Gonzaga rewind: Mark Few praises Adam Miller’s ‘mental toughness’ during emotional return to Arizona State

TEMPE, Ariz. – Adam Miller walked onto the floor for pregame warmups at 6:55 p.m. PT, more than an hour before No. 19 Gonzaga and Arizona State tipped off late Friday night.

A walk that normally takes 20-30 seconds took a good five minutes for the former Arizona State player, who greeted no fewer than a dozen people before eventually joining Gonzaga teammates who were stretching and shooting on the other side of the floor.

There were long hugs with ASU staffers, handshakes with Sun Devil coaches and short conversations with media members who covered Miller during his tenure with the Big 12 school.

Wearing a black jersey with “Zags” script across the chest, Miller later posed for a photograph with ASU’s mascot, Sparky the Sun Devil. After Gonzaga wrapped up a 77-65 road win, the photo was shared to the mascot’s Instagram story with a caption that perfectly summarized the unique situation Miller found himself in against his former school: “Frenemies.”

With the circumstances of Miller’s return to campus, the first half of Friday’s game wasn’t at all what the guard had in mind.

Miller missed a 3-pointer inside the first two minutes but the ball found him again on an offensive rebound and he proceeded to dribble into a mid-range shot that fell through the net. Miller’s next two looks didn’t drop and the guard was subbed out at the first media timeout, part of the starting unit that allowed ASU to take an early 11-6 lead. Miller didn’t return to the floor until he was subbed back in with 17 seconds remaining in the half.

Miller worked through another rough stretch to start the second half before delivering two of the biggest shots of the night.

With under seven minutes to play, the Sun Devils had cut the deficit to double digits before Miller came up with a steal and earned two free throws, sinking both to make it 61-50.

It didn’t take much longer for Miller to find his 3-point shooting touch. After missing his first three tries, the ASU transfer knocked down his first 3-pointer with six minutes to go and extended GU’s lead to 15 points with another long make 32 seconds later.

“Maybe he can speak to (returning to ASU),” Gonzaga coach Mark Few said. “What I told him after the game in front of the guys is that’s so hard to do. He’d missed some shots early and I know he was down on himself and wasn’t feeling good and I think that just shows incredible mental toughness to be able to — when it’s not going good — to be able to flip the switch and come back and make plays.”

After a frustrating first half, Miller was all smiles when the final buzzer sounded. The guard was one of four Gonzaga players to finish in double figures, scoring 10 points in 20 minutes while shooting 3 of 9 from the field, 2 of 7 from the 3-point line and 2 of 2 from the free throw line.

After spending time pregame with staffers he became friendly with during his time at the school, Miller received a mixed reaction from ASU fans – boos mixed with cheers – when he was introduced in GU’s starting lineup. The boos were more discernible when Miller made his first shot of the game just two minutes into the first half.

“Those shots were huge and kind of gave us a cushion to get us through there at the end,” Few said. “So I was proud of him and obviously that was kind of a hostile environment and kind of a crazy game, but our guys, we made enough plays to win.”

In our GU-ASU rewind, we look at two other topics from Friday’s game in Tempe, including another Zag making his return to the Phoenix area.

Keeping their cool

Players and coaches from both teams had reason to be frustrated with officiating decisions in a game where it was difficult to get through two possessions with at least one foul call.

The Zags kept their emotions in check, enduring choppy stretches where key players like Graham Ike, Braden Huff and Jalen Warley started to watch their fouls stack up.

“I actually thought it was a great team effort from everybody trying to keep the team cool, calm and collected, just through huddles, timeouts,” Gonzaga’s Graham Ike said. “Just trying to stay focused on the possession, that’s the biggest thing.”

Gonzaga finished with 22 fouls, just one fewer than ASU, but the Zags navigated the chaos better than the Sun Devils, who picked up multiple technical fouls as the visitors were starting to pull away at Desert Financial Arena.

ASU’s Santiago Trouet received a technical after barking at GU’s Warley following a defensive stop. Bobby Hurley nearly picked up a technical protesting the call, but an official walked away from ASU’s coach without penalizing him.

Hurley’s frustration boiled over less than a minute later, when Ike wasn’t whistled for contesting Massamba Diop, and the coach received a technical foul when Andrija Grbovic checked Mario Saint-Supery to earn a foul at the other end of the floor.

“I’m not going comment on it, I’m just not,” Hurley said. “Because I could go into this and we could spend 10 or 15 minutes talking about this. But I’m not going to do it tonight.”

Hurley, known for sideline antics and entertaining postgame press conferences – two traits he shares with younger brother Dan, a two-time national champion coach at UConn – was asked if he expected to get feedback on how Friday’s game was officiated.

“Zero. There won’t be any feedback. I won’t get any feedback. There will be nothing. Zero,” Hurley said. “Sending clips in doesn’t do me any good. It gets me nowhere, so I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

Grant-Foster sizzles in return to desert

At some point before Gonzaga took the court, Tyon Grant-Foster likely spent time mulling everything he’s been through between his final college game at Grand Canyon last spring and Friday’s return to the greater Phoenix area.

There aren’t many players in college basketball who’ve been through the emotional swings the 25-year-old transfer has since leaving GCU.

Grant-Foster’s time with the Antelopes officially ended on March 21 with an NCAA Tournament loss to Maryland. The wing entered the transfer portal in April and committed to Gonzaga in late May. Over the next five months, the NCAA denied the transfer’s initial eligibility waiver, rejected a request for reconsideration and denied a subsequent appeal. Grant-Foster’s eligibility situation was finally resolved last month when a Spokane County judge granted a preliminary injunction that would enable him to play for Gonzaga in 2025-26.

On Friday, he was flying all over the court for the Zags, finishing alley-oop dunks, soaring to block ASU shots and plucking rebounds out of the air.

“I thought Ty really got in there and really helped us, especially in that first half,” Few said. “Really made a difference when we were struggling on the offensive end.”

Grant-Foster finished with a 14-point, 12-rebound double-double, adding two blocked shots and two assists to his stat line on Friday. He finished 5 of 12 from the field, 0 of 3 from the 3-point line and 4 of 6 from the free throw line.

The former Western Athletic Conference Player of the Year wasn’t returning to an old school, but he could still could look into the crowd at any point of the game and find friendly faces.

“I have a lot of friends here, that I (made) while I was here, and I think I had like 20, 25 people here,” Grant-Foster said. “So it was fun getting the win and getting to play in front of them again.”