Dave Boling: Resilient ‘til the end, this Gonzaga group may have struggled at times, but never stopped battling

WICHITA, Kan. – Mark Few talked to his Gonzaga players often during the season about the qualities that made Houston such a great team.

Their energy and intensity were a paradigm for them to emulate.

It can be considered painful irony that it was when the Zags truly began playing like the top-seeded Cougars that they made a frantic late rally and closed to within one point before falling 81-76 in the NCAA second round Saturday night.

In the final 4½ minutes, the Zags got defensive stops, forced turnovers, and pounded the ball inside to come back from a 14-point second-half deficit.

In the final moments, it was the Cougars’ aggressive guarding that blocked Khalif Battle’s desperation 3-pointer.

“I’m so proud of how they hung in there and gave ourselves a chance right at the end,” Few said.

“That was a game that would have been awesome in the Elite Eight or Final Four,” Houston coach Kelvin Sampson said. “Gonzaga is as good as anybody we’ve played all year.”

Houston was fully deserving of its No. 1 seeding and No. 2 national ranking. Of their four losses this season, three were in overtime, and all four opponents qualified for the NCAA Tournament.

The Cougars were a typical Kelvin Sampson team with a predatory defense that made it seem as if they had six men on the court — all of them with long arms, sticky hands and cranky attitudes.

Yet, on this night, the Cougars seemed to have some threads of DNA of the old gifted Houston teams mixed in. Add it to the defense and rebounding, whew, dangerous.

Phi Slamya Grabya.

Gonzaga had been to nine straight Sweet 16s and Houston five, so somebody’s streak was going to end.

The Zags, ending 26-9, could have hardly started worse, looking every bit the No. 8 seed against the powerful Cougars.

The Houston front court seemed to have a wall built around the rim early on, and the Zags trailed 33-19.

Two trips down the floor showed the Cougars’ steely rim defense that led Graham Ike and Huff to miss consecutive point-blank shots.

The sense it was slipping away for good was quelled when point guard Ryan Nembhard, defending frantically, stabbed the ball free and corralled it before it headed out of bounds, leading to a Khalif Battle fast break.

Battle came back shortly and nailed a lengthy 3 to pull the Zags within six at 33-27.

With great energy on both ends, the Zags had clawed back to within striking distance.

The problem at that point? Houston got 12 second-chance points to GU’s two, and netted four of their eight 3-point attempts.

Even as the Houston lead swelled to 14 in the second half, the Zags kindled several promising rallies. But Houston would not cooperate. Guard LJ Cryer and forward J’Wan Roberts repeatedly damaging the Zags inside and outside.

Giving themselves the chance to pull off a memorable and highly unexpected upset at the end, and suffering a thrilling, narrow loss, in some ways, reflected much of an inconsistent season for the Zags.

Although they had fallen out of the Top 25 and suffered four conference losses, Few and his staff figured out a way to get the Zags peaking heading into March.

Their No. 8 seed will be debated, of course, as their play in the first two rounds of this tournament was a testament to their late-season improvement.

Probably the most important streak, consecutive NCAA Tournament berths (now up to 26), was extended.

“I told them afterward, I mean, they just showed their winning character,” Few said. “We fought back from where we were in mid-January to now. They never had a bad practice. They kept their heads high, and they stayed together and kept battling and learning.”

Few had praised the team’s resiliency throughout the year. It was a useful quality to have Saturday night. The Zags were dominated in stretches.

But they eventually forced one of the top two or three teams in the nation to scramble to secure the win.

This turned into a loss, an abrupt end to the season, but it was strong effort, on the whole.

“I think they showed their true colors tonight,” Few said. “And that’s a blessing I’ve had all year … just how high character they are, winners they are, and how easy they are to coach. What a blessing to have that as a head coach.”