Bulldogs’ pups step up

SANTA CLARA, Calif. – If this weren’t the season that the Gonzaga Bulldogs were supposed to trip and fall, it was at least presumed they’d have to stop and re-tie their shoelaces.

So you can imagine the resignation in Randy Bennett’s tone Monday night.

Not only had the Zags overcome the best West Coast Conference collective in decades, they’d just blitzed through the conference tournament, including a championship romp over Bennett’s senior-saturated Saint Mary’s Gaels, winners of 25 games themselves. Gonzaga had done so with but one senior in its eight-man rotation, the impertinence personified by sophomore Adam Morrison, who had just fragged the Gaels for 30 spectacular points.

And next year, the tournament was headed to Spokane.

“Don’t make me think about that,” Bennett protested. “I’m going to start pushing for Morrison to leave early – that’s my only hope.”

Underneath the sympathetic laughs could be heard the backbeat of drums.

Perhaps it is part of the landscape Gonzaga now inhabits, but after enduring the will-he-or-won’t-he hang-wringing over one of its heartthrobs weighing early departure via the National Basketball Association draft last summer, there may be a quick reprise.

If that notion were easily dismissed early this season, it can’t be any longer.

Such is the flipside of a big-time player coming up bigger than life at the biggest moment.

It wasn’t just that Morrison was the hands-down MVP of the tournament. It’s that his 55 points against San Diego and the Gaels showcased his entire arsenal – the 3s, the runners, the full-tilt lane-filling on the break. It’s that he was remarkably aware, too, of finding the open teammate and defending, taking a turn at the Toreros’ Brandon Gay – also a bona fide NBA prospect – in the second half Sunday and faring every bit as well as teammate Erroll Knight had earlier.

But let’s be honest – it won’t be Morrison’s dishing or defense that wins over the pros. He was, in this tournament, simply unguardable. San Diego coach Brad Holland had been almost shrill in touting Toreros forward Corey Belser ahead of Knight as the league’s top defender, and Morrison reduced him to a puddle of epithets.

And, of course, this all played out before a phalanx of NBA evaluators, including recently spent Lakers coach Rudy Tomjanovich and Boston’s Danny Ainge.

So, in Zag terms, yikes.

This will play out all in good time, of course, but it’s what people want to talk about – but not Morrison.

“I have no idea right now,” he said Monday night of that aspect of his future. “I’m just concerned about our team and the tournament and my college career right now.”

OK, so let’s talk about that.

One thing in particular struck Bennett about Gonzaga’s most impressive sweep through the tournament since 1999.

“They’ve really improved,” he said. “From the first time we played them in the league to now, they’ve improved. The young guys have come on and Morrison’s a hell of a player.”

Improved? Doesn’t every team improve from January to March?

By different degrees. Last year, it was hard to quantify the Zags’ improvement – veteran as they were and so superior to the WCC pack. Likewise, with four seniors, it’s hard to say that Saint Mary’s is that much better than they were when they scorched GU in early January. But while these Zags may not have looked all that improved even two weeks ago when they needed a last-second shot by Morrison to beat San Francisco at home, but they were decidedly sharper here.

Perhaps more remarkable for a team so young, the Zags didn’t go all autopilot when it was obvious to all they didn’t need the automatic bid to visit Bracketville.

“A lot of us said, ‘Let’s keep this a one-bid conference,’ ” Morrison said. “Let’s leave it up to the committee if (Saint Mary’s) gets in or not. I mean, they’re obviously a good program and they’ve taken strides, they have a good RPI and coach Bennett has them playing hard. But we wanted to win this for our seniors and have the automatic bid for ourselves – it was as simple as that.”

Not so simple is pinpointing just how the Zags have made a jump even in just the last week, but Bennett took a stab at it – and, not surprisingly, it centered on Morrison.

“They’ve changed who they’re playing off of offensively,” he said. “They’re playing off Morrison now. They used to be playing off (Ronny) Turiaf, but now they’re playing off Morrison, then (J.P.) Batista and then (Derek) Raivio. They play off Turiaf some, but not as much as they did early.

“I think it’s made them better. It makes them harder to guard now.”

So much of that, though, is Gonzaga pushing the ball and playing less set-up – the pace Monday sometimes got pretty frantic, and that alone plays to Morrison’s strength.

And Morrison is playing better, and not only on the offensive end.

“About the middle of the conference, I wasn’t playing real well and got benched one game – and I think rightfully so,” Morrison said. “It woke me up a little bit, and I started playing harder on defense and trying to be a more complete player.

“Scoring has always been there for me my whole life. I’ve got to work hard not to just use my natural ability to make tough shots when I can get some easy buckets and get myself going – some back cuts and curls, getting a 4-footer instead of taking three or four dribbles and shooting a fadeaway.”

His father John, a former junior college coach in Montana and Wyoming, sees all that, and something else, too.

“We’ve never seen him smile so much on the court,” he said. “He’s having fun, and that’s good to see.”

Whether any father is the most objective observer of his son’s game is always doubtful, but John Morrison does offer a tempered perspective on the leaving-early chatter and its worth.

“I’d say it’s 99 percent sure he’ll be back next year,” he said. “Is he ready? No. He needs another year of getting stronger, adding weight, adding a little vertical and improving in all areas.

‘You can’t absolutely say it won’t happen, but as an ex-coach, I’ve always been pessimistic about my own players and that extends to my son. You worry about him biting off more than he can chew. There’s a lot of rumors out there and stuff that comes in the mail (from agents), but until you start hearing it from the horse’s mouth about strengths and weaknesses and areas to improve, it doesn’t mean anything. That’s when we’ll start paying attention.”

Hope they can hear themselves think, with the drums beating louder.