Heytvelt leads way as Zags level Waves
MALIBU, Calif. – Vance Walberg didn’t even bother with trying search out a superlative to describe the play of Gonzaga’s Josh Heytvelt on Saturday.
Instead, the first-year Pepperdine coach fell back on the old cliché about basketball players making plays.
“And he just happened to make a lot of them,” Walberg added of Heytvelt, who turned in one of the most dominant performances in recent memory to lead the Bulldogs’ 82-57 West Coast Conference charge past Walberg’s Waves in Firestone Fieldhouse.
A relatively benign crowd of 3,104 was on hand to watch Heytvelt, a 6-foot-11 sophomore forward, abuse Pepperdine with 27 points, 22 rebounds and six blocked shots – all career highs – as the Zags (17-7 overall, 7-1 in the WCC) beat the Waves (6-18, 2-6) for the 12th straight time to retain sole possession of first place in the conference standings.
“He was phenomenal today, I mean phenomenal,” GU coach Mark Few said of Heytvelt, a former prep standout at Clarkston High School, who posted his sixth career double-double despite playing only 28 minutes because of some first-half foul problems. “And he was good at everything.
“He was good in our zone (defense) with things that don’t even show up (on the stat sheet) – with his positioning and where he was at. And he just slowed it down and kept it very simple on the offensive end.”
Along with the big numbers turned in by Heytvelt, the Bulldogs got 21 points and four assists from senior guard Derek Raivio, 10 points from junior forward David Pendergraft and nine rebounds and eight assists from sophomore point guard Jeremy Pargo, who was limited to just two points after scoring a career-high 23 in Wednesday night’s 90-86 non-conference road win over Stanford.
The balance was enough to make Walberg marvel.
“I just love guys like Raivio,” he said of the WCC’s leading scorer. “He just plays his game and never panics. He ended up with what – 20-some points? And he only took nine shots.
“And then you have a guy like Pargo, who doesn’t handle the ball as well as he normally does, but still ends up with nine defensive rebounds and eight assists. That’s why they’re as good as they are.”
The Bulldogs, in winning their fifth in a row, shot 64.4 percent (29 of 45) from the field, including 66.7 percent (8 of 12) from 3-point range, and won the rebounding battle by an outlandish 49-20 margin.
About the only downside to the Zags’ effort was the 28 turnovers they committed against a pressing Pepperdine defense.
But even those weren’t enough to force Few to lose sight of how well his team performed in all other areas.
“That’s how they play,” he said of the Waves’ frenzied defensive plan. “They try to disrupt your system, and every possession – for the entire game – is a challenge to your fundamentals and your approach. Are you going to be casual with the ball, or are you going to be solid.
“And when we were solid, we shot dang near 70 percent from the floor. So other than the turnovers, we played a great basketball game.”
Pepperdine, which launched 39 shots from beyond the 3-point line but made only nine, got 22 points from senior guard Chase Griffin, but never came close to finding an answer for Heytvelt, who made 9 of 12 field-goal attempts – including two from 3-point range – and seemed to think every shot the Waves took was a pass to him.
“It was a lot of fun out there,” Heytvelt said. “Everything worked, it seemed like. Guys were finding me a lot, we worked pretty good on offense and we rebounded the heck out of the basketball.”
GU 82, Pepperdine 57
| Gonzaga | FG | FT | Reb | ||||
| (17-7, 7-1) | Min | M-A | M-A | O-T | A | PF | PTS |
| Mallon | 6 | 1-2 | 0-0 | 0-1 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Heytvelt | 28 | 9-12 | 7-9 | 5-22 | 1 | 3 | 27 |
| Pargo | 33 | 1-3 | 0-0 | 0-9 | 8 | 1 | 2 |
| Raivio | 37 | 6-9 | 6-6 | 0-2 | 4 | 2 | 21 |
| Bouldin | 18 | 1-1 | 2-2 | 1-2 | 1 | 4 | 5 |
| Altidor-Cespedes | 17 | 2-3 | 0-1 | 1-2 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| Sorenson | 1 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Downs | 16 | 3-5 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 1 | 2 | 8 |
| Pendergraft | 30 | 5-8 | 0-0 | 2-5 | 1 | 1 | 10 |
| Kuso | 10 | 0-0 | 1-2 | 1-3 | 0 | 2 | 1 |
| Burgess | 1 | 1-1 | 0-0 | 0-2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Foster | 3 | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0-1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Totals | 200 | 29-45 | 16-20 | 10-49 | 17 | 19 | 82 |
Percentages: FG .644, FT .800. 3-Point Goals: 8-12, .667 (Raivio 3-5, Heytvelt 2-3, Downs 2-3, Bouldin 1-1). Team Rebounds: 0. Blocked Shots: 6 (Heytvelt 6). Turnovers: 28 (Pargo 7, Downs 5, Bouldin 3, Kuso 3, Mallon 2, Heytvelt 2, Altidor-Cespedes 2, Pendergraft 2, Raivio, Burgess). Steals: 5 (Pargo 3, Bouldin, Altidor-Cespedes). Technical Fouls: None.
| Pepperdine | FG | FT | Reb | ||||
| (6-18, 2-6) | Min | M-A | M-A | O-T | A | PF | PTS |
| Galick | 23 | 2-5 | 1-2 | 3-3 | 2 | 4 | 5 |
| Barlow | 24 | 2-8 | 0-0 | 1-3 | 0 | 3 | 4 |
| Pranciliauskas | 21 | 1-6 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Griffin | 36 | 5-17 | 8-8 | 0-2 | 2 | 1 | 22 |
| Carr | 11 | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 1 | 2 | 0 |
| Wallace | 12 | 0-2 | 0-0 | 0-1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Lea | 28 | 4-11 | 1-4 | 0-0 | 3 | 3 | 9 |
| Costain | 32 | 5-14 | 0-0 | 0-1 | 1 | 1 | 14 |
| Henry | 13 | 0-1 | 0-4 | 3-5 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Totals | 200 | 19-65 | 10-18 | 11-20 | 11 | 18 | 57 |
Percentages: FG .292, FT .556. 3-Point Goals: 9-39, .231 (Griffin 4-11, Costain 4-12, Pranciliauskas 1-6, Wallace 0-2, Barlow 0-3, Lea 0-5). Team Rebounds: 5. Blocked Shots: 1 (Barlow). Turnovers: 12 (Lea 5, Barlow 4, Pranciliauskas, Costain, TEAM). Steals: 16 (Lea 5, Pranciliauskas 4, Barlow 3, Costain 2, Griffin, Carr). Technical Fouls: None.
Halftime–Gonzaga 36, Pepperdine 32. A–3,104.