No need to agonize: These Zags are what they are

Everything we know about anything we learned at the movies, and so it is with the Gonzaga Bulldogs.

There is a scene in the old courtroom classic “The Verdict” in which a booze-beaten Paul Newman tries to save a lost-cause trial – and stave off his own inevitable failure and resignation – by insisting, “There is no other case. This is the case.”

Well, there are no other Zags. These are the Zags.

As much as you might want them to be the smooth-flowing killers of the past, they’re not. As much as you want to think, oh, if (fill in player du jour here) got more minutes it would make all the difference, it wouldn’t. As much as you can’t believe they can let an opposing gunslinger make three 3-pointers – including an and-one – in the space of 21 seconds, they can.

And as much as you might want to be speculating about NCAA tournament seeding now instead of gobbling Xanax and sweating out dramas against teams that haven’t impacted West Coast Conference play for years – just to hang tough in second place – you can’t.

The Zags did take care of one such team Thursday night at McCarthey Athletic Center, outlasting purposeful Santa Clara 85-76 with a crunch-time lineup that included three point guards, more or less.

And the highlight of the game was the smallest of them – 5-foot-11 David Stockton – blocking a shot and turning it into a layup. On a play in which he got beat.

There are no other Zags. These are the Zags.

You know, that’s OK. In its own unsettling way, this is the most intriguing Gonzaga basketball season in a decade – though that was helped along significantly by a favor from an old friend.

When former Bulldogs assistant Bill Grier’s last-place San Diego Toreros rose up and stunned WCC-leading Saint Mary’s on Wednesday night, it reopened the secret passage known in the sports world as Controlling Your Own Destiny. Of course, that takes a little something known as Imposing Your Will.

In any case, the Zags still have a shot at an 11th straight WCC regular-season championship. Don’t think some of the life from USD’s upset didn’t infuse the proceedings Thursday night.

“Somebody told me about it,” Stockton deadpanned. “I had some homework.

“No, everybody was excited. We sent a few texts back and forth (as it was happening). We got a break, but now we have to act on it and pick up the momentum.”

Which they did in building a 15-point lead in the first 10 minutes with some impressively efficient offense. And then blew all of it in 130 seconds by losing track of the Broncos’ Kevin Foster, the aforementioned gunslinger who torched the Zags for 36 points a month ago.

That didn’t sit well with coach Mark Few, who had Demetri Goodson hounding Foster early and bemoaned “a couple of bonehead plays” after Goodson had been subbed out.

“But that’s just us, too,” he said of the Bulldogs’ inevitable strolls in the fog. “Sometimes it’s hard to say why. And there are adjustments made by the other team that have an impact. But that’s basketball, too. You watch these games every night (on TV) and see that.”

If those moments have defined the Zags, they no longer seem to be succumbing to them. A nice run by the threesome of Steve Gray, Elias Harris and Robert Sacre early in the second half rebuilt some of the cushion. Marquise Carter’s increasingly steady play continues to be a revelation. And when the Zags needed a hero, there was Stockton with a late-clock basket, a steal, an assist and the unlikely block of Foster.

“I used to block shots all the time in high school,” he protested. “I got beat on the screen so I was already behind and was just trying to make a play.”

Demurred Few, “That’s the play people will want to talk about, but there were others just as important. He’s a doer. He’s not a sit-back-and-wait guy. He’s a tough guy, and he’s not afraid.”

No kidding. It looks as if he’s even taking a crack at a mustache, but further investigation might be necessary.

But there’s a lot of that going around. If the old WCC chump-of-the-week club used to occasionally mail these in against the league’s dominant program, this is no longer the case. The Zags and Gaels aren’t as good as they’ve been; the Santa Claras and, especially, San Franciscos are better, and more.

“They’re playing with confidence and belief,” Few said. “Hence, they’re a handful.”

That’s an evolution, if not a revolution. It’s not likely to go into turn- around even anytime soon, nor will Gonzaga’s identity go all retro based on some magic-bullet rotation.

Because, for this year at least, these are the Zags. There are no other Zags.