison Square Garden in New York City.
Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.