‘He’s just a Zag, man:’ The untold stories of Drew Timme’s singular, legendary Gonzaga career

His college career may be winding down, but his legend in Spokane will live on forever in the pantheon of great Gonzaga players and characters.

[GU 67 - 59 SMC 3:33] Gaels are hanging around and Zags are playing too sloppy to close this one out going away. Bolton with a key bucket after he subbed in, but Hickman and Strawther with some empty possessions that are on them.

[GU 52 - 44 SMC 12:27] Bad couple minutes for the Zags has let St. Mary’s right back into the game as Mahoney hits two threes for his first scoring of the night.

[GU 39 - 26 SMC HT] Lead should be more as the Zags pushed it as high as 19 during an 18-1 run before fading a bit late in the half. Zags are definitely in the driver’s seat, but SMC are fully capable of grinding out a comeback.

[GU 24 - 19 SMC 6:02] Pace of this one totally favors St. Mary’s, but Hicks and Strawther have both scored since my last comment so that’s promising.

[GU 20 - 14 SMC ] Zags leading despite subpar games from Hicks and Strawther so far. As well as the rest of the squad is playing if those two get it dialed in it will be game over.

I’m not sure it’s fully intentional, or just well-managed by security, but I like that the SMC students didn’t storm the court after their OT win over the Zags. They were already the WCC leader, they’re a very good team, and they should expect to win this game.

From a Zag perspective Timme and Strawther were subpar in OT and when your two best players don’t deliver in crunch time it’s really hard to win.

Great game, but Zags are not executing in overtime and now trail SMC 64-70.

I’ve missed a fair amount of Zags games in the last month, but I’m looking forward to their big clash at league-leading St. Mary’s tonight. Randy Bennett continues to do a phenomenal job as the Gael’s coach and given that it’s in Moraga I’m not surprised at all to see SMC favored by the oddsmakers.

Former Gonzaga center Przemek Karnowski reunites with Tommy Lloyd, becomes GA at Arizona | The Spokesman-Review
Really happy to see one of my all-time favorite Zags joining up with Tommy Lloyd in Tucson as a Graduate Assistant for U of A.

Wow! Julian Strawther breaks a lot of hearts in Provo with a 3 point go ahead dagger with 10 seconds remaining and the Zags pull out an amazing come-from-behind victory.

Zags trail 63-68 now with 3:43 remaining. BYU’s lead has reached 10 points, but a couple empty possessions have allowed the Zags to gain some ground.

Zags lead BYU 52-51 with about 12 minutes left in the second half. Ben Gregg with some excellent energy plays and putbacks, but the rest of the team is a bit rattled.

[GU 63 - 64 BAY FT] Zags give up eight straight points without scoring and lose the game. Guard play. Guard play. Guard play.

[GU 63 - 64 BAY 12.6] Baylor gifted with a phantom fifth foul on Timme. Tough to swallow rebound foul based on how physical this game has been so far and the fact that the Baylor player jump sideways to get the rebound and just lost his footing in my view.

[GU 63 - 62 BAY 34] Gonzaga has settled for and missed tough shots and Baylor has hit clutch ones. Baylor’s ball with 34 seconds to play.

[GU 63 - 59 BAY 1:33] Ugly physical game, but Gonzaga has gritted their way to into the lead over the last few minutes. Still anyone’s game if they can make stops down the stretch.

[GU 43 - 46 BAY 12:30] Timme just got hosed on a blockout foul situation with George. Baylor’s 5-star stud appeared to stumble on his own and then tripped Timme, but that’s not how it was called.

[GU 41 - 40 BAY 15:45] Watson with the go ahead basket after he rips it away from Lohner. Physicality of this game pretty ridiculous.

[GU 34 - 38 BAY 18:01] Bolton with another turnover on a charge. Smith gets ready to check in.

Bolton with 4 turnovers, Hickman with 2, and Sallis with 2. Completely unacceptable numbers for Bolton in particular as the experienced senior. It’s getting to the point where Few should be starting Smith instead. That said, I expect Timme to make his presence felt in the second half.

GU 33 - 38 BAY HT] Gonzaga lucky to be within 5. Turnovers and guard play continue to be an issue. Nolan Hickman needs to get a better feel for controlling GU’s offensive flow.

[GU 20 - 30 BAY 5:07] Super physical game tonight and Zags aren’t handling it well. Timme completely neutralized so far because he hasn’t been able to get the ball comfortably in his usual spots.

[GU 17 - 19 BAY 10:07] Malachi Smith with some nice defense and a steal good to see him make his presence felt, he’s too good of a player. Watson heading to the line with a chance to tie the game.

[GU 12 - 19 BAY 11:19] Rough stretch early, but some good contributions from Gregg once again.

Looking forward to this rematch of the NCAA championship from a couple years ago back when Drew Timme was just a sophomore. Baylor is ranked 6 and the Zags are currently checking in at a completely reasonable 14 in the rankings.

Gonzaga vs Baylor

🏀Indiana Pacers rookie Andrew Nembhard hits gaming winning 3 over Lebron at the buzzer! Fantastic result for one of Gonzaga’s all time great point guards.

[GU 88 - 84 XAV FT] Zags squeak it out. Much better game from Strawther and Anton Watson, great minutes from Ben Gregg off the bench, and Nolan Hickman continues to improve. I’ll take it.

Anton Watson just took 10 years off Mark Few’s life when he fouled on a dunk up 6. Few literally turned into an old man before our eyes.

[GU 81 - 75 XAV 1:28] Julian Strawther stepping up big late in the game nails a 3 as the shot clock expires. Xavier takes a timeout to regroup.

[GU 73 - 73 XAV 3:56] This ones going down to the wire. Zags battle back after a bad stretch let Xavier take a 5 or 6 point lead.

[GU 61 - 62 XAV 9:18] Xavier takes the lead after fighting their way back into this game. Zags haven’t played terrible, but haven’t been good enough at both ends.

[GU 40 -34 XAV HT] Ben Gregg continues his campaign for more minute with a long 3 that puts the Zags up 6 going into the half. Disappointing last 5 minutes considering they led by as much as 13 this half, but I’ll take it.

[GU 31 - 23 XAV 5:01] Much better game than yesterday so far.

Zags off to a good start in this one and lead 11-4. Wasn’t particularly excited for this game beforehand, but seeing them play well always helps.

Gonzaga vs Xavier

🏀Purdue absolutely embarrassed the Zags last night. Hickman is clearly improving, but there continues to be a perimeter leadership deficit from the veterans in these losses. Instead of executing though adversity we devolve into hero ball and it just compounds our offensive problems.

GU losing to Purdue by 5 at the half thanks to poor shot selection and offensive execution.

Gonzaga vs Purdue

[GU 55 - 31 PSU HT] Pretty dominant performance tonight with 8-14 from 3 already. Notably Nolan Hickman has 4 assists and 0 turnovers and Rasir Bolton has 5 assists and 0 turnovers so great to see improvement on that front.

Zags vs Portland St.

Gonzaga bounces back in win over Kentucky, 88-72
Totally intended to watch this, but was eating and watching a movie with my younger daughters and completed spaced it. Great win for the Zags and it figures they’d play a lot better when I missed it. Turnovers are still very much a problem though with 18 last night and 56 in the first three games.

🏀So far this season Hunter Salles is the only Zag guard that actually gives me decent point guard vibes and he’s really raw. I really like his defensive skillset, but his shot selection has been a little iffy at times. Dom Harris is the only other unexplored option (and his dad sure seems to be a Dom PG believer on social media), but he’s still working his way back from last year’s injury setback.

[Final 74 - 93 Texas] A lot of work ahead for the Zags between now and the Kentucky game on Sunday.

[62 -78 Texas 8:00] Hunter and Carr are a combined 9-14 for 3 for Texas.

Sallis was literally fouled 3 times on that length of court drive before getting the call.

[46 - 66 Texas as 14:16] Completely embarrassing performance and it’s all down to guard leadership and composure.

[42 - 58 Texas 16:37] Zags giving up way too many 3’s today and their half court execution is so poor that they have no chance of coming back.

[37 - 47 Texas] Terrible end to the half. Zags too predictable about relying on Timme and Texas is too good defensively. Strawther only having 4 points on three shot attempts is completely unacceptable. Nolan Hickman has been good, but I still want more leadership from him.