Eagles-Zags in the Arena must continue

Here’s why the Gonzaga Bulldogs may not want to keep playing Eastern Washington downtown at the Spokane Arena:

With 5 1/2 minutes to play Monday night, the Zags – ranked eighth in the nation – were tied with a team they’d beaten 19 straight, by an average of 18 points each time. Momentum was a push, and some of the few undecideds among the 11,879 in attendance had thrown in with coach Mike Burns’ underdogs.

And here’s why the Zags need to: Chuck and Bobbie Donnenwirth drove all the way from Pinehurst, Idaho, to watch them for the first time.

“This is the only time we can get tickets,” said Chuck.

From his seat in row M of Section 222 – three from the top in the east end zone – he probably couldn’t see well enough to know whether EWU’s Jake Beitinger got a big enough piece of Adam Morrison to send the Gonzaga supernova to the foul line for the tipping points in a 75-65 Zags victory, or whether it was just another knock in a game of hard ones.

One section over, Shirley Cannon, Devon Greyerbiehl and Jean Larson were in much the same boat.

“We don’t get into McCarthey (Athletic Center, on the GU campus) ever – unless somebody gives you a ticket, which doesn’t happen,” said Greyerbiehl. “Of course, you see it better on TV – look at where we’re sitting.”

“But there’s nothing quite like going to a game,” Cannon said.

She has that right.

Even if it’s not up close, there’s nothing quite like seeing one of Morrison’s improbable raids on the rim or the gashing drives of EWU’s Rodney Stuckey or even the gradual emergence of a future game-turner like Gonzaga’s Larry Gurganious. Surely there’s nothing like sharing it with 11,000 new best friends, even if it means the hot dog line is 20 deep at halftime.

This is why it was a good idea to move this series off the two campuses three years ago. It remains a good idea for that reason, though other reasons may be tugging it toward a different reality.

Evolution is a funny thing.

The last four Decembers, these two teams have lured 46,516 to the Arena for their annual mudwrestle. Yet as recently as seven years ago, not even 1,700 showed up in Cheney for the game. Not only were Chuck and Bobbie not driving all the way from the Silver Valley, but Dick and Jane couldn’t be lured out of their living room in Spokane – and the game wasn’t even on the tube.

You’d think that would be enough to guarantee that it remains at the Arena in perpetuity. Not so fast.

There have been rumblings that Gonzaga wants to take the series back to its own arena with no return dates in Cheney, along the lines of what happened to its games with Idaho once that series resumed two seasons ago after a two-year hiatus. That in the push-and-pull of college scheduling – with GU’s increased emphasis on neutral-court games with high RPI teams and its need to keep a reasonable level of home games as well – it would push for a change.

It’s what happens in college basketball, a game for carnivores and not Communists. Gonzaga is a Top 25 program and has been for almost five years now, and in scheduling it owes it to itself to flex its muscle the same way a Syracuse, an Oklahoma or a UCLA will. The Bruins don’t do home-and-homes with Loyola Marymount, or even play at Staples Center, for example. It’s uncertain whether Syracuse ever leaves its bubble.

Gonzaga athletic director Mike Roth didn’t exactly dynamite the notion of de-neutralizing the series – he did call it “good for Spokane” – but he didn’t put it on the negotiating table, either. Because at this point, there is no table.

“The contract has one more year to run and no different than any other contract, we’ll sit down and discuss what we should do,” he said. “Which we haven’t done. I haven’t talked to Pam (EWU interim A.D. Pam Parks) about it and Mark (Few, GU’s coach) hasn’t talked to Burnsy.”

Roth is well aware that a similar comment by Washington coach Lorenzo Romar before the Huskies-Zags game in Seattle two weeks ago sent the Seattle media and Gonzaga fans into a furious lather, for no reason other than that’s what both seem to live for. So he added this:

“Will Gonzaga continue to play Eastern? Absolutely.”

Hold that thought for a minute while we brush up on Eastern’s evolution.

The fact the Eagles have now lost 20 in a row to GU doesn’t seem to weigh all that heavily on Burns, though losing a “winnable” game Monday night didn’t make him happy.

“This has never been a home game for Eastern Washington – it’s always been Gonzaga’s home game,” he said. “So it’s a hostile environment against a great team and I thought we played well enough to win.”

Then he was asked that if the Eagles had pulled it out, would it be the biggest win in school history?

“No,” he insisted. “The biggest win in school history is beating Northern Arizona to go to the NCAA Tournament (in 2004). Mr. Few and some of the folks around here have put too much into this game. I love this game, but there’s a perception that this game is everything for Eastern Washington and it’s not.”

Well, he’s mostly right. The NAU game is certainly Eastern’s watershed victory, but it’s a little delusional to think – as Burns later suggested – that beating St. Joseph’s in 2001 might even rank above a hypothetical over GU. Ninety percent of his own team’s fans don’t even remember that game, but a win over No. 8 right here in River City would resound even with those who don’t know a drop step from a drop trou.

It would be cachet the Eagles simply couldn’t buy.

As for the home game business, yes, the joint was full of Gonzaga logo gear. Hostile, however, hardly describes the atmosphere. By basketball standards, it’s an opera crowd – which is certainly not Eastern’s fault, but it is one of the forces that could change the series.

“Selfishly,” Roth admitted, “we would like to leave the friendly confines (of McCarthey) as little as possible.”

Fair enough. But there were some people up in sections 222 and 223 on Monday night, loyal TV viewers all, who feel owed the opportunity to get as up close and a personal as the second deck allows them to be.

“And I wouldn’t disagree with that at all,” Roth said. “We want to continue to bring a game a year downtown. That’s the very reason we’re playing this. And if it’s not Eastern, would we try and find somebody else to bring here? Sure we would.”

And it, too, might sell out. But the guess here is that it wouldn’t be as good for Spokane as this one.