ZAGS TRACKER with STEVE CAMERON: Proof you can be nice ... and still win
You already know this, but…
Gonzaga faces its two toughest non-conference tests this coming week, dueling with UCLA next Tuesday and Duke just three days later.
The games are part of a typical Las Vegas mega-event, and they’ll get the billing and blah-blah of a heavyweight title bout.
The win over Texas has been forgotten already, with the national media consigning the Horns to some lower tier in the college hoops landscape.
Yeah, Drew Timme was great, but can he do it against bigger, better and more athletic defenses?
America wants to know, and Mark Few has repeated over and over that the Zags are happy to engage the toughest competition.
Few even agreed to play Central Michigan the night before the matchup with UCLA.
The Bruins, meanwhile, are ranked No. 2 behind the top-ranked Zags, and Duke — in the midst of Mike Krzyzewski’s farewell tour — have enough talent to check in at No. 7.
Coach K most definitely intends to go out a winner.
JUST A mention of Duke, of course, gets a lot of people’s blood boiling.
It’s a matter of faith — an absolute truth in the minds of millions — that Duke wins plenty of games because the officials take care of them.
They always have one, maybe two, characters who are serial whiners.
Seriously.
Duke is Grayson Allen tripping players intentionally, then pouting to a ref.
It’s a legacy with that damn team — back to Christian Laettner and onward with Bobby Hurley and all the rest of them.
They’ve NEVER committed a foul. They’ll argue that until the technical foul, which no official wants to plant on Coach K, becomes impossible to avoid.
Maybe that official finds himself calling far less ACC games — all because he did the right thing with Duke.
The other side of all this is predictable.
If a really physical team like conference contender Florida State knocks the Blue Devils around in the paint, they’ll almost come to tears.
Krzyzewski has a particular expression where he screws up his face for officials, opponents — shoot, for everybody. It makes him look like a white-collar criminal, maybe a slippery hedge fund manager who’s been stashing millions in the Cayman Islands.
Now he has just been sentenced to four years in a real prison, and … and …
And …
Finally, THOSE implications are just setting in.
But hey …
It’ll all work out — yes, really — since the district appeals judge who eventually decides the case is probably a 1956 Duke Law grad.
And his grandson maybe spent a couple of seasons as a ball boy at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Yep …
It always works out.
SO, HOW does all this sobbing and yelling and having calls reversed impact Gonzaga?
Well, the Zags want to beat UCLA and Duke. They want to beat everyone.
Few has some sideline postures to express his displeasure, the most common being opening his arms as wide as possible, as though he’s going to be (or has already been) crucified for his actions.
But it’s all for show.
Oh, Mark wants those critical calls, no question. He and many others have complained (almost non-stop) about the officiating in that 2017 national title game against North Carolina.
Bill Walton has made that (“injustice,” or fill in any other word) something of a crusade.
It comes up almost every time Bill calls a Zags game or, sometimes, when there’s simply some mention of previous championship games.
Walton also defends the Zags when they hear the notion of acting really nice (say, giving an opponent a hand to get up from the floor) and then running over the same guy while blasting down the lane a couple of minutes later.
This argument came up almost where you’d expect it, with former Gonzaga assistant and now Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd.
Tommy faced the accusation that his Wildcats pretended to be nice — but that it’s all just an act.
Lloyd responded just as he would have anytime during his 20 years in Spokane.
“You know, I told (the players), ‘You can be nice guys and still kick ass,’ ” Lloyd said.
“That’s the message. That’s what we want to do.”
And where, I wonder, did Tommy Lloyd get THAT philosophy?
When you walk into the Gonzaga locker room at the Kennel, the first thing you see is a beautifully painted sign that, more or less, looms over everything.
There is nothing on the wooden sign but a quote from ESPN analyst Jay Bilas — who was reflecting on Gonzaga’s two decades of non-stop success.
Bilas’ words…
“They go to school. They do their homework. They shake hands. They say please and thank you.
“But once you throw that ball up, they will rip your heart out and watch you bleed.”
IN BILAS’ short message, you can find everything there is to know about Gonzaga hoops.
Play hard as hell and smart as hell; your teammates and your university believe you will.
Because …
We are GU.
Email: scameron@cdapress.com
Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.
He also writes Zags Tracker, a commentary on Gonzaga basketball which is published weekly during the season.