NCAA Tournament Day 1: Gonzaga survives and America falls in love
Scenes from the first day of the NCAA Tournament at the Moda Center in Portland.
Welcome to The I-5 Corridor’s coverage of the NCAA Tournament’s Portland regional. Basketball coverage this week is on the house. If you want to stick around for spring football coverage and more, we’re running a 50 percent off promo through the end of the weekend.
PORTLAND — Mark Few had his head lowered and arms crossed as the question came to Gonzaga guard Andrew Nembhard. Few’s No. 1 Bulldogs had just opened the NCAA Tournament with a 93-72 win over No. 16 Georgia State — a win that came easy by box score but tougher in execution. It wasn’t until Drew Timme (32 points, 13 rebounds) and Chet Holmgren (19 points, 17 rebounds, 7 blocks, 5 assists) took the game over in the second half that the Bulldogs truly looked like the tournament’s top seed.
So Nembhard, the team’s point guard, was asked about what it’s like to be in the middle when those two catch fire. He started to answer, then was interrupted by one 7-footer destined for the NBA Draft lottery and another for a role as the Brawny lumberjack.
“How many assists did he have, Chet?” Timme asked his teammate.
“He had 11 assists,” Holmgren answered.
“How many dudes are doing that?” Timme said. “Come on. Give him some more credit.”
Few allowed himself a smile after that one, as it seems even a press conference can be bailed out by one of the nation’s best one-two (or three) punches.
“I kept telling people that’s not a 16-seed,” Few said of Georgia State. “I think they showed that tonight.”
Few’s not lying. A day earlier Gonzaga’s 23rd-year head coach sat at the same podium and made it pretty clear that the Panthers, winners of 10 consecutive games coming into the Portland Regional, weren’t a typical 16-seed. And you certainly saw that from a Georgia State team that carried a lead as late as a minute remaining in the first half. The Panthers won’t go down in history as the second 16-seed to ever beat a one, but they certainly made it interesting — until Gonzaga used a 24-1 run in the second half to ease the tension of a Zag-heavy Moda Center crowd.
“I guess I just had some jitters,” said Timme, who scored 22 points in the second half. “It’s my first true March, so I was a little nervous. Credit to my teammates for telling me to keep going.”
Timme reached the national championship game with Gonzaga a season ago, though there’s two big differences now:
1. Fans were in attendance with no restrictions for the first time since 2019.
2. Gonzaga didn’t have Holmgren a season ago.
The 7-foot freshman moves around the court like a giraffe with a handle. And while his stat line was already significant, the amount of shots he altered and the way Georgia State had to change its path to the bucket was immeasurable. I think he’s going to have to put on weight to be effective in the NBA. But he pretty casually dominated the college game on Thursday in all facets, something that will be huge Saturday against a Memphis team that looked to be the most athletic in the regional.
“I think it’s really, really important to be the hunter and not the hunted,” Few said. “I thought we were trying to be that in the first half. We just weren’t converting very good.”
Abu Kigab shines in loss
I wrote about the Boise State forward to preview the tournament, and I know how much better he’s become since his freshman year at Oregon. Still, I really needed to see it in person.
And in the second half of Boise State’s 64-53 loss to Memphis, I was pretty blown away. Look, Boise State shouldn’t have been in the same gym as the Tigers, who have a former NBA star at head coach in Penny Hardaway, and a NBA champion head coach as an assistant in Larry Brown. Memphis was bigger, more athletic and at times really appeared to be running away against the Broncos.
But Kigab kept his team in it. He was always a decent defender at Oregon, and you saw that on Thursday with a pair of steals. But I never saw anything like the 20-point performance he put up. At 6-foot-7, he looked like the exact type of shot-creating wing that Oregon could have used the last month.
“It’s definitely tough seeing it come to an end, but our guys battled,” Kigab said. “That’s all you can ask for. I thought everyone did a tremendous job of competing, and sometimes it’s like that. It’s basketball and sometimes things don’t go your way. You just have to take that negative and turn it into a positive however you can.”
For more on Kigab, check out Shane Hoffmann’s piece on the Daily Emerald.
Memphis may have an ace up its sleeve
It’s going to be a doozy of a 9/1 matchup on Saturday against Gonzaga — especially if Memphis’ former 5-star Emoni Bates gets more run. The 6-foot-9 freshman has been out since Jan. 27 with a back injury, but he played three minutes on Thursday and nailed a three.
“He was on a minutes restriction today” Hardaway said. “In the first half, he did play phenomenal. He played the way he knows how to play. Knocked down a really big three…He learned a lot today.”
Hardaway won’t have to watch much film on Holmgren. The fourth-year head coach said he used to talk to the Gonzaga star “three to four times a week” when Memphis was recruiting the Minnesota high school star.
“Such a terrific player,” Hardaway said. “…We know we have our work cut out for us.”
UCLA survives
UCLA won. Don’t take that for granted. Far too many times have we seen touted Pac-12 teams dip out early in the first weekend. The Bruins didn’t. They won. They advanced. They did their job.
However, woof. Coming off one of the best basketball games of the year against Arizona in the Pac-12 tournament final, this one was sluggish, slow and a darn-near upset until Tyger Campbell rattled off eight consecutive points late in the second half.
I have the Bruins into the Final Four. I don’t feel great about it — but is anyone feeling good about their brackets after Day 1?
“In a game like that, it reminds me of my Big East days,” UCLA coach Mick Cronin said. “If you’re going to win a rock fight, you’ve got to put your hardhat on and you’ve got to take care of the ball and get some extra possessions. Offensive rebounding was huge and we didn’t turn it over.”
The Bruins will face Saint Mary’s, who blasted a sleep-walking Indiana team 83-53. The Hoosiers, who beat Wyoming in the play-in round on Tuesday, didn’t arrive into Portland until early in the morning Wednesday before the day’s practices. The only interesting thing to come from this one was the save by the Indiana cheerleader in the second half.
This video comes with a, “Spot the guy from the Oregon beat,” Easter egg embedded in it. Let me know if you see it.
A star is born
I spent about three minutes Thursday morning staring in the mirror, debating whether or not to take the mustache off. I’ve been pretty scruffy lately, and just got a haircut a few days ago. Why not just go all in?
This is why.
You’re welcome, America.
I’ll be back on Saturday, if they’ll have me.
— Tyson Alger
You have entered the rarified air of the ‘Stache Zone, with Adam Morrison as your swashbuckling and zany copilot of the small and now defunct South American Air!
Great piece of writing, Tyson. Keep up the great work!!!