The West Coast Conference men’s basketball race is far from over — at least four schools still loom as legitimate contenders for the title — but Saint Mary’s finally looks like the team the league’s coaches picked as the favorite.
The Gaels, who lost five of six games during one stretch early in non-conference play, won for the 10th time in 11 outings Saturday with an emphatic 73-49 victory at Santa Clara. Just two nights earlier, the Broncos announced themselves as serious players with a 77-76 nationally-televised win over No. 23 Gonzaga.
“I was really proud how our guys came out,” Gaels’ head coach Randy Bennett said. “We put a big emphasis on the start of that game because they did jump out on Gonzaga.”
Saint Mary’s robbed the afternoon of all the drama by sprinting to a 9-0 lead before assembling a 21-0 run that left the Broncos trailing, 30-6. The margin became 39-9 and finally 47-18 at halftime of what felt a bit unreal.
Santa Clara head coach Herb Sendek was in no mood to suggest his team hadn’t yet recovered from an emotional win over the Zags.
“It would be really disingenuous for us to use that as a reason for the outcome,” he said. “I think we owe all due respect to St. Mary’s. They took the game to us and dominated the game.”
This was Saint Mary’s operating on all cylinders. The Gaels’ defense gave the Broncos no room to operate, blocking five shots in the first half when Santa Clara managed to score just seven baskets. Dominant rebounding allowed the visitors to forge a 16-3 edge in second-chance points in the opening 20 minutes.
But it’s the Gaels’ offense that has evolved since the team’s early-season struggles. With point guard Augustas Marciulionis directing things, Saint Mary’s had 12 assists and no turnovers during a nearly flawless first half.
“We’ve gotten tougher, we’ve gotten tighter and we’ve really just taken pride in our work,” said All-WCC sophomore guard Aidan Mahaney, who led the Gaels with 18 points. “The belief was huge. Obviously, it wasn’t the prettiest at times. Just continuing to believe.
“This is what you get when you get a team that’s not (one of these) transfer-portal teams. You get guys that are bought into a culture. We believe in each other; we trust each other and we know what we can build here.”
Sendek paid the Gaels the ultimate compliment, suggesting, “Saint Mary’s is good because they’re a good team. Yes, they have good individual players but they play team basketball. They play together on both ends of the floor and they complement each other extraordinarily well.”
The Gaels (13-6, 4-0 WCC) know the road ahead is long and littered with challenging assignments. San Francisco (14-4, 3-0) has yet to be tested by any of the WCC’s top teams. Santa Clara (12-7, 3-1) isn’t going away, and neither will Gonzaga (11-5, 2-1), although its AP Top-25 ranking seems likely to disappear after a stunning 143 consecutive weeks.
“Like I told the team after Thursday’s game, this is not our destination,” Sendek said, reflecting on the win that snapped the Broncos’ 26-game losing streak to Gonzaga. “The same message – maybe with a different taste – today. We’re only four games into the start of conference.”
THURSDAY LEFTOVERS: If not for the Gaels’ big win Saturday, the headline on this column no doubt would have focused on the Broncos’ electric victory over Gonzaga two nights earlier. The matchup brought a packed house that included Santa Clara coaching legends Carroll Williams and Dick Davey along with Steve Nash, the program’s greatest player. Fans were given No. 11 Nash commemorative jerseys.
After French-born sophomore Adama-Alpha Bal scored the winning basket with 4.6 seconds left, teammate Johnny O’Neil, a transfer from American University, summed it up, saying, “That’s what we all came here for. We all wanted to come here to make this happen, and it happened tonight.”
The Broncos hadn’t beaten the WCC’s perennial powerhouse since Jan. 20, 2011, and this was their first win ever over a nationally-ranked Gonzaga team.
The best player on the court was Zags’ senior forward Anton Watson, who matched his career high with 32 points on 14-for-18 shooting to go with nine rebounds and six steals (tying a school record) while playing all 40 minutes.
“Anton was spectacular tonight,” said Gonzaga head coach Mark Few, whose pursuit of 700 career victories was postponed until Thursday’s game at Pepperdine.
Santa Clara’s Sendek gave the Zags credit for creating the atmosphere for a memorable showdown. “Because of their longstanding success, this kind of competition comes about,” he said. “What they’ve been able to achieve year in and year out is remarkable.”
THE NET RESULT: The NCAA’s NET computer rankings gave Saint Mary’s a nice bump on Sunday morning, up seven spots to No. 31 nationally after its fourth road win without a loss. USF checked in at No. 41, Gonzaga held steady at No. 49 and Santa Clara dropped 10 spots to No. 111.
GONZAGA WOMEN IN CHARGE: In the women’s NET rankings, Gonzaga (16-2, 3-0) resided comfortably at No. 17 Sunday morning after beating San Diego, 85-67, for its 28th consecutive home victory — third-longest streak in the nation. Santa Clara (13-5, 1-2), despite road losses to Gonzaga and Portland, is the only other WCC team in the top-100, ranked 81st.
Gonzaga is the lone remaining unbeaten team in WCC play after two weeks, having won its first three conference games by an average of nearly 26 points. Those include victories over the Pilots and Broncos, picked by the coaches to finish second and third in the WCC.
LAST WEEK’S BIG THING: San Francisco senior guard Jasmine Gayles scored 40 points — second-most in USF history — as the Dons rallied from 14 points down in the second half to post an 81-68 victory at Pacific on Saturday. Gayles scored 27 points in the second half – and also had four assists – leading to 11 more points, meaning she had a direct hand in 51 of USF’s points. Her 40 points were just two shy of the program record of 42 set by USF Hall of Famer Teri Hunt against San Diego on Jan. 31, 1987 — nearly 37 years ago. The win improved the Dons to 3-1 in WCC play, lifting them into a tie for second place.
THIS WEEK’S BIG THING: The only two men’s teams still unbeaten in WCC play, Saint Mary’s (13-6, 4-0) and USF (14-4, 3-0) clash Saturday night (7 p.m. on CBS Sports Network) on the Dons’ home floor. The Gaels have won the past eight meetings dating back to a USF home victory five years ago. The Dons, winners of their past six games and nine of 10, face LMU – also on CBS Sports Network – at home Thursday before hosting the Gaels.
WAVES MAKING SOME NOISE: Two days after beating Pacific, 93-78, in its highest-scoring performance in a WCC regulation-length game in seven years, the Pepperdine men’s basketball team did something it hadn’t accomplished in nearly three years — the Waves won a road game.
Pepperdine used a 17-0 second-half run to erase what was left of a 15-point first-half deficit and posted an 83-77 win at San Diego, snapping a 26-game road losing streak. A bigger challenge awaits on Thursday: a rematch at home two weeks after losing, 86-60, at Gonzaga.
DOUBLE-DOUBLE BARRAGE: The WCC’s top three double-double producers all added to their season totals on Saturday. Leading the way on the women’s side is USF’s Debora dos Santos, a 6-foot junior from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, who totaled 12 points and 13 rebounds in the Dons’ win at Pacific for her fourth straight double-double and 11th of the season.
Pepperdine junior forward Michael Ajayi also pocketed his 11th game with double digits in two statistical categories, contributing 24 points and 12 rebounds to the Waves’ win at San Diego. And USF junior forward Jonathan Mogbo now has 10 after 18 points and 14 rebounds in a victory over Portland.