Zags continue to dominate

By Jeremy Herb

Entering the West Coast Conference Tournament this weekend, every team is looking to knock off Gonzaga, who has dominated the conference for the past eight years.

The Bulldogs have almost run the table, winning six of the past eight WCC Tournaments and earning the regular season title seven times.

On Monday, the program was rewarded for its dominance. Gonzaga head coach Mark Few earned his sixth-straight Coach of the Year award, a WCC record, and Gonzaga forward Adam Morrison was named WCC Player of the Year, the sixth-straight season a Bulldog has received the award.

But a decade ago, Gonzaga was not the supreme basketball power in the WCC. In 1992, an unrecruited freshman named Steve Nash transformed the Broncos into the top WCC team for a majority of the 1990s.

"We were tremendously lucky in even seeing him," Broncos head coach Dick Davey said. "He had written letters to a lot of schools trying to create some interest. When we saw him, I was highly intrigued, and because nobody else recruited him, we did."

When Nash entered Santa Clara in 1992, the Broncos were returning one starter from the previous year. Santa Clara was not picked to finish higher than seventh in any preseason WCC poll. Santa Clara ended the regular season third in the WCC, which was not good enough for an at-large berth into the NCAA Tournament.

Instead, the Broncos had to win the WCC Tournament to earn an NCAA berth, as the WCC Tournament champion automatically qualifies.

Behind Tournament MVP Steve Nash, the Broncos shot 9-for-9 from three-point range in the second half of the championship game, defeating top-seeded Pepperdine and earning their first NCAA berth since 1987.

The Broncos were rewarded with a 15 seed and a match-up with second-seeded Arizona, ranked fifth in the country.

After falling behind by 13 in the second half in what was supposed to be a blowout, the Broncos became only the second team in NCAA history to knock off a two seed in the first round, defeating Arizona 64-61 and shining the national spotlight on Santa Clara.

"I think it helped the school more than it helped basketball," Davey said. "The school got a lot of recognition through the NCAA, and that helped generate more applications through admission."

While Santa Clara was celebrating their victory over Arizona in 1993, Gonzaga had never stepped onto the court in an NCAA Tournament game.

The Bulldogs earned their first berth by winning the WCC Tournament in 1995, but lost in the first round to Maryland 87-62, and did not qualify again for the next three years. In 1999, Gonzaga won the WCC Tournament and was given a 10 seed in the NCAA Tournament, which meant they would likely be the underdog in every game they played.

Gonzaga embraced the role, defeating three higher-seeded teams, including second-seeded Stanford, to advance to the Elite Eight, before falling to top-seeded Connecticut. The deep run into the tournament put their team in the spotlight, as their run was documented on national television.

And then they did it again. And again.

In 2000, as a 10 seed, Gonzaga knocked off second-seeded St. John's to make the Sweet 16.

The following year, the Zags reached the Sweet 16 again, this time as a 12 seed, knocking off fifth-seeded Virginia and 13th-seeded Indiana State.

"Anytime there's a national thing, whether it be in the arts or in math or some Nobel Prize winner, or you win a championship, it creates information about the university, and I think it helps the university's admission situation," Davey said.

Since then, the Zags have yet to make it back into the third round, but with two future NBA Draft picks signed during the three-year run, the Bulldogs have remained dominant in the WCC.

Following the 1999-2000 season, current Boston Celtic Dan Dickau transferred to Gonzaga from Washington. Then, after the Zags' final appearance in the Sweet 16 in 2001, they signed freshman Ronny Turiaf, who was drafted by the Lakers in 2005.

And while those players have graduated, Morrison -- a potential lottery pick in the upcoming NBA draft and the NCAA leading scorer -- has continued the influx of NBA-bound players to Spokane.

"Once you start winning, being ranked and you're on TV all the time, that helps recruiting, and that helps everything," Gonzaga head coach Mark Few said.

So why didn't Santa Clara replicate Gonzaga's success after Nash put them in the nation's eye?

In Nash's final three years as a Bronco, Santa Clara returned to the NCAA Tournament twice, making it to the second round again in 1996.

However, after winning the WCC Tournament in 1993, the Broncos followed with four consecutive first round exits -- the last three after finishing with the top conference record.

In 1998, the Broncos finished third in the conference, and were shut out of the postseason again. The Broncos have not finished higher in the WCC since.

"We just went through some years where we probably didn't do as good a job as we needed to recruiting-wise, as far as the guys we recruited weren't quite the caliber we were looking for," Davey said.

Gonzaga's success has also stemmed from finding players that top college programs pass on. Morrison was not ranked in the top-100 players in his high school class, according to Scout.com.

"What really helps them is they've been able to recruit the northwest," Davey said. "They've also had a large number of very good players from Spokane, which is really unusual."

For next season, the Bulldogs have signed one top-100 player, Matt Bouldin, ranked 53rd.

"It's a long hard haul to get where we are," Few said. "I'm just paranoid about trying to stay up there and trying to get a little better. You're always looking at who's over your back."

Contact Jeremy Herb at (408) 551-1918 or jmherb@scu.edu.