ZAGS TRACKER with STEVE CAMERON: Zags built for this unusual tourney setup

Gonzaga’s journey remains on course at the NCAA tournament.

Two wins down, four to go.

Of course, a variation of that same assessment is also the punchline of a goofy joke.

Question: “A guy fell from the roof of an 80-story building. What did he say as he zoomed past the 40th floor?”

Answer: “So far, so good!”

Of course, the Zags aren’t likely to go splat in downtown Indianapolis, and even in a serious basketball context, Mark Few goes out of his way to brush aside the notion — now so common in the media — that if his team cannot make history with an undefeated national championship, this will be a disappointing season.

“That’s just foolish,” Few said during a midweek Zoom conference with reporters.

“We appreciate every game.”

Few added that, while every game has gotten the Zags’ full attention and enjoyment, there’s a contest that’s foremost in their minds.

“The next one,” he said.

IN THIS case, that would be a tussle with Creighton of the Big East Conference on Sunday afternoon.

The Sweet 16 game (11:10 a.m., Pacific time) will send the winner into a showdown next Tuesday with a Pac-12 foe, either USC or Oregon — with admittance to the Final Four as a lovely door prize.

Gonzaga is a 14-point favorite over Creighton, but if this particular March Madness has shown us anything, it is that no result — not even any tip-off — is truly guaranteed.

COVID is still lurking in the shadows, as VCU can attest.

Regarding the basketball challenge, Few is preaching just what you’d expect, that it’s crazy to look ahead.

We’re at the point, he said, where…

“If you don’t play good to great, you’re going home.”

Creighton gets its direction and energy from point guard Marcus Zegarowski, but all five starters in its up-tempo game average in double figures.

Whether an offensive-minded club like the Bluejays can have success running with a Zags bunch that has routinely scored at a historical level, well…

That seems like tugging on Superman’s cape.

But Creighton plans to give it a shot.

Coach Greg McDermott’s team is going to bring its high-octane offense to the party, and see what happens.

MEANWHILE, McDermott himself is trying to get out from under a hideous mistake, a blunder that cost him a brief suspension — and a warning that one more error would be his last at Creighton.

After a tough loss at Xavier on Feb. 27, McDermott used what could only be called a racial analogy when telling his players that they had to hold on as a group.

The quote…


"Guys, we've got to stick together. We need both feet in. I need everybody to stay on the plantation.

“I can't have anybody leave the plantation."

Needless to say, that use of the word “plantation” was terribly offensive.

The Creighton administration suspended McDermott, and the coach admitted that what he’d said was wrong.

McDermott’s subsequent honesty seemed to show that his 10 good seasons in Omaha outweighed one awful choice of words.

He apologized personally to the team, and returned to his coaching duties for the NCAA tournament.

The Bluejays, seeded No. 5 in the West, barely escaped UC Santa Barbara in a tense 63-62 opener, but looked far sharper while dispatching Ohio 72-58 to reach the Sweet 16.

“We’re ready for Gonzaga,” Zegarowski said (mispronouncing it as Gon-ZOG-a), “and that’s a game we can win.”

Few agreed with the assessment, and repeated his warning that any missteps could finish the Zags’ run.

THE ZAGS are giving Creighton their full attention, but must do so in the mind-numbing isolation that the NCAA has imposed to protect tournament teams from COVID.

Players have managed to get in some football, plus a strange form of golf, and they went on a pleasing trip to the Indianapolis Zoo.

They’ve also taken turns at the Zoom press conferences, which have brought up some questions that were, ah…

Unusual.

For instance, Joel Ayayi was asked if it were true that he dislikes dogs and, if so, how could he choose Gonzaga with such a nickname and mascot (Bulldogs).

Ayayi clearly was more prepared for questions about the Creighton offense, and he tried to be diplomatic regarding dogs.

He mentioned the fact that dogs know what you’re thinking, and he’d rather not add anyone else to the household that was getting in his head.

(I tried to get in a follow-up question about cats, but we ran out of time.)

Oh, and Ayayi naturally dismissed the school nickname as having anything at all to do with choice of universities.

Apparently, he has no worries about the mascot reading his mind.

That entire discussion about dogs gives you an idea about how both participants and media sometimes struggle as these tournaments drag on.

We’re talking about weeks in isolation.

THE LONG road to a title — sorry, possible title — doesn’t seem to be bothering the Zags.

In fact, the whole lockdown issue might work to their favor.

This is one of the times when Gonzaga’s specific recruiting goals may really help.

Zags coaches target a certain type of player, and also a particular kind of young man.

To build a selfless team that will work for a common goal, it almost goes without saying that “me-first” players are going to be bypassed.

The offshoot of producing a smart, connected group on the court is that these types of players tend to like each other.

That sort of camaraderie really helps in situations like this Indianapolis encampment.

A national talk show host specifically mentioned that the Zags don’t seem the least bit fazed in the midst of this strange tournament setting.

They got behind Oklahoma fairly quickly, he noted, but never displayed even a hint of panic.

It takes everyone on exactly the same page to pull that off.

Corey Kispert might have summed it up when a reporter asked point-blank what it would take to win this tournament and finish with a historic 32-0 record.

“Just be us,” Kispert said.

Email: scameron@cdapress.com

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays during the NCAA tournament. “Moments, Memories and Madness,” his reminiscences from several decades as a sports journalist, will return and run each Sunday after Gonzaga’s season is concluded.

Steve also writes Zags Tracker, a commentary on Gonzaga basketball which will be published each Thursday during the tournament.