What Does Gonzaga’s Loss Mean For The NCAA Tournament?
What does Gonzaga’s loss mean for the NCAA tournament? At the moment, not much. But that could quickly change.
On Saturday night, the Bulldogs suffered their first defeat since the day after Thanksgiving.
The timing of the loss was both good and bad. It was bad because, obviously, getting beaten is never good. However, fortunately enough for the Zags, San Diego State fell in an upset on the same day.
BYU completely and totally outplayed Gonzaga in their outing. The victory was not a fluke by any stretch of the imagination.
The Cougars hit 11 three-pointers in the effort while the Bulldogs went five-of-twenty five from behind the arc.
Although it is difficult to compete with any team when it heats up like BYU did on Saturday, the loss still calls Gonzaga’s status as a top seed into question.
To be fair, the Bulldogs still have a great resume – all things considered. The defeats to Michigan and BYU are glaring, sure, but victories against Arizona and Oregon are also hard to ignore.
The one unfortunate thing that Gonzaga has to deal with is that early-season victories over Washington and North Carolina look a lot worse now than they did back then.
All that being said, one thing working Gonzaga’s favor is the San Diego State loss.
Over the past few months, the strongest thing the Aztecs had going for them was their undefeated record. With a loss to UNLV, that all changed.
San Diego State still has a shot at the East Region top-seed if they win out and a few things fall in their favor going forward, but Gonzaga likely as the West Region on lock at this point. Clearly there cannot be any more losses like the one the Bulldogs experienced this weekend, but so long as there aren’t, it should be smooth sailing from here on out.
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Jennifer Withers Hoey is a former Business Development Manager who transitioned to writing about sports. With valuable connections all over the West Coast, she has used those contacts to break some of the most interesting stories pertaining to the Portland Trail Blazers, Oregon Ducks, LA Lakers, LA Clippers, Seattle Supersonics (RIP), and more.
