The 2023 University Credit Union West Coast Conference Tournament championship game featured the two top teams in the conference: second-seeded Gonzaga and top-seeded Saint Mary's. The first two matchups lived up to the hype, with both teams winning on their home floors in the regular season, including an overtime thriller in Moraga.

Tuesday's championship game had less drama, as Gonzaga pulled ahead early and captured their fourth-straight WCC championship by beating the Gaels 77-51. Saint Mary's is now 26-7 heading into the NCAA Tournament.
 
HOW IT STARTED
It did not take long for the Gaels to fall into a hole, after it took both teams more than three minutes to score. About 4:30 minutes into the game, Gonzaga opened up a 9-0 run that quickly made it 14-4 in favor of the Bulldogs. Saint Mary's then pulled within seven points after a layup from Aidan Mahaney and two successful free throws from Logan Johnson, but then Gonzaga widened the gap. With just 6:30 remaining in the half, it was a 28-12 Gonzaga lead, and after holding the Gaels scoreless in the final 3:12 of the first half, Gonzaga made it 37-19 at the break.
 
STAR REPORT
Under the brightest lights, Gonzaga saw their stars have great games while Saint Mary's lacked a true standout performance from their stars. Drew Timme was the best player on the floor, scoring 18 points and grabbing six rebounds. Three other Bulldogs had at least 10 points (Smith – 14, Hickman – 12, Strawther – 10) while Anton Watson was one point shy of a double-double. On the flip side, Saint Mary's got a late surge from Johnson to finish the game with 20 points (game-best), including the final 14 points for Saint Mary's. Alex Ducas was the only other Gael with 10 points (named to the All-Tournament team), as it was quiet nights for Aidan Mahaney (seven points) and Mitchell Saxen (five points).
 
AMONG OTHER NUMBERS
The 51 points scored by the Gaels are the fewest that Saint Mary's has scored in a game in the WCC Tournament since the 2013 championship game…Gonzaga dominated in every statistic on the night, with none more than field goal percentage telling the story: Gonzaga shot 58% while holding Saint Mary's to just 33.3%…it was another solid game for Jefferson against the Bulldogs, finishing the game with seven points, three rebounds, a block, and a steal…ordinarily great in the paint and at limiting teams to few assists, SMC did not have strong nights in those areas, dropping the points in the paint battle 36-24 and trailing in assists 17-8.
 
QUOTABLES
"I'm glad we finished the game the way we did in the last four minutes. Logan made some plays. I thought Alex competed the whole way…he might not have had great numbers, but I thought he did really compete…it's not a guy, it's a team deal. We got to play better as a team. We need to go back to practice and we'll go from there. But we have to get better. We didn't play the last 15 minutes last night and we didn't play until the last four minutes tonight." – head coach, Randy Bennett
 
"From one to ten, you're out there and you have a job to do, and through one to ten, we didn't do that. That shows, obviously in the score, but we're a lot better than that. All we can do is bounce back and hopefully when we get the next opportunity we'll show what we are capable of." – Logan Johnson
 
UP NEXT
Saint Mary's will now await Selection Sunday on March 12 to find out where they are playing in the NCAA Tournament.