Lifelong Gonzaga fan Ben Gregg anticipates special Homecoming as top-seeded Bulldogs open NCAA Tournament in Portland

Not long after Gonzaga won the West Coast Conference championship, all but guaranteeing the Bulldogs would enter the 2022 NCAA Tournament as a top overall seed playing in Portland, assistant coach Brian Michaelson had a favor to ask Matt Gregg.

“‘We’re probably going to need some gym time,’” Michaelson said, according to Gregg.

C.C. Perry Gym is normally reserved for the men’s and women’s basketball teams at Warner Pacific, but on Wednesday gym-goers will include a lanky 7-footer who’s projected to be taken with one of the top picks in the NBA Draft, another All-American frontcourt player who may arrive with a handlebar mustache and an up-and-coming freshman forward who’s already familiar with the NAIA gym located in the Mount Tabor neighborhood of Portland.

Matt Gregg, the interim athletic director at Warner Pacific and longtime women’s basketball coach, gladly rented out the venue to the top-ranked, top-seeded Zags ahead of a first-round NCAA Tournament game against 16th-seeded Georgia State at the Moda Center.

The main incentive of doing so was an opportunity to see his son Ben, a reserve forward at Gonzaga who’ll be enjoying a Homecoming of sorts this week in Portland. The sophomore became a four-star prospect, earning offers from Gonzaga, Arizona and Oregon, in part because of all the hours he put in at Warner Pacific’s gym from the time he was a child to his senior year at nearby Clackamas High School.

“He grew up there from the time he as 6 years old, he’s got a lot of shots up in that gym,” Matt Gregg said before joking, “maybe he’ll perform really well and he’ll be in the starting lineup on Thursday.”

Ben Gregg is the fourth frontcourt option on a Gonzaga team that normally plays three forwards – Chet Holmgren, Drew Timme and Anton Watson – but he’s still registered minutes in 16 games this season, playing 10 minutes or more against Alcorn State, Bellarmine, North Alabama and Pepperdine.

The point spread of Thursday’s game – Gonzaga sits as a 23½-point favorite – combined with the fact the Bulldogs have won their last 12 first-round games by an average margin of 16.9 points, including the last two by 81 combined points, may mean there’s a good chance Gregg will check in at some point against Georgia State.

You can bet Matt Gregg has already played that scenario out in his head.

“We were hoping it all the time, so that’s a blessing by itself but for him to be home and be in Portland and playing in front of all the people that watched him grow up, if he gets some time we’re going to be very excited for him,” he said. “I can’t even express how that’s going to make us feel as parents.”

Added Ben: “He just loves coming to games, he’s always been a fan so even if I’m not playing he would still be here. For us to be in Portland, right in his backyard, he’s very happy about it for sure.”

Long before Ben made his commitment to Mark Few’s program, the sophomore was immersed in Gonzaga basketball. Matt Gregg is a Clarkston native who lived in Spokane and coached at Freeman High before the family moved to Portland. A longtime Gonzaga fan, Matt attended “A Day with the Zags” coaching clinics where participating coaches would earn one free game ticket. If he could swing it, Matt would try to snag a second ticket for Ben.

“We would try to go to games and obviously that’s the hottest ticket around, so that’s a tough get,” Matt said. “We didn’t get to see a lot of them but we were always watching on TV, we would go to those games.”

In 2009, a 6-year-old Ben sat on the bench at McCarthey Athletic Center wearing a full suit as his dad’s “assistant coach” when the Bulldogs hosted Warner Pacific for an exhibition game.

When Ben took his recruiting trip to Gonzaga as a high school sophomore, he was able to identify most of the former players depicted in photos throughout the basketball facility – knowledge that most prospects can’t relate to.

“It was surprising how many he could name as well,” Matt said. “So I thought that was pretty cool.”

Ben habitually attended Gonzaga games at the University of Portland and the family had good seats for the Portland-based PK80 tournament in 2017, when the Bulldogs played the likes of Ohio State, Florida and Texas.

“Just being able to see the Gonzaga fans travel to Portland and sold it out and it was all red and blue,” Ben said. “That was pretty incredible, so to be able to play in front of all the Gonzaga crowds and not too far away from Spokane is going to be really cool.”

Provided Gonzaga offered a scholarship, there was never much debate as to where Gregg would end up playing college basketball. The top-rated player in the state of Oregon, per 247Sports.com, Gregg got his offer on Aug. 27, 2020, and committed two weeks later.

“We were contemplating it as a family, then Gonzaga came in and it was like, OK well that ends that conversation,” Matt said. “We knew right away that was the place for him and always has been.”

The family’s history with Gonzaga made it an easy sell and it didn’t hurt that Gregg’s primary recruiter was Michaelson, a Portland native and Jesuit High graduate. During the COVID-19 pandemic Gregg stayed in shape by playing in secret runs with former Bulldog, Jesuit grad and Beaverton native Kyle Wiltjer.

“There’s a lot of hoopers there,” Ben said. “Portland, it’s not known as a basketball town but everyone loves hoops there and we play as much as we can. You just grow up on it.”

With potentially two of GU’s three rotational frontcourt players leaving to play professionally next season, there could be a bigger role in store for Gregg this season. Even if only Holmgren leaves, Gregg may be called on as the first forward off the Bulldogs’ bench – Watson’s role this season. Although he’s in his second year at Gonzaga, Gregg is still classified as a freshman, graduating high school early so he could join the Bulldogs midway through the 2020-21 season.

“His body has changed so much, he’s gotten so much bigger, thicker. And one of the things I think people miss is he’s behind Chet, Anton and Drew and playing with them every day,” Matt said. “He’s got no choice but to get better and I think people think – I always hear people, ‘Oh he should transfer, he’s not playing in games.’ We’re just like, listen he’s going to get better in practice, not in games.

“That’s the part as a coach that bugs me when people think he’s got to be playing to get better. He’s getting better in practice and people will be surprised when his time comes.”

The Zags played a game at the University of Portland last year, but COVID restrictions barred families from attending – even those that lived 10 miles away. Since the NCAA Tournament bracket became official, Ben has fielded so many ticket requests he decided it was easier to delegate those duties to his mother, Cori.

“At first my phone was getting pretty hot,” he said, “so I told my mom to handle all of it.”