ZAGS TRACKER: Back on top, but the discussion on who's best continues

Bring on …

Auburn?

Yep, even though Gonzaga reclaimed the No. 1 spot in the AP poll this week as Baylor lost twice at home, it’s obvious that a lot of college basketball aficionados believe Auburn is the best team in the land.

The War Eagles (yes, I know they’re formally called the Tigers) are 16-1, they’ve won on the road at Alabama, they’re 5-0 in the improving SEC, and they received 36 first-place votes – as opposed to just 25 for Gonzaga.

Overall, the Zags just edged the total vote, 1,486 to 1,482.

Supposedly, that oddity occurred because one voter placed Auburn ninth.

Perhaps someone in Tuscaloosa.

But the overall point here is that Auburn is obviously very good – that lone loss was to UConn in overtime — and this is the time of year for teams to pick up momentum.

It’s also about when serious, even ugly, arguments begin on Twitter.

And of course, we get to see all the anti-Gonzaga hate, the insults about a weak WCC, and so on.

HERE’S the thing, though …

You can scream profanities and tweet until your fingers are raw, and it doesn’t matter.

Polls are for shouting over beers.

Is it kind of cool for the Zags to be No. 1?

Sure.

Mark Few himself has mentioned that the lofty ranking is beneficial for the program, and validation of all Gonzaga has accomplished in this sport.

There is a single tangible benefit to being No. 1. Or No. 2, for that matter.

It’s useful to lock up a top seed when the NCAA committee decides who will play in its tournament, where they’ll be seeded, and where they have to travel.

Joe Lunardi’s bracketology is the gold standard for eyeballing the events of March, and at the moment, Joe has the Zags with the No.1 seed in the West Region (to be played in San Francisco).

Besides all these debates, of course, there are games being played when COVID doesn’t interfere.

I’D GUESS that hoops pundits (and AP voters) east of the Rocky Mountains paid no attention to Gonzaga scoring 100 points for three straight games — or becoming the first team in 25 years to ring up 60 or more in the first half three times in a row against a Division I opponent.

No doubt fans and reporters in the Mysterious East just assumed the Zags were running up scores against the Little Sisters of the Poor.

That’s OK.

We’ll see how it goes in the NCAA tournament, where your conference and AP poll numbers don’t protect you.

Gonzaga is the only school in the country to reach the Sweet Sixteen in each of the past five tournaments, and the Zags have played in two of the past four national championship games.

Those aren’t Twitter shouts.

They’re facts.

THE BIG question when we get to tournament time — besides the fate of the omicron variant — is whether a team can slow down the Gonzaga offense.

Those 100-plus games weren’t a fluke.

The Zags are ruthlessly efficient.

“Coach is always on us to get more possessions,” said center Drew Timme. That’s basically the formula …

Play decent defense, rebound the ball, get it up the court and get a good shot quickly.

Gonzaga is doing that with blistering pace and an amazing ability to share the ball.

The Zags are second in the nation in assists (to No. 3 Arizona, where Tommy Lloyd is preaching the same gospel).

In the Santa Clara game, however, we got a fleeting glimpse of how things might always go wrong.

SOMETHING besides COVID, in other words.

Point guard Andrew Nembhard, currently playing the best basketball of his life, got tangled up with some bodies in the lane and needed to be helped off the court.

At first, it appeared that Nembhard had done serious damage to his knee.

In the end, it turned out to be a slightly rolled ankle, and Andrew came back into the game after some treatment.

But the warning is there, for the Zags and every other team.

An injury or two can change an entire season.

Just ask Killian Tillie, who is now starting for the Memphis Grizzlies — but could never stay healthy long enough to help Gonzaga grab that national title.

Those are the events of March, however.

For now, we can just waste our breath arguing about polls — and enjoying the way the Zags play hoops.

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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.

Steve suggests you take his opinions in the spirit of a Jimmy Buffett song: “Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On.”