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Gonzaga Basketball

Could Gonzaga open against Idaho in the NCAA Tournament? Bracketologists aren’t ruling out the possibility

Gonzaga Bulldogs forward Graham Ike (15) and guard Mario Saint-Supery (17) joke with each other as they celebrate winning the WCC Tournament Championship after they defeated the Santa Clara Broncos on Tuesday, Mar 10, 2026, at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas, Nev. The Gonzaga Bulldogs won the game 79-68. (Tyler Tjomsland / The Spokesman-Review)
Gonzaga Bulldogs forward Graham Ike (15) and guard Mario Saint-Supery (17) joke with each other as they celebrate winning the WCC Tournament Championship after they defeated the Santa Clara Broncos on Tuesday, Mar 10, 2026, at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas, Nev. The Gonzaga Bulldogs won the game 79-68. (Tyler Tjomsland / The Spokesman-Review)
By Theo Lawson theol@spokesman.com(509) 459-5584

The unknowns typically outweigh the certainties on Selection Sunday eve, but Gonzaga players and coaches still went to sleep Saturday feeling significantly better about their NCAA Tournament outlook than they did each of the last two years.

Gonzaga can’t start planning for a first-round opponent until sometime after 3 p.m. on Sunday, when CBS officially releases the full bracket during its annual selection show, but fans could safely start booking flights and hotels anticipating the 12th-ranked Zags will open their 27th straight NCAA Tournament at the Moda Center in Portland.

Nothing is set in stone until Sunday afternoon, but virtually every mock bracket in recent months has sent the Zags to Portland and that didn’t change on Saturday night as various outlets projected the field of 68 for the final time.

More pertinent to Mark Few and his team is Gonzaga’s seed. Regardless of where the Zags land, they’ll be in much better position than they were in 2025 as a No. 8 seed that had to play No. 1 seed Houston in the Round of 32. Projections also suggest Gonzaga will wind up with a stronger seed than it did in 2024, when the Zags were slotted in as a No. 5.

As of 9 p.m. on Saturday, the majority of mock brackets were listing Gonzaga as a No. 3 seed, with others penciling in Few’s team as a No. 4. Bracket Matrix, a website that takes the average of more than 130 projections, indicated Gonzaga was closer to a No. 3 seed than a No. 4, giving them a 3.14.

A Gonzaga team that hasn’t missed the NCAA Tournament since 1998 could potentially meet up with an Inland Northwest team making its first appearance since 1990.

One mock bracket from Rocco Miller, who runs Bracketeer.com and contributes to the Field of 68/On3 Network, projected a first-round matchup in Portland between No. 3 Gonzaga and No. 14 Idaho. The Athletic’s Joe Rexrode published an updated “bracket watch” on Saturday, also predicting the Gonzaga-Idaho matchup.

The Vandals are dancing for the first time in 36 years after making a surprise run through the Big Sky Conference Tournament as a No. 7 seed, beating fourth-seeded Montana 77-66 in Wednesday’s championship game.

As of Saturday night, most bracketologists were undecided on whether Alex Pribble’s team would earn a No. 14 or 15 seed. The Vandals scored a 14.88 on Bracket Metrix, with only a handful of the 134 projections listing them as a No. 16 seed. Idaho would need to be at least a No. 15 seed to avoid the First Four games that kick off the NCAA Tournament on Tuesday in Dayton, Ohio.

Conference tournaments that wrapped up Saturday night may have impacted seeding situations for both Inland Northwest teams playing in March Madness.

ESPN’s Joe Lunardi made a midday switch with Gonzaga, projecting Few’s team as a No. 3 seed in the morning before curiously pushing the Zags to the No. 4 line in the afternoon and elevating Virginia to a No. 3. Lunardi had the Zags penciled in as the No. 10 overall seed in his initial projections Saturday before dropping them to the No. 13.

That change was made before Virginia lost 74-70 in the ACC championship game to a Duke team missing two starters. Lunardi didn’t release an updated bracket Saturday to reflect the results of championship games in the ACC and Big East.

The Zags appear to be competing with an assortment of teams for a No. 3 seed, including Virginia, Illinois, Purdue, Nebraska and Vanderbilt. The Boilermakers could make one last case in Sunday’s Big Ten championship, but it would require beating the third-ranked Michigan team that thumped Gonzaga 101-61 back in November and may show up as the No. 1 overall seed on Selection Sunday.

Most projected brackets feature seven teams Gonzaga faced during the regular season, including two from the West Coast Conference. The league is on track to send three teams to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2021-22, with Saint Mary’s and Santa Clara slated to join Gonzaga. The Broncos, who picked up a key win over the Gaels in the WCC Tournament semifinal before losing to the Zags in the championship game, would be making their first NCAA appearance since 1996.

Four of Gonzaga’s nonconference opponents should hear their names called on Selection Sunday and another could be sweating out the bracket reveal. Michigan, Alabama, UCLA and Kentucky are virtual locks to make the field while Oklahoma was listed as one of Lunardi’s “last four out.”