Sweet 16 Exit to Arkansas a New Low for No. 1 Gonzaga and Mark Few
March 25, 2022
Copy, paste. Rinse, repeat. Gonzaga didn't win a national championship, and college basketball media is here to talk about it.
While social-media timelines and comment sections can be horrible metrics of consensus opinion, one seems to have clearly developed about the Zags: They can't win it all, and none of the excuses or justifications are good enough anymore.
Nuance is still important. But after yet another loss—this time 74-68 opposite Arkansas in the Sweet 16 of the 2022 men's NCAA tournament—they're not proving it incorrect, either.
The program is riding a 23-year NCAA tournament streak, and perception has evolved dramatically. Through the 2011-12 season, Gonzaga was the plucky underdog from a mid-major conference that peaked in 1999 with a surprising Elite Eight run and the subsequent Ronny Turiaf and Adam Morrison years.
Beyond a three-season run as a top-three seed in 2004, 2005 and 2006, Gonzaga was basically just another mid-tier team.
The real expectations didn't arrive until the 2012-13 tourney when the program landed its first No. 1 seed in March Madness and bowed out to Wichita State in the second round. Everything in the last decade is fair to judge to the harshest degree, and the results are both improved and unsatisfactory.
During this stretch, the Zags have become a national force and reached an elite level of performance. Most recently, they secured No. 1 seeds in 2017, 2019 and 2021. Their tournament runs ended as the national runner-up, in the Elite Eight and with a second loss in the championship game.
Disappointing, sure. Hardly a failure.
Thursday was different.
Gonzaga, the No. 1 overall seed and tournament favorite, fell to Arkansas in devastating fashion. The short version is the Zags missed open shots—like, wide-open shots—and could not atone for it against a physical, relentless Arkansas defense.
They shot 23.8 percent from three and committed 15 turnovers, including five each by Andrew Nembhard and Drew Timme. Chet Holmgren drew a poor whistle and fouled out, which certainly didn't help. But the result didn't come down to a few questionable calls on Gonzaga's star freshman.
The performance left Gonzaga in a familiar, yet different, spot.
"It's hard. We're not used to losing in this round over these last four, five years," Few said on CBS after the Sweet 16 letdown. "We've been able to advance past this round and keep it going, so I think we're a little bit in shock."
Point to the randomness of a single-elimination tournament. Blame it on two months of West Coast Conference play. Criticize the Zags' potential for being physically overmatched.
But, once again, they're not returning to Spokane with a title.
Gonzaga is not overrated. In the last decade—the real peak of the program—just Michigan has matched the Zags' seven Sweet 16 trips. Their four Elite Eight appearances trail Duke's five, and nobody else. Michigan, North Carolina and Villanova are the only other programs, as of now, with two chances on the national championship stage.
Gonzaga is, however, failing to capitalize on prime opportunities to hang that elusive March Madness banner.
This decade-long run might not end in the near future, but no program stays among college basketball's elite forever. Gonzaga's inability to navigate the NCAA tourney is steadily feeling more like wasted chances than a precursor to that coveted celebration.