THE CHEAP SEATS with STEVE CAMERON: It shouldn't really matter who Zags face along the way

Bracket?

What bracket?

Oh, that one.
 Honestly, I haven’t been paying much attention, because, well…

Gonzaga needs to win six more games, and if the Zags are really the best team in the country, there shouldn’t be anyone among those six opponents who are better than the Zags.

Therefore, they will be favored in every game they play.

Their only mission is to play like a favorite six times in a row.

Simple.

So why worry about who’s seeded where in your region?

Or…

Who might you face in the Final Four?

It has to work like this: “Hi, we’re Gonzaga, and we’re going to beat you.”

Yes, I realize the frightening difficulty of the NCAA tournament — one bad night and you’re out.

It ain’t a two-out-of-three format.

And here’s the dagger…

If these Zags lose to anyone, then this season will be considered a disappointment.

FRANKLY, I think that’s a terrible thing to hang on a college basketball team.

Go 32-0, or we’ll remember you as the guys who didn’t get it done.

Never mind that this unbeaten season thing hasn’t been done since Indiana ran the table in 1976 – and that was before the tournament was expanded to 64 teams.

That’s correct.

You will find NOBODY who has won the NCAA tournament to conclude a perfect season, and has done it under the current format.

Longtime journalist and podcaster Tony Kornheiser has generally been unkind to Gonzaga over the years.

“I haven’t been a Gonzaga fan,” he said last week. “I think they’ve been overrated and overseeded most of the time.”

Tony has only lived and worked in Washington D.C. and New York, so of course he’s been asleep for most Zags games.

He hasn’t really looked at tournament results, either, or he’d know that Gonzaga has made it to the Sweet Sixteen or beyond in more consecutive years than anyone in college hoops.

True.

It’s now five tournaments and counting, which nobody else can match.

Kornheiser, to his credit, has woken up and taken note of the Zags’ 26-0 record, and conceded that there’s a stunning target available to them.

“Gonzaga is chasing immortality,” he said.

IS THIS a team good enough to find its way into the company of Bill Walton’s UCLA, or the San Francisco team led by Bill Russell, or the North Carolina group that defeated Wilt Chamberlain?

That remains to be seen, of course, but I’m pretty sure that how the bracket was drawn up won’t make any difference.

Yes, I was slightly amused that the tournament committee chose to put Iowa, Kansas and Virginia — three teams the Zags already have beaten — into the same region.

They could have added West Virginia and BYU, and made it a royal flush.

The only reason I could see a tiny tweak in that odd West Region placement goes back to something I’ve believed since the start of the season.

I really feel that the Zags have a slight advantage over teams they haven’t played — simply because they’re faster and more efficient in real life than they look on tape.

That’s the small stuff, though.

The bottom line is that seedings and regions won’t really matter.

There have been times this year that the Zags have looked pretty close to unbeatable — no matter who the opponent might be.

Even better, they’ve shown an ability to lift their game whenever it’s necessary.

That’s the kind of thing that might win you a tournament.

Assuming you’re good enough in the first place.

So…

Are they?

Email: scameron@cdapress.com

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. “Moments, Memories and Madness,” his reminiscences from several decades as a sports journalist, runs each Sunday.

Steve also writes Zags Tracker, a commentary on Gonzaga basketball which is published each Tuesday.