Men's Basketball By WCC Columnist Jeff Faraudo

Newcomers Steal The Show In First Week Of WCC Hoops

Oh sure, the names we know in the West Coast Conference were on display last week as the college basketball season got under way. All-America candidate Drew Timme and No. 2 Gonzaga won twice, including over Michigan State on an aircraft carrier in San Diego.

But to appreciate the headliners on opening night, you needed a game program. Newcomers stole the show with a series of impressive debut performances as the curtain lifted on the 2022-23 season.

Here are the highlights:

— Santa Clara’s Brandin Podziemski, a sophomore transfer from Illinois, scored 30 points to spark the Broncos’ 84-72 win over Eastern Michigan. Podziemski (pronounced poe-GEM-ski), is a 6-foot-5 guard from Greenfield, Wisconsin, where he was Mr. Basketball in 2021 after scoring more than 2,000 career points.

Along with nine rebounds and five steals, he gave the Broncos more points on Monday night than he totaled in 16 appearances for the Illini last season.

Describing himself as “fearless,” Podziemski looked up at the banners hanging in the Leavey Center after the game and said, “We’re going to do something special this year. We haven’t been to the (NCAA) Tournament since ’96, when (Steve) Nash was here. Hopefully, we can change that.”

Podziemski  wasn’t the only fresh face among the Santa Clara contributors — Carlos Marshall Jr., a senior transfer guard and two-time All-Ohio Valley Conference honoree from Tennessee State, scored 12 points off the bench.

The Broncos were back in action three nights later and Podziemski delivered a new career-best 34 points (along with 11 rebounds) in a 78-62 win over Georgia Southern. He became the first Santa Clara player to open his career with back-to-back 30-point performances, putting up the most points by a Broncos player since Kevin Foster had 34 vs. Purdue in 2013.

The Santa Clara women also introduced a new standout with a 28-point performance from Tess Heal, a 5-10 freshman guard from Melbourne, Australia. “Tess is so tough, she’s such a great competitor,” coach Bill Carr said after the Broncos’ loss to UC Santa Barbara. “It’s hard to keep her in front of you. She showed that tonight. That’s 28 points on 14 shots.”

The SCU women played again on Friday, beating Cal State Fullerton, 76-72, in overtime with Heal scoring 10 of her 16 points in the extra period. Another newcomer, Arizona State senior transfer Ayzhiana Basallo, made her presence felt with 22 points, including the game-tying shot in the final minute of regulation that forced OT.

— Saint Mary’s returns with a strong contingent of veterans, but they’re going to make room for freshman guard Aidan Mahaney, who attended Campolindo High School — just two miles from the Gaels’ campus. Mahaney scored 25 points in a win over Oral Roberts, the most points scored in a player’s debut during Randy Bennett’s 22-year coaching run in Moraga.

— USF made first-year coach Chris Gerlufsen a winner, thanks in part to the efforts of graduate transfer guard Tyrell Roberts. The former UC San Diego and Washington State star scored 17 points in the Dons’ win over Texas Southern.

— Coach Steve Lavin won his San Diego debut vs. Sonoma State, aided by a 17-point, five-assist contribution from junior guard Seikou Sisoho Jawara, a native of Barcelona, Spain, who began his college career at LMU before blossoming the past two seasons at Weber State. Eric Williams Jr., a grad transfer guard from Oregon, provided 11 points, nine rebounds and four steals in his first game with USD.

Two days later, Jawara had 22 points and five more assists, and Williams posted 19 points and 12 rebounds as the Toreros scored a more significant 79-73 win over a Florida Gulf Coast team that was coming off a win at USC.

— Sophomores Maxwell Lewis (career-high 29 points) and Houston Mallette (22 points) led Pepperdine’s 106-67 rout of Rice — the most points the Waves have scored in a season opener in more than 40 years. But Pepperdine also got nice all-around production from freshman forward Jevon Porter. The younger brother of the Denver Nuggets’ Michael Porter Jr., filled the box score with 16 points, seven rebounds, four assists and two steals. On Friday, Porter posted his first collegiate double-double with12 points and 10 rebounds in a loss to Cal State Fullerton.

— While Pacific couldn’t quite get over the hump at Stanford, it wasn’t the fault of backcourt newcomers Jordan Ivy-Curry and Donovan Williams. Ivy-Curry, a sophomore transfer from UT San Antonio, scored 23 points while Williams, a junior from Oklahoma State, contributed 17.

— LMU opened with a 50-point win over Life Pacific in which the Lions’ bench combined for 52 points. That included 15 points from freshman guard Chance Stephens and 14 from Michael Graham, a junior forward who played last season at Elon.

ZAGS RIDE TIMME VS. SPARTANS: Gonzaga played the first in a series of high-profile non-conference games on Friday, beating Michigan State, 64-63, on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, an aircraft carrier docked at North Island Naval Air Station in San Diego.

The Zags, with players in new roles, leaned on Drew Timme, the reigning WCC Player of the Year, who contributed 22 points, 13 rebounds, four assists and two blocked shots.

“We did everything we needed to do to win the game,” MSU coach Tom Izzo said, “and yet an All-American won the game for them.”

Playing a rare outdoor game, the teams combined to shoot 7-for-34 from the three-point arc. But Timme was unaffected by the elements.

“It’s definitely something different, something you don’t experience every day,” Timme said of the unique atmosphere and the playing conditions. “I think growing up, playing in the park is something that helped us and look, they had to play in it too. 

“Like coach said, it wasn’t the prettiest game to watch but it was, just put your nose in the dirt, keep going and don’t stop and I thought it was a true test of out grit and heart.”

ROBERTSON MAKES HISTORY: Portland’s Tyler Robertson did more than score 30 of his career-high 32 points in the second half of the Pilots’ 98-91 win over rival Portland State. He broke a couple of nearly 67-year-old school records.

The junior wing from Melbourne, Australia, shot 22-for-24 from the free throw line, eclipsing records in both categories set by Jim Winters, who was 20-for-23 against Seattle on Feb. 12, 1956.

GAELS’ HOME STREAK: Saint Mary’s opened its schedule with wins over Oral Roberts and Vermont, running their streak of consecutive home victories to a school-record 20 games.

The current streak, which spans portions of three seasons, breaks the previous program record set nearly 13 years ago.

Nationally, Gonzaga has by far the longest current win streak at home (68), while Texas Tech (23) is second. Kentucky and Arizona also have won their past 20-consecutive home games.

The Gaels go for No. 21 on Sunday evening vs. North Texas.

IT’S A TWIN THING: Gonzaga senior guards Kaylynne and Kayleigh Truong performed the way you’d expect from identical twins in the Zags’ season-opening 80-54 win over Long Beach State.

That is, they each scored 13 points, each had six assists, each made five field goals and each sank three 3-pointers.

How can we possibly tell them apart? Well, Kaylynne had four steals, Kayleigh just three.

BYU’S WICKED GROWING PAINS: BYU’s men opened their season with a win over Idaho State, but then suffered an 82-75 road loss to No. 19 San Diego State.

“We’re trying to play with more pace and we’re going through some wicked growing pains trying to do that and it’s super unfortunate, especially when it costs you the game,” Pope said. “I’ve got to find a way to grow this way more efficiently and less costly.”

The Cougars are back it at Wednesday at home vs. Missouri State.