For the second straight game and the third time in the last four the Zags poor defensive effort and too many turnovers led to a huge first half deficit and blowout defeat. Tonight’s game had many similarities to the Georgia game, in that the Bulldogs turned the ball over far too many times, leading to easy transition baskets for their opponent, and then when the Zags were able to keep the Cavaliers from scoring on the break they failed to contain Virginia’s backcourt, allowing them bomb away uncontested from the outside on their way to a school record 18 three pointers, including an amazing 12 in the first half. For the second consecutive year Sean Singletary set his career high against Gonzaga, this time scoring 37 points, including 12 early points before the Bulldog’s could get their feet under them in a hostile road gym. Gonzaga failed to challenge shooters all night, giving up far too many uncontested looks, on the way to allowing Virginia to shoot 50% from the floor and 53% from 3. When Virginal did get the ball inside or attack Gonzaga on the bounce the Bulldogs were a step or two slow, as evidenced by the 29 Gonzaga fouls leading to 37 Virginia free throws. The lack of half court defense spelled enough trouble for the Zags, but the Cavaliers did a nice job of turning many of the Zag’s turnovers into easy transition baskets, further exasperating the Bulldog’s defensive problems. In giving up 18 three pointers and 108 points there is no doubt this was one of the worst defensive performance the Bulldogs have had in years and by far their worst of the year, but Virginia also deserves a great deal of credit for shooting well and running their offense almost flawlessly for 40 minutes.

In what appears to be becoming a disturbing trend Gonzaga once again had an extremely high number of turnovers, including 5 in the game’s first four minutes. For a team that plays a three-guard rotation and has skilled big men Gonzaga is committing far more turnovers than they should be at this point in the season. The guards are over pentrating, leading to charges, carrying violations, and forced passes; while the bigs are bringing the ball down to get it stolen or hurrying too much causing traveling violations. Hopefully the Zags can all slow down a bit at the offensive end and limit the number of turnovers to about 13 per game, because if they continue to turn the ball over nearly 20 times a game, they have 19 turnovers each of the last two games, they will continue to struggle for the rest of the year. What makes the high turnover count even more frustrating is how well this year’s team shoots the ball, as evidenced by 43% percent shooting from the floor and 3 point line and over 85% from the free throw line on their way to an impressive 87 points on the road. Unfortunately 61 of those points came in the second half once the game was well out of reach and the 87 point effort was greatly overshadowed by allowing 108 points and trailing by as many as 36 points in the second half.
Tonight’s game was a combination of fabulous play by Virginia and inconsistent and bad play by Gonzaga. Mallon was the only Gonzaga player to play a complete game, with Derek having a great game scoring, but most of his points coming once the game was over. Pargo and Kuso had their moments, but the consistency was not there to make the game competitive and Josh’s severe struggles left the Zags with no inside scoring presence. When looking at the stats from the game it is very deceiving because the Bulldogs had 4 players in double figures, scored 87 points, and shot the ball very well, but it was the things that don’t show up in the stats-defense, effort, passion and attention to the scouting report that the Zags failed to do tonight that led to Virginia running them out of the gym.

By no means can tonight’s loss be attributed to just one player, it was a collective effort that got the Zags crushed, but hopefully they will respond as a team and begin to shore up some of their weaknesses which have been exposed in the current 4 game losing streak. Gonzaga needs to put Virginia behind and focus on the future, which begins Saturday with a very experienced and talented LMU team visiting the Kennel. The Zags have to limit their turnovers, get back to playing defense with passion and aggressiveness, rebounding the ball well and getting solid efforts from the entire team, and major contributions from Josh, in order to get back to the winning ways they enjoyed early in the year. There is no doubt this team has a chance to be very good, but now is the time they must show their ability and what they have learned during their killer preseason schedule in order to win another WCC Championship.