THE CHEAP SEATS with STEVE CAMERON: Good start, but great needed again for Zags

Graham Ike wasn’t mincing words.

“We’ve got a chip on our shoulder,” the Gonzaga center said with a deadly straight face.

“A really big chip.”

Ike was speaking for all the Zags, who spent the week ahead of the NCAA tournament hearing over and over that 12-seeded McNeese State was a great bet to upset them.

The national media carried on about McNeese’s 30-3 record, the Cowboys’ relentless press, high-tempo offense and ability to bring down 3-pointers like rainfall.

On one pre-tournament show, a former coach laughed and said, “McNeese has done so much winning this year, they may have forgotten how to lose.”

Well.

They remember it now.

Gonzaga breezed to an 86-65 rout in Salt Lake City Thursday night that, to use an old line, wasn’t as close as the final score.

The lead ballooned to 35 points at 83-48 with 4:49 remaining on a muscle drive — plus free throw — by reserve guard Luka Krajnovic.

The score actually seemed irrelevant, though, because this was never a competitive event.

THE ZAGS took care of that thing on their shoulders by playing a fierce —and almost perfect — first half, racing out to a 48-25 lead.

McNeese led 2-0, and then the roof fell in.

Nolan Hickman responded with a wide-open 3-pointer, giving the Zags a lead that was never relinquished.

And in fact, that first bucket on skip pass out of double team, started a theme that just went on and on and on.

McNeese coach Will Wade said before the game that given his team’s lack of size, they’d have to be quick to double-team Ike and Anton Watson — and most of all, work to get Ike into the kind of foul trouble he’s found late in the year.

So, how did that work?

Let’s see.

Watson turned in a pretty decent line: 13 points, 13 rebounds and 9 assists.

As for Ike, he was literally perfect with 16 points, 10 rebounds … and ZERO personal fouls.

Memo to Will Wade: Things can go up in flames when a plan gets too close to the campfire.

And make no mistake, the Zags were sizzling.

It wasn’t just their shooting (8-for-10 on 3-pointers in the first half) or the crisp passing (15 assists on 17 baskets), but it was Gonzaga, not McNeese, which unleashed the in-your-face defense.

“Our defending was the key to everything, coach Mark Few said. “The offense fed off that, and we ran things really well – plus, obviously, hitting so many of our 3s.”

McNeese’s much-publicized outside shooting game not only failed to produce a rainfall, it was barely a drizzle until garbage time in the final few minutes.

The Cowboys hit just one shot behind the arc in the first half.

GONZAGA looked like something considerably better than a 5-seed during this demolition, and a repeat performance on Saturday would give the Zags at least a fighting chance against No. 4 Kansas, which survived Samford in the late game at the Delta Center.

The Jayhawks, for what it’s worth, threw Samford out on the street much the way the Zags had done to McNeese.

Going around the ring with Kansas on Saturday will be a completely different waltz.

That game, if you recall, will have a bit of historical context to it, since Gonzaga has made the Sweet 16 eight straight times (most in the nation).

Games like Thursday night’s blowout leave you wondering if a team like the Zags have begun purring into the school’s routine spot somewhere deep in this tournament.

Or.

Did they he just catch a smaller team with stage fright at the Big Dance, and turn in one of those one-sided romps we see so often in preseason at The Kennel?

There have been a lot of laughers at home against teams from the Southland Conference (which McNeese won with a 17-1 record).

It was a good sign, though, that Few was “tournament coaching” early in the game.

He was forced into a move when Ben Gregg picked up two early fouls, but the Zags looked just fine with Dusty Stromer, Braden Huff and Krajnovic all playing meaningful minutes with the outcome (theoretically) still in doubt.

We’ll need to see another game or two to know whether or not Gonzaga has stepped it up a gear.

Actually, just one game will be enough.

We’ll get a verdict, one way or another.

Kansas ain’t McNeese.

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press four times each week, normally Tuesday through Friday unless, you know, stuff happens.

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