Santa Clara ended a 26-game losing streak to Gonzaga last season for its first win over the Bulldogs since January 2011.
Now the Broncos look to halt a string of 17 straight road losses in the series when they face No. 16 Gonzaga on Saturday night in Spokane, Wash.
Santa Clara (12-7, 4-2 WCC) hasn’t won in Spokane since 2007. But at least the Broncos ended the overall skid with last season’s dramatic 77-76 home win over then-No. 23 Gonzaga.
Adama-Alpha Bal converted the decisive layup with 4.6 seconds left and then stole the ball on the other end just before time expired to set off a wild scene in Santa Clara’s cozy gymnasium.
However, the Broncos won’t be arriving in the Pacific Northwest with confidence after losing 57-54 at Loyola Marymount on Thursday. It marked Santa Clara’s lowest point total of the season.
The mistake-prone Broncos missed a big opportunity to take a step forward in the improved WCC.
“We shot ourselves in the foot with 13 turnovers,” Santa Clara coach Herb Sendek said afterward. “We didn’t have that margin for error when you’re 4-for-26 from three. A couple of those shots go down and the game might have a completely different feel to it.”
Christoph Tilly scored a career-high 25 points on 10-of-15 shooting for his fourth 20-point effort of the season. Bal added 14 points and five assists.
The setback was just the second in the past 11 games for the Broncos.
Bal leads Santa Clara in scoring at 13.7 points per game. Also averaging in double digits are Tilly (12.9), Elijah Mahi (12.6) and Carlos Stewart Jr. (12.2).
Gonzaga (14-5, 5-1) also will be trying to bounce back after losing 97-89 in overtime at Oregon State on Thursday.
The Bulldogs were suspect on defense while allowing their most points of the season. The Beavers made a stellar 58.5 percent of their shots.
“We had a struggle defensively all game,” Gonzaga point guard Ryan Nembhard said. “This is probably one of our worst defensive games of the year. We let guys drive on us, we let guys knock down threes — pretty much everything that we shouldn’t allow. Can’t do that, and if you want to win these games, we gotta tighten that up for sure.”
Bulldogs big man Graham Ike excelled with 26 points and nine rebounds before fouling out in overtime. It was Ike’s eighth 20-point output of the season and third in the past four games.
“He was great. Graham was terrific,” Gonzaga coach Mark Few said. “He delivered time and time again in a high-level game against a very good, physical, big post man.
“You know, you also got to guard at the other end too. So again, our offense wasn’t the problem — our defense was at pretty much all five spots.”
Ike leads the Bulldogs in scoring (17.1 points per game) and rebounding (7.5) despite averaging just 21.8 minutes per game.
Khalif Battle averages 13.5 points while Nembhard contributes 11.5 points and is tied for the national lead in assists at 9.4 per game.
Nolan Hickman leads Gonzaga with 43 3-pointers while averaging 10.1 points per game.
Now the Bulldogs will try to bounce back from a stunning result.
“We gotta have a good approach (Saturday),” Nembhard said. “We’ll have practice, it’ll probably be a little lighter day, but we gotta go figure some things out defensively. We scored enough to win the game (against Oregon State) but defensively we weren’t good enough so, that’ll definitely be the focus.”
–Field Level Media
