PROVO — The way-too-early-to-look at BYU basketball fortunes — since there is much work left to do — is that first-year coach Mark Pope has created something special in a matter of 10 months.
The 23-7 Cougars are headed to a final regular-season clash at Pepperdine Saturday and must still hold onto a No. 2 seed in the West Coast Conference Tournament in Las Vegas March 6-10. But NCAA Tournament bracketologists have the No. 17-ranked Cougars in the Big Dance, seeded anywhere from 6 to 8, and that in and of itself is a big deal.
“The Cougars were a dark-horse choice to reach the Sweet 16 before they scored 91 points in Saturday night’s 13-point win over Gonzaga. Now they’re going to be a trendy pick to go even deeper in the NCAA Tournament.” — Jon Rothstein
The Cougars, fresh off a 13-point home win over No. 2 Gonzaga, would be the first BYU team to make the NCAA Tournament since 2015 when a No. 11 seed Cougars squad appeared in the first-four in Dayton, Ohio. That absence from the Big Dance was filled by three trips to the National Invitation Tournament and no postseason games last year.
“The Cougars were a dark-horse choice to reach the Sweet 16 before they scored 91 points in Saturday night’s 13-point win over Gonzaga,” said Jon Rothstein of College Hoops Today.
“Now they’re going to be a trendy pick to go even deeper in the NCAA Tournament. A breathtaking offensive team, BYU shoots 50.3% from the field and 42.3% from 3-point range. The Cougars also average 80.6 points and have three players — Yoeli Childs, Jake Toolson and TJ Haws — that could play anywhere in the country.”
Pope’s deployment of the pick and roll set is considered among the best execution seen in college ball.
That combination of firepower inside and out compares with other Cougars teams that have made a splash historically in the NCAA Tournament. Since the tournament went to 64 or 68 teams, BYU has produced one Elite Eight team in 1981. The Cougars have made the Sweet 16 seven times (1950, 1951, 1957, 1965, 1971, 1981) and 2011 with Jimmer Fredette.
A key component of those successes was inside-outside firepower and elite players.
In 1972 under Stan Watts, a team comprised of Hall of Famer and All-American Kresimir Cosic with guards Doug Richards and Belmont Andersen was ranked No. 9.
In 1981, a Danny Ainge (Player of the Year) team coached by Frank Arnold made the Elite Eight after an iconic win over Notre Dame.
In 1988, a Michael Smith team coached by the late Ladell Andersen achieved a No. 2 ranking, and most recently a hot-shooting team that featured Jimmer Fredette (Player of the Year) and was coached by Dave Rose was ranked as high as No. 3 and made the Sweet 16 nine years ago.
Pope’s elite trio, two of whom (Toolson and Childs) were not slated to be on the roster until Pope got the BYU job last April, have proven high-octane players in this season’s run, which now includes an eight-game win streak and 17-3 record in the last 20 games.
Said Pope, “That’s a tough trio for a lot of people to deal with. They’re grown men and have absolutely no fear of anybody they’re going to play.”
While this Cougars team could certainly lose at Pepperdine Saturday — it was seriously challenged by San Diego and Santa Clara as WCC league play winds down — the three losses in the past 20 came down to a loss at Gonzaga without Childs (broken finger), a one-point loss at San Francisco after having a 14-point lead and a one-point loss at Saint Mary’s in overtime.
But what stands out at this stage of the season is the Cougars did beat the Zags last Saturday night by a convincing 13-point margin and without the services of injured Dalton Nixon.
Gonzaga holds a death grip over WCC foes, including BYU, but that win signaled a significant shift in league teams’ ability to challenge Mark Few’s talented program. BYU’s 91 points were more than any team had scored on the Zags this season, including Michigan (81) and North Carolina (81).
During Saturday’s win, the Pope-led Cougars practically duplicated an iconic historical moment when the Cougars upset San Diego State in the Marriott Center on national TV, culminating in an emotional storming of the court. A year ago, that kind of moment was not on the radar for the Cougars’ program.
In the win over the Zags, BYU’s offensive efficiency was rated at 123.4 and was the highest allowed by Gonzaga all season.
That Cougars win, while still a meager tick on the historical BYU and WCC challenge to Gonzaga’s league armor, gives the Cougars three big wins over Few’s team in the past five seasons. In 2017, BYU beat No. 1-ranked Gonzaga at Spokane, Washington, on Senior Night. In 2015, the Cougars defeated a No. 3-ranked Zags team, and on Saturday, the Cougars took down a Zags team that was ranked No. 2 but had previously achieved a No. 1 ranking and is projected as a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.
This week, Few, speaking to the media in Washington, proclaimed after the BYU loss: “It’s a great message for me, it’s a great message for the rest of our staff. It’s certainly a very strong message to the players ... and it’s a message to our fans. You are not gifted anything.”
BYU athletic director Tom Holmoe tweeted out last Saturday that in the Cougars’ win over Gonzaga, the atmosphere and emotional result was comparable to BYU football’s win over defending national champion Miami in 1990. BYU fan interaction on Instagram was ranked No. 9 in the nation for that week.
What’s up next?
BYU’s 23 wins are two short of tying the last best of Rose’s teams in 2015 of 25 and three wins are needed to tie Rose’s 26-win squad of 2012. It would take a very deep run in the WCC tournament (two games) and NCAA to surpass BYU’s 30 wins in 2010 and 32 in 2011 with Jimmermania.
By almost every matrix (NET 14th; KenPom 17th; BPI 19th; Sagarin 19th; and KPI 26th), and as the nation’s top 3-point shooting team, there is no question this Pope team is special and capable.
But at this stage of the season, on the eve of March Madness, it all boils down to matchups. BYU has shown that certain teams with athletic guards who can get to the rim can cause issues.
But when you have a team like BYU that is more than capable of hitting a dozen 3-point shots in any given game, it is the great equalizer and a kind of trump card.
In postseason play at the college level, it also is imperative to have guard play that can take over a game at critical moments or when the shot clock winds down. In Haws, Toolson and even with Alex Barcello’s 49% accuracy from distance (51 of 104), Pope definitely has those weapons.