NCAA

When a college basketball team is a double-digit seed to the NCAA Tournament, projecting where said team lands is like trying to throw darts blindfolded.

The reason this feels largely new to the Zags is, well, it is for 11 of 12 players. UConn transfer guard Ines Bettencourt was on two teams in Bristol, Connecticut, that played in the NCAA Tournament including the Final Four in 2022-23.

PULLMAN – The most sober assessment of this Washington State season, the most salient summary of the reason the Cougars’ season petered out in nondescript fashion last weekend, may have come from their starting power forward.

Another member of Gonzaga’s 2022-23 Elite Eight team will have an opportunity to make his NBA debut with the Brooklyn Nets.

March, as the old adage goes, came into the Palouse like a lion this week.

Gonzaga’s Graham Ike is one step closer to winning one of college basketball’s top individual awards.

What better way to cap our season-long coverage of a conference that doesn’t exist than to hand out imaginary awards?

This idea that Riley somehow killed all of the momentum that Kyle Smith created is a little far-fetched. Smith was terrific in leading the Cougs to the NCAA Tournament. Still, he was just one game over .500 in three of his five seasons at WSU. And after that 2024 NCAA berth, he and nearly his entire roster – including future pros Jaylen Wells and Isaac Jones – scattered just as WSU dropped to the WCC. 

BOISE — After 36 years, the Idaho men's basketball team is finally going dancing again.

BOISE – The Idaho women’s basketball team made only one field goal in the fourth quarter of the Big Sky Tournament championship.

LAS VEGAS – It’s tough to beat a team three times in the same season.

BOISE — Kolton Mitchell has struggled with a back injury over the past few weeks, but it didn’t prevent the Idaho guard from performing some heavy lifting in the Vandals’ Big Sky tourney semifinal Tuesday night.

LAS VEGAS – It might be timely to point this out: Saint Aloysius Gonzaga is touted, among other things, as the patron for youth.

LAS VEGAS – With both eyes focused on the basket, Gonzaga’s Davis Fogle drove from the right sideline, curled up and around the hoop and laid the ball off the glass while drawing contact from Santa Clara’s Christian Hammond.

LAS VEGAS – Minutes after Gonzaga had secured a trip to the NCAA Tournament, Ines Bettencourt sprinted to Gonzaga’s locker room at the Orleans Arena to retrieve her cell phone.

LAS VEGAS – Kind of magical, really, how this group of players turned a basketball tournament into a dance party.

From staff reports

After a spotty start at Orleans Arena, the top-seeded Zags turned the tide in Tuesday’s West Coast Conference Tournament championship game, taking their first lead midway through the second half and emerging with a victory.

Gonzaga outlasted Oregon State to win the West Coast Conference Tournament for an 11th time on Tuesday at Orleans Arena in Las Vegas.