Congrats everybody, we did it. We made it.
Welcome to March, and the spoils that accompany it.
Each week during the year, we’ll talk about three games on the weekend slate—one you have to see, one you have to keep an eye on and one you should avoid at all costs. And it turns out, it’s all worth watching now, because [altogether now] it’s March basketball.
As always, the weekend begins at 7 p.m. ET on Friday. Apologies to a deeply interesting Arkansas State visit to Appalachian State.
Must Watch (Times ET)
No. 23 Gonzaga at No. 17 Saint Mary’s (10 p.m., Saturday, ESPN)
There are better matchups on paper, and we’ll touch on those in the honorable mentions. There are a lot of ranked-on-ranked meetings this weekend, and they matter for a lot of reasons—seeding in the conference tournament, potential slotting in the NCAA Tournament, burnishing resumes for awards and the postseason alike—and that is all well and good.
But only the one in Moraga features the sort of raw, searing hatred that makes college sports so special sometimes, with some pretty enticing stakes to match.
Saint Mary’s clinched the outright WCC title with Thursday’s win against Pepperdine, and that was historic enough; no one in the WCC had an outright regular season title to their credit outside of Gonzaga since the Gaels 2012 crown. Saturday, the Gaels could do something Gonzaga has done six times this century and no other WCC team has done since Pepperdine in 1992—go unbeaten in league play.
And I’m sure that will not weigh on the minds of any of the principals involved at all, including Mark Few and Randy Bennett. Basketball teams and coaches never consider historical context at all; they are only concerned about the next team on the schedule1.