alt=Jeff CallPROVO — Two weeks into the West Coast Conference race, No. 1 Gonzaga is unbeaten and San Diego is winless.
And those are the two teams that BYU faces this week — hosting the last-place Toreros Thursday and visiting the league-leading Zags Saturday.
Gonzaga has won 31 WCC regular-season games in a row, tying a streak set by Bill Russell’s San Francisco teams of the 1950s. With a victory Thursday over Santa Clara, the Zags would tie the WCC record of 32 — set by Pepperdine from 1991 to 1993. Gonzaga could set a new WCC record by beating the Cougars this weekend.
BYU (13-5, 2-1) split its two games last week, falling in overtime at Saint Mary’s before routing Portland at home.
After the Gaels (15-4, 2-2) outlasted BYU, they lost at home to Santa Clara, 67-66.
“You saw what happened to Saint Mary’s. It’s a hard league,” said BYU coach Mark Pope.
What makes it even harder is the fact that there’s only one day between games. And it’s more difficult when that one day in between is a travel day.
“You have this one day off,” Pope said. “If we had won the Saint Mary’s game or lost the Saint Mary’s game, either way with the way that game went, our biggest job was to help our guys to rehabilitate their hearts and souls to be ready to come compete.”
That’s what made BYU’s start against Portland — the Cougars raced out to a 24-2 lead in the game’s opening minutes — impressive.
“We talked about how we have responded to adversity throughout the season,” said forward Dalton Nixon. “If you look at all the times we’ve lost these heartbreakers, overtime losses or teams that are ranked really high — Kansas and San Diego State — we’ve responded really well. That’s how this team fights. We knew we were going to come out and fight. That’s what we do.”
Santa Clara and Pacific both own 2-1 records in league play after strong performances in their nonconference schedules.
As for the Cougars, three of their five losses this season have come in overtime. BYU has fallen to Boise State, Utah and Saint Mary’s in OT — all on the road.
The Cougars’ latest challenge, of course, is dealing with having leading scorer Yoeli Childs sidelined due to an open dislocation of the index finger on his shooting hand, which was suffered in practice two days before the Saint Mary’s game.
“It’s hard to see him go down but we played nine games this year without him,” said guard TJ Haws. “It’s like a different team without him. But our mindset has to be the exact same in every game.”
In the latest edition of Joe Lunardi’s ESPN bracketology, BYU remains projected as a No. 9 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Saint Mary’s fell to a No. 10 seed and Gonzaga is pegged as a No. 1 seed.
Here’s the latest NCAA’s NET rankings of WCC teams — Gonzaga (No. 7), BYU (No. 33), Saint Mary’s (No. 41), Santa Clara (No. 75), San Francisco (No. 97), Pacific (No. 131), Pepperdine (No. 152), Portland (No. 224), San Diego (No. 233) and Loyola Marymount (No. 238).
And the latest KenPom rankings has Gonzaga No. 7, BYU No. 26 and Saint Mary’s No. 34.
Cougars on the air
San Diego (7-12, 0-4)
at BYU (13-5, 2-1)
Thursday, 7 p.m. MST
Marriott Center
TV: BYUtv
Radio: KSL 1160 AM, 102.7 FM