Graham Ike navigates ups, downs to deliver for Gonzaga against Pacific | Rewind

Knowing how Gonzaga handled many of its nonleague contests against high-major opponents, some might have deduced the Zags would breeze through their West Coast Conference schedule, outside of close calls against the teams that traditionally sit beside them in the WCC standings.

The top of the conference has tested 11th-ranked Gonzaga – in some cases, though, not as much as the teams expected to finish near the bottom of the standings.

Portland, which was pegged to finish last in the preseason WCC poll voted on by coaches, is still responsible for Gonzaga’s only conference loss. Seattle U, picked to finish No. 8, took Gonzaga to overtime at McCarthey Athletic Center and San Diego, which checked in at No. 9 in the preseason poll, gave the Zags a brief scare in December, mounting a late rally to lose by just six points.

On Saturday, Gonzaga got a visit from the team selected to finish 10th by WCC coaches. Pacific has outperformed those expectations and sits within striking distance of the No. 4 seed at the WCC Tournament, but in a game Gonzaga was favored to win by 23 points, it was still somewhat shocking to see the teams tied with under 10 minutes to play.

The Zags didn’t collect many style points in their latest victory, but were solid enough at both ends when it mattered to pull away for a 71-62 win.

We take another look at Graham Ike’s night, what the Zags did to limit Pacific wing Elias Ralph and how other results around the country could impact GU’s NCAA Tournament seed.

Up, down and effective

For much of the night, Ike wasn’t on track to extend his school-record run of consecutive 20-point games – a streak that reached eight just three days earlier against San Francisco at the Chase Center.

It was a frustrating first half for Ike on the offensive end and the senior went into the break with just four points on 2 of 9 shooting. With multiple bodies and lots of traffic in the paint, Ike, who’d been making midrange and 3-point shots at a high clip in recent games, took a majority of his first-half shots outside the paint.

“It was certainly better in the first half, I think he got duped into thinking that some of those shots we were making against San Francisco would be the same tonight,” Gonzaga coach Mark Few said. “He’s got to remember, he’s an All-American when he’s down around the paint, but there was a lot of bodies around the paint. A lot of bodies.

“It’s hard, he’s the focal point of every scouting report and gets fouled on every possession. They don’t get called very often. Then there’s a lot of bodies down there around him too.”

Ike had to overcome a few more frustrating moments before finding his groove in the second half.

After arguing a no-call on a missed layup, Ike picked up his fourth technical foul of the season and was replaced by Ismaila Diagne. Later on, Ike subbed back out after another missed shot and had a brief conversation with Few, later relaying the nature of the coach’s message to reporters in a postgame news conference.

“He said quick moves, you’ve got to get the quick moves,” Ike said. “It wasn’t really about the tech. Me and the ref talked about the tech, it wasn’t really anything out of pocket I don’t think. He called it, rightfully so. We talked about it afterwards, heat of the moment, I don’t think it was anything outlandish or what not.”

Ike ultimately did reach the 20-point mark for the ninth time in as many games, scoring 12 of his game-high 21 points in the final 11 minutes, 17 seconds.

“I thought our two bigs worked hard to keep him off his spot as much as possible and I thought we did a decent job of changing up when we wanted to double and when wanted to dig and just try to keep him off balance,” Pacific coach Dave Smart said. “When it mattered, he made plays.”

Defense holds strong

At points of the game when Gonzaga couldn’t find a reliable source of offense, the Zags had to lean hard on their defense.

It’s nothing new for a team that’s become significantly more defensive-minded in the wake of a left knee injury to junior forward Braden Huff, who was scoring 17.8 points per game but has now missed 11 games.

“It totally kept us in the game, it’s what won us the game because we weren’t very good on offense tonight at all,” Few said. “The defense just kept us in, kept us in, kept us in so we could make just enough plays on the offensive end. That’s kind of how it’s been since Braden (Huff) has been out, we’ve been more of a defensive-oriented team. We can do that, we can be that and I think we’ve shown that.”

Gonzaga devoted much of its defensive attention Saturday to Ralph, a do-it-all senior wing who was leading the Tigers in scoring at 16.4 points per game.

The 6-foot-7 senior from Canada still scored 12 points, but he only made 4 of 10 shots from the field and was limited to just one 3-point attempt. Due to foul trouble, Ralph also played just 30 minutes, approximately four below his season average.

“Oh he’s a great player, man,” Few said. “I just think he’s a terrific player, he knows how to play, he’s tough as nails, he’s smart, he’s skilled. We spent a lot of time talking about him. He had 12, but I think our guys did a pretty good job on him because he’s a tough guard.”

Their loss is GU’s gain

Hours before Gonzaga tipped off against Pacific, the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee revealed its current top 16 seeds in a bracket preview show aired on CBS.

The Zags slid in as the final No. 3 seed and avoided becoming one of six top-16 teams that would lose games later the same day.

Top overall seed Michigan dropped a high-level showdown to fellow No. 1-seeded Duke in Washington D.C. Another No. 1 seed, Iowa State, lost on the road to BYU while No. 2 Illinois, No. 2 Houston, No. 3 Kansas and No. 4 Vanderbilt also took losses throughout the day.

A No. 1 seed probably isn’t attainable for Gonzaga with one week of regular-season games remaining, but the Zags still have an outside shot of claiming a No. 2 seed. It would all but certainly require Gonzaga to go 4-0 in its remaining regular-season and WCC Tournament games – a stretch that begins with Wednesday’s home finale against Portland.

The Zags would probably need a few more slip-ups from current No. 2 seeds Houston, Illinois, UConn and Purdue, along with losses from fellow No. 3 seeds Nebraska, Florida and Kansas.