Mark Few’s loyalty, pedigree pay off with admittance to basketball’s most exclusive club | Dave Boling

As Mark Few’s coaching accolades accumulated over the years, this ultimate honor seemed increasingly inevitable.

That doesn’t lessen the enormity of the recognition.

Reports leaked out Tuesday that the Gonzaga men’s basketball coach will be among the 2026 Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame class of inductees announced Saturday.

It doesn’t get bigger than this.

But maybe it should, given the degree of difficulty involved.

Consider the astronomical odds against a coach lifting a program of limited resources to a sustained position among the national elite as Few has at Gonzaga.

This should prompt additional enshrinement into a Hall of Highly Improbable Fame.

Few’s nearly 800 career wins and consistent NCAA Tournament success (27 straight tournaments) will be noted as key factors in his induction.

Expand the resume to include two National Coach of the Year awards, an Olympic gold medal as an assistant on Team USA, and the highest winning percentage for active men’s college coaches.

A few underlying elements make this honor even more important to Few’s community at Gonzaga and Spokane.

For the very accomplished, highly creative, hyper-competitive people who seek elite levels of achievement, a career often becomes a chase. Especially in the coaching profession, it involves a series of stair-step and springboard positions, climbing the career ladder.

It is most often an individual journey. Coaches rise; schools remain in place, generally unchanged.

Few, 63, is a rarity. Few stayed in one spot and lifted everything and everyone around him – not just Gonzaga’s enrollment and international recognition, but the image of Spokane as a basketball hotbed, as well.

Despite annual opportunities to cash in at openings at bigger schools with greater resources, Few stayed and Gonzaga grew. The administration is to be credited with keeping him; they made it work and everybody benefited.

Not since Houston’s Guy Lewis was recognized in the 2013 Naismith class has a coach been inducted who started as an assistant at one school and stayed at that school his entire head-coaching career.

Few came to GU as a graduate assistant in 1989 and took over as head coach in 1999, replacing Dan Monson, who started the Zag tournament streak.

Few has taken the Zags to every NCAA Tournament since, including National Championship appearances (2017, 2021).

Over the years, so-called “midmajor” teams have gotten hot and made deep NCAA Tournament runs. Going back to George Mason in 2006, six schools from such conferences made it to the Final Four (other than GU). Five of those head coaches moved on to higher-profile positions, and one resigned after allegations of misconduct.

Few is the only one who stayed and remained competitive at the highest level, stacking consecutive NCAA appearances, now with 17 straight first-round victories.

So many seasons – including this one – Few and his staff have had to change their approach to overcome obstacles such as injuries and roster churn.

Getting 31 wins this season after having lost forward Braden Huff (the most efficient frontcourt scorer in the country) with an injury was another laudable effort by Few and the Zags.

It caused rival coach Randy Bennett to comment that it might have been the best coaching job of Few’s career.

Last season, when the Zags met top-seeded Houston in the Round of 32, Houston coach Kelvin Sampson assessed Few’s Hall-of-Fame qualities. “He’s not one of the best coaches in our game, he’s one of the best coaches our game has ever seen.”

This is a big deal for Gonzaga.

What could be bigger? If former longtime president Father Coughlin had been named Pope?

GU point guard John Stockton was added to the Naismith Hall in 2009, in recognition of his record-setting NBA career.

Two Zags from the long-defunct football program, running back Tony Canadeo and coach Ray Flaherty, are in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Few will be formally inducted in September at the Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts.

His remarkable trek to the top has never required relocation from Spokane.

Seemingly worthy of enshrinement to the Hall of Extraordinary Loyalty.