Grand Canyon NCAA primer: Lopes ready to face basketball giant Gonzaga in March Madness

Grand Canyon is making its second trip in three years to the NCAA Tournament, this time to face No. 3 seed Gonzaga in the West Region on Friday afternoon at approximately 4:35 p.m. (Arizona time) in Denver.

GCU (24-11) came out of the Western Athletic Conference as the No. 5 seed to win the championship, beating four teams in five days. The Antelopes are the No. 14 seed in the West, and is in a same bracket as possibly Arizona State, if the Sun Devils can win their Wednesday game in Dayton, Ohio, against Nevada to get to the first round on Friday.

First things first. Gonzaga (28-5) is the program mid-majors aspire to be, especially GCU, which made Gonzaga the blueprint when it began its move from NCAA Division II to Division I 10 years ago. Like Gonzaga, GCU doesn't have a football program and puts most of its athletics resources in basketball, having former Suns owner Jerry Colangelo as a major contributor to the program.

This team came in as the preseason WAC favorite, but injuries — including what could have been a soul-crushing loss on Jan. 5 of point guard Jovan Blacksher Jr., preseason WAC Player of the Year — had the team struggling to find its identity through conference play.

Things came together in the last trip of the regular season through Utah with two wins to start March — with a snowball fight being an ice breaker.

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"It's been awesome as a coach to see it play out and be a player-led team," said coach Bryce Drew, who is 2-0 in WAC championship games since coming to GCU in 2020 when the pandemic was hitting hard.

Here is a quick look at the Lopes as they head out Wednesday to get ready for this next giant step as a mid-major program:

GCU's five biggest wins

1. First, of course, has to be the 84-66 win against Southern Utah in the WAC Tournament championship game in Las Vegas on Saturday. That gave the Lopes the automatic bid to dance. It was the last of a four-games-in-five-days stretch and ended up being the easiest thanks to a monster game from guard Ray Harrison, who had 31 points, eight rebounds and eight assists. The Lopes continued to torch from beyond the 3-point arc, making 13 of 20, five each by Harrison and reserve guard Noah Baumann.

2. The Lopes' 78-75 semifinal win over No. 1 Sam Houston teetered on the edge of an exit back home. But the basketball gods were looking down on the Lopes with a 76-75 lead with eight seconds left when Kaosi Ezeagu missed two free throws. GCU's Walter Ellis, calm and cool, sank two free throws with five seconds left, and WAC POY Qua Grant couldn't get a last-second shot to fall. But maybe the biggest move came during the second half when it appeared the Bearkats would run away with it. Drew had the defense go into a triangle-and-one and it worked. Grant, a tremendous point guard, got bottled up in the lane. Sam Houston was forced to try to win outside and couldn't get shots to fall. Meanwhile, the Lopes made their move.

3. The quarterfinal win over Seattle U, 84-79, which made up for two regular-season losses to the Redhawks, the last of which coming on GCU's Senior Night that led to a players-only meeting and the run they are currently on. In that revenge win, junior forward Gabe McGlothan took over with a career-high 35 points to go with 10 rebounds. He also made 5 of 9 3-pointers.

4. The 83-74 win at Southern Utah on March 1. The Lopes seemed up against the wall, at a loss on what went wrong this season, before this game jump-started a renewal, the beginning of the current season-long six-game winning streak, and it came at a place where the Thunderbirds hadn't lost a WAC game at all season. Harrison had 29 points and nine rebounds to revive this team.

5. In a 94-84 win against Abilene Christian on a late Friday night game at home on Feb. 17 in front of an ESPNU national audience, the Lopes had their best shooting performance in their Division I history, making 30 of 45 field goals (66.7%) and 10 of 14 3-pointers (71.4%), as Harrison, Chance McMillian and McGlothan all had at least 20 points. This was the potential they knew they had and caused such frustration later when they weren't able to maintain consistency.

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GCU's NCAA tournament history

Two years ago, the first season the Lopes were led by Drew, they reached their first March Madness in one of the weirdest years in NCAA history. This came the season after the pandemic shut down college basketball during conference tournaments and led to no NCAA tournament. People were still masked up, players and coaches constantly testing for COVID, and everybody was placed in Indiana to play in a tournament bubble format, like the NBA had to finish out the 2020 season. GCU won its first WAC championship, behind the great play of Jovan Blacksher, who was tournament MVP. But the Lopes, who went to Indianapolis as a 15 seed, were a quick exit, facing No. 2 Iowa and big man and Big Ten Player of the Year Luka Garza, falling 86-74 after getting into a 16-point hole early in the second half. Two days later, GCU was hit with the horrific news that forward Oscar Frayer died in a car accident in norther California, sending the Lopes grieving the loss of their beloved teammate.

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Keys for the Lopes

Not losing their mojo: They're going to have to stay laser-focused and continue their hot outside shooting. They shot better than 50% in each of the four WAC tournament games in Vegas. They made at least 10 3-pointers in each of their last three games, which were on successive days.

Keep helping Harrison: For so long this season, the Lopes were dependent on the transfer guard from Presbyterian, who, at times, was trying so hard to win games that some of his shots were forced. He's as strong a guard as GCU has ever had at driving the lanes to make tough shots, but he couldn't do it alone. Along came McGlothan, McMillian, freshman guard Kobe Knox, Walter Ellis, Noah Bauman and everything started to click during this six-game streak. In the semifinal win over the top seed, Harrison spent much of the bench in foul trouble and ended up fouling out with seven points. But everybody picked up the slack to pull out the win. It was Baumann's 3-pointer with 51 seconds left that gave GCU a 76-73 lead.

Yvan Ouedraogo's big body: He is the team's enforcer at 6-foot-9, 250 pounds, not an ounce of fat, an immoveable object in the paint who does the little things. He grabs offensive rebounds, blocks shots, bodies up, deflects passes, dives for loose ball, gets hands on missed shots to bat to a teammate. Gonzaga is easily the biggest team GCU has seen, and its will be vital for Ouedraogo to find a way to make life uncomfortable for the Bulldogs' bigs, including 6-10 Drew Timme, one of the best players in the nation.

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Bracket-busting: Looking over West Region

USA Today's Josh Peters analyzes the West. Some takeaways:

—Northwestern as a sleeper: "Dismiss the Wildcats at your own peril. In its last game, Northwestern fell in overtime to Penn State, which nearly beat Purdue in the Big Ten Tournament final. The Wildcats have six Quad 1 victories and are 13th in defensive efficiency."

—UNC Asheville in potential upset of UCLA: Mainly because of key Bruins injuries, losing defensive whiz Jaylen Clark in the regular-season finale, and dynamic center Adem Bona suffering a shoulder injury during the Pac-12 tournament semifinal. "An UNC-Asheville upset would hinge on Drew Pemper, the Tennessee transfer and senior center who scored a school-record 48 points against Presbyterian on Jan. 25. He leads UNC Asheville with 21.1 points per game and 9.4 rebounds per game. "

—Kansas to emerge from the West: The Jayhawks are "battle-tested thanks to Big 12 conference play and has 15 Quad 1 victories — more than any team in the country. Among Kansas’ talent-rich roster, freshman guard Gradey Dick is the one catching the eyes of NBA scouts."

To suggest human-interest story ideas and other news, reach Obert atrichard.obert@arizonarepublic.com or 602-316-8827. Follow him on Twitter@azc_obert

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Grand Canyon NCAA primer: Lopes ready to face Gonzaga in tournament