ESPN duo projects opponents Gonzaga might want to avoid in March Madness

ESPN’s Dave Flemming and Sean Farnham have probably called more Gonzaga basketball games over the past decade than any other national broadcast team.

Whether it’s GU-Saint Mary’s in Moraga, California; GU-BYU in Provo, Utah; GU-San Francisco at the McCarthey Athletic Center or GU-vs.-whomever at the West Coast Conference Tournament in Las Vegas, there’s a strong chance Flemming and Farnham were stationed courtside.

Flemming and Farnham have described Gonzaga’s strengths and weaknesses for viewers for many of the Zags’ biggest WCC contests. The Zags’ are No. 1 in the NET rankings and AP poll and they’re the top overall seed in the NCAA Tournament, so their strengths are pretty well documented at this point.

For this article, we quizzed Flemming and Farnham last month on opponents that could present problems – and why – for Gonzaga in March Madness.

The Zags would be better off avoiding opponents that are “super physical at the defensive end, teams that are going to get up and pressure them,” Farnham said. “That’s what Alabama did a great job of in the game in Seattle. So you’re looking at a team athletically that is maybe a step ahead of Gonzaga, which is hard. There’s not many of those. But (a team) physical enough to get up and disrupt, extend out the offense to create a longer pass, which gives more time to recover for any kind of post entry. That’s No. 1.

“No. 2, you have to be a team that can control the game through your offense, meaning you have to be patient enough to work both sides of the floor. Sometimes when you play against Gonzaga, you fall into trying to play catch-up. When you try to play catch-up, you end up taking a worse shot than you normally would, which means it’s a lower-percentage shot and you end up building a deficit rather than actually being able to eat away at the lead.”

Flemming nodded his head in agreement with Farnham. Asked for a team that could be troublesome for the Zags, the veteran play-by-play announcer mentioned Arizona and first-year coach Tommy Lloyd, the former longtime Gonzaga assistant.

The Wildcats, who are the top seed in the South Region, won the Pac-12 regular-season and tournament titles. They’re ranked right behind GU at No. 2 in the NET and AP and join the Zags as one of the nation’s best offensive teams.

“If I were the Zags, I wouldn’t want to play Arizona,” Flemming said. “I think they’re a better version than what Tommy has, but that’s a lot of insider knowledge about how they do things.

“UCLA matched up with them great last year obviously, so maybe they could again, but I’d think Arizona is the team. For fans, it would be super fun.”

Farnham nodded in agreement with Flemming, but the analyst cited Kentucky and Auburn as his top two choices.

“Oscar Tshiebwe’s size and his fight, along with the experience now of some of the younger players like TyTy Washington, who is really good,” Farnham said. “There’s not a hole on that Kentucky team. I would say Kentucky is the best suited team to try to knock off Gonzaga and maybe win a national championship.

“Auburn is an interesting team because they want to play fast, they have a great rim protector with Walker Kessler, they have a star in Jabari Smith that’s 6-10 and can really shoot it on the outside. With both of those guys’ ability to shoot from the outside, it would pull Drew Timme and Chet Holmgren away from basket, not that Chet is uncomfortable away from the basket. But Drew would have to defend out on the perimeter on somebody.”

Auburn was ranked No. 1 for three weeks before going 5-4 in its last nine games. The Tigers, seeded second in the Midwest Region, went to the Final Four in 2019.

“The secret sauce for (coach) Bruce Pearl’s team is actually the three guards because they are physical,” Farnham added. “They have a little JYD (junk yard dog) in them, and you have to have that.”

Duke, Alabama and Saint Mary’s were responsible for Gonzaga’s three losses. Duke is the No. 2 seed in the West with Alabama at No. 6. A potential rematch couldn’t happen until the Elite Eight, but neither the Blue Devils nor the Crimson Tide made Farnham’s list.

He said after Selection Sunday that third-seeded Texas Tech, which lost to GU 69-55 in December in Phoenix, looms as a potential issue for the Zags.

“I don’t think Alabama would (beat GU) again,” Farnham said. “Alabama is really an enigma. They’ve had some of the best wins in college basketball and then they’ve had some of the most confusing losses.

“I don’t think Duke can (beat the Zags again). Duke is not connected at the defensive end at the level you need to be. If you really watch Duke closely, there’s some holes that have not been fixed. And they also don’t know where they want to get the ball in late-game situations. (Standout freshman) Paolo Banchero didn’t even take a shot in the second half until a last-second heave against Virginia (in an early February loss). Those are things that alarm me a little bit about them.”