Fitz Can’t Believe His E Unexpectedly Fast Start Puts Gu Back Among Wcc Title Contenders

The Gonzaga University men’s basketball team had barely broken into a sweat this fall when coach Dan Fitzgerald was quizzed about the prospects of his new and inexperienced club.

“They’re gonna get beat around some early, so a key will be how they handle adversity,” he said.

Well, 12 games into the season, Fitzgerald still isn’t sure how his Bulldogs will handle adversity.

They haven’t encountered much.

Expected to plummet to the bottom of the West Coast Conference standings as if they were wearing cement sneakers, the Bulldogs, instead, have skipped through their preconference schedule with an 11-1 record.

And heading into WCC play Thursday at San Diego, the surprising Bulldogs are viewed as one of the favorites.

“We were picked to finish last, and if you look at what we lost, that’s probably not unreasonable,” Fitzgerald said. “So, obviously, I’m pretty pleased with what we’ve done.”

The expected story line was how the Bulldogs would cope with life after the loss of Jeff Brown and Co. - a corps that won 62 games in three seasons and took the 1994 WCC title by a four-game margin.

But the rapid assimilation of junior college transfers Kyle Dixon and Paul Rogers, along with the emergence of Jon Kinloch as an offensive force to support sharpshooter John Rillie, has made GU the WCC surprise.

The early success, Fitzgerald said, has done two things for the Bulldogs: given them an identity separate from last year’s 22-8 NIT team, and boosted the confidence level heading into conference play.

“I don’t really know how good we are and I think we’re going to have a hard time in conference,” Fitzgerald said. “But I think we’re going to have an easier time than if we were 6-5 or 5-7 or something like that.

“We’ve won some tough games and you kinda have to learn how to win. I don’t know where we’re going to finish, but if we’re last, then I’d say the league’s pretty good.”

It’s unlikely GU would be selected as a candidate for last place at this point.

“I would have to say it appears that Gonzaga and Santa Clara (9-3) have had the best preseasons,” said Loyola Marymount coach John Olive. “Their defensive numbers and shooting numbers are excellent, so if there’s any favorites, it would have to be those two.”

But none of the conference’s coaches is willing to suggest anything but a tight race to the wire.

“The mark of a good conference is there’s no weak teams and I don’t think we have a weak team,” San Diego coach Brad Holland said. “There is no way you can look at any game and think for sure you can win this one or we can get that one. Nobody is counting up wins now.”

It might be a case of all eight teams meeting somewhere in the middle.

“Nobody may be great, but everybody is pretty solid,” Santa Clara coach Dick Davey said.

What has been the surprise thus far is “that all of us have done so well against strong outside competition,” Olive said. “That makes me a little uneasy, actually. So, whoever wins this conference this year will have truly earned it.”

Fitzgerald, WCC Coach of the Year last season, said GU shoulders no added pressure as defending titlists.

“Every year is so different. It’s not yesterday and it’s all so new and the league changes so much,” he said.

Especially on the bench, where three new coaches - Holland at San Diego, Rob Chavez at Portland and Tony Fuller at Pepperdine - take over.

As for a single dominating player in the conference, Fitzgerald points to Santa Clara guard Steve Nash.

Nash, a 6-foot-2 junior, leads the conference in scoring and assists and pumped in 34 in the league opener against Saint Mary’s - sinking all 21 of his free-throw attempts.

“He’s gonna be a pro,” Fitzgerald said of Nash, who played on the Canadian national team at the 1994 World Championships last summer. “You get a lot of valuable experience playing against the Dream Team.”

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with story: Tight race Predicted order of finish in WCC men’s basketball: 1. Santa Clara 2. Gonzaga 3. Portland 4. Loyola Marymount 5. San Francisco 6. San Diego 7. Saint Mary’s 8. Pepperdine ——- WCC team previews can be found on page C5.