NCDS: Ray Giacoletti, Asst. Coach - Gonzaga

By: Ray Giacoletti, Asst. Coach - Gonzaga

In my last update of Gonzaga basketball, we were 16-3 overall, 5-0 in the West Coast Conference and ranked 13^th in the nation.  Next up was a road swing to the Bay Area.  First up was Santa Clara.  We had to rally from 14 points down in the second half to win 71-64.  On Saturday at San Francisco, it would be a different story.  Dior Lowhorn hit a 3 pointer with 9.8 seconds left in regulation to tie the game.  In overtime, Lowhorn hit back to back 3 pointers to help the Dons beat the Zags 81-77.  The loss was our first conference loss in 28 regular season WCC games.  We would find out how our young team would respond to the loss.  The second half of conference play, we would play 5 of our last 7 games at home!  It would all start with the University of Portland.

The Pilots are one of the most experienced teams in the WCC.  We went on a 20-2 run midway in the first half to run away with a 76-49 victory!  Matt Bouldin led the way with 20 points.  The next morning we practiced at home at 9 a.m. and then took our charter flight to Memphis where we would play the Tigers at 1 p.m. on Saturday.  It would be a tough turn-around and our last opportunity for a quality non-conference win.  Matt Bouldin scored 19 points and we got a big win (66-58) in front of 17,000 people.  That would improve our overall record to 19-4 and 7-1 in the WCC.  When you get into the month of February, your team needs to be playing its best basketball of the season.  That was our focus, and what we were searching for.  Our Thursday game with St. Mary's (21-4, 8-2) would be a show-down for the Conference Championship.

Elias Harris scored 19 points and Matt Bouldin had 18 as the Bulldogs beat the Gaels 80-61.  The win helped improve our record in the McCarthey Athletic Center to 71-4 since it opened in 2004.  On Saturday, 2/13/10, the #16 Zags completed the weekend sweep with an 82-65 win over San Diego.  Both wins moved us up to #9 in the ESPN poll and #13 in the Associated Press rankings.  The last conference road trip of the season would start out at Loyola Marymount.  It would be a bad night to have one of our worst shooting performances of the season at 34% from the field.  LMU beat us 74-66, but two nights later we would regroup and beat Pepperdine 72-54.

With one weekend of conference games to be played we needed one win to the tie for our 10^th consecutive regular season conference championship.  On Thursday we would get it, with an easy 88-51 victory over Santa Clara.  Our guys did not want to share the championship, but to win it outright, they would need to beat San Francisco in our last conference game.  It wouldn't be easy with USF playing their best basketball of the season.  Fortunately, Gonzaga pulled away with a hard-fought 75-69 victory, and the WCC Conference Championship.  Tonight (3/2/10) we will play our last regular season game and also honor our 3 graduating seniors.....Matt Bouldin, Will Foster and Chris Pontarolo-Maag.  It should be a special night for both of them.  Matt will leave Gonzaga as one of the all-time greats to wear a Zag uniform.  Congrats on a great career Matt!

The West Coast Conference tournament starts now in Las Vegas.  March is the best time of the year for college basketball!  The Zags should be in good shape to be selected to play in our 12^th consecutive NCAA Tournament!  Head Coach, Mark Few has built this program to an elite status in college basketball. 

Enjoy March Madness and GO ZAGS!

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