Gonzaga Basketball: Zag Shop (Thrift Shop Parody)

Two things have been taking the US by storm lately, Gonzaga basketball and the song Thrift Shop. Well it was only a matter of time until someone would combine them!

(Click here to get on the Gonzaga bandwagon now)

Why the Zags at No. 1 is a big deal

After surviving BYU and crushing Portland this weekend, the Zags did what they needed to do and they were rewarded handsomely.

Gonzaga is No. 1 for the first time in school history, and unlike having to play any more regular season games - the move right into the WCC Tournament.

Why is this such a big deal?

Spokane usually doesn't get to lead the country in anything except for weird street people that like to ask for money and mumble to themselves. The town will go absolutely nuts and they deserve it since they live and die with their Zags.

Playing in the WCC, Gonzaga is the definition of a mid-major. While a No. 1 mid-major squad has happened before, it's still amazing for someone that doesn't play in the big 6 conferences to get the nod. Look at how the Zags have been chewing up the WCC and it's in stark contrast from years past where Gonzaga was eeking by these opponents and then wondering why they didn't get respect from the national media. They're impressive, if not the most impressive version of the Zags I've seen.

What does this mean? Probably a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament, which practically means a trip to the Sweet 16 (probability wise). The Zags have never gotten any further than the Elite Eight and it looks like that this season Gonzaga might be able to go further.

Is this the year the Zags make the leap?

(Click here to get on the bandwagon now)

Gonzaga heading to No. 1?

Spokane is about to implode on itself from the combined weight of it becoming the center of the college basketball universe. First, Gonzaga was recently ranked No. 2 in the AP Poll, and last night the No. 1 team Indiana lost to Minnesota 77-73, which means the Zags could be looking at their first No. 1 ranking in school history. 

Now there is a chance they could get leap-frogged by Miami or Duke, but considering they've been ranked as high as No. 2 already and receiving first place votes, you'd think the voters would also give them the nod for No. 1. 

But hold on, Gonzaga still has to win their games this week to be considered. And it won't be easy.

Coming up, the Zags travel down to Utah to face 20-9 Brigham Young on Thursday, then on Saturday will host the 11-19 Portland Pilots. They might be a little slowed from travel to BYU in the Portland game.

If they win those two, expect the Zags to be No. 1 and be shocked if they aren't.  

Gonzaga No. 2 in the AP Polls

At 27-2 overall and 14-0 in the West Coast Conference, the Gonzaga Bulldogs are having one of their best, if not the best, seasons in school history. They just got another cherry on the top as the new NCAA rankings have come out and Gonzaga is ranked at No. 2 behind Indiana. Spokane must be exploding at the seams right now.

Gonzaga becomes the first team outside the major six conferences to be ranked in the top two since Memphis was No. 2 in the final poll of 2007-08, a span of 92 AP polls.

"It establishes us as a national program, which I believe we have been for the last 10 years," Few said. "This group has done a great job of competing at that level, winning games at the highest level."

Now usually I'd go into an age-old rant of how Gonzaga plays in a weak conference and blah, blah, blah. But they're actually a really good team this year and I wouldn't be suprised to see them move up to No. 1. So there you have it, the Bulldogs might actually get a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Shocking.

(To hop on the Gonzaga bandwagon, go here.)

RUHT ROW! Somebody give the Zags some Scooby Snacks

With St. Mary's losing to Loyola Marymount, all Gonzaga had to do was win out and they would at least have a share of the title. However, after last night's loss to San Francisco, the Zags have blown it.

What does this  loss mean? Basically Gonzaga no longer controls its destiny to win the WCC regular season title. They need St. Mary's to lose. If they don't win the regular season title, that means their resume for the NCAA Tournament might take a hit. If it takes a hit, that means they're going to have to do good in the WCC Tournament in order to go dancing. If they go one and done at the conference postseason tournament... Spokane might be idle this March.

They host BYU in the Kennel on Feb. 23, and if they lose that game, their NCAA hopes could take a bigger dip. That's four conference losses. That's a WCC team that haven't beat in the regular season and could be facing in the postseason tournament. I'm not saying that Gonzaga's season is over, but it's hanging by a thread at the moment and some late season losses could put them over the edge.

Angry mob threatens Rooney

Wayne Rooney spoke earlier this week about how he desired to leave Manchester United. However about 30 crazy Europe soccer fans disagreed with his statement:

An angry mob in front of Wayne Rooney's home has threatened his life if he leaves Manchester United, according to The Telegraph in England.

Cheshire police were called to his mansion during the night as the crowd outside screamed out chants including, 'Join Man[chester] City and you die.'

The police had to be called and the mob dispersed.

A very similar event happened when Brandon announced that he was leaving Spokane for Polson. However the mob was "the Kennel" from Gonzaga University and instead of threatening him to stay, they escorted him to the Idaho border.

Campus Rail Jam Tour 2010

I was cruising around the internet today looking at snowboarding stuff. Why? Because everyone was talking about Shawn White and the Olympics today.

Anyway, I came across this site about Campus Rail Jam 2010. And imagine my surprise to see which schools they are going to but none other than Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington on March 18. (Why they didn't choose Eastern is beyond me. I mean seriously, Eastern is getting red football turf)

The site was pretty neat and the event seems like a lot of fun. Their first stop was the University of Arizona. Yes, Arizona of all places for snow. But I guess that if Vancouver can bring in truckloads of snow for the Olympics, why couldn't U of A bring in a few loads for a rail jam.

You can follow this link to view video from the event in Arizona. The female host is super annoying, but snowboarding in the heat and sun looks like fun.

(This is from Just Northwest)

Video Bites: Gonzaga Bulldogs

The December 28th edition of the JustSON Video Bites! That's right, bite-sized videos!

View more of our adventures at http://justson.blogspot.com

Contact us at justsouthofnorth@gmail.com

Eastern Eagles
CLICK HERE

Sounders FC Blog
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Epic Video: Barats and Bereta

A new video from those amazing Gonzaga grads, Barats and Bereta. They're the 2nd best thing to come out of the Spokane region. The 1st of course being the Northern Rangers.

This is a sketch from our unaired pilot "This Is Culdesac" for NBC. It's one of many sketches that made it into the show. Enjoy!

Gonzaga not in Top 25

Uh-oh Zag fans. No respect I tell you. No respect!

Gonzaga came in 34th, receiving 24 votes, in the ESPN/USA Today (coaches) preseason Top 25. Kansas is No. 1, followed by Michigan State (Gonzaga visits East Lansing on Nov. 17th).

Of the eight schools in the Maui Invitational, No. 26 Maryland, No. 30 Vanderbilt and GU were in the receiving votes category. Arizona, Wisconsin and Cincinnati didn’t receive one vote. Gonzaga also faces No. 8 Duke and No. 16 Oklahoma, as well as three other teams receiving votes (No. 27 Illinois, Wake Forest and Memphis).

Actually, I shudder to think was Eastern Washington's national ranking is.

10 pickup lines that never work

So Casey and I have had our far share of experiences sampling the various bars around the Spokane area. It's here where we've sharpened our skills to become masters of night life.

"Why are we sitting at a table to one leg shorter than the other?"

"Why are we in the corner by ourselves"

"Why is Lindsey not sitting with us?"

"Lets go home and play Halo."

It was during this time that we discovered the top ten pickup lines that will never, ever work.

1. I play for the Seattle Mariners - Unless your last name in Junior or Suzuki, you're not getting any baseball groupies. They're too busy going after the Spokane Indians and Spokane Shock players.

2. Want to see my Transformer's lunch box? Insert Justin Timberlake's "Dick in a box" joke here.

3. I was the top player at Laser Quest today, yeah I had 60 percent accuracy shooting. You know what I like to do after I do battle, yeah, I like to mate. You might want to take off the Laser Quest gear before taking a crack at this line.

4. I'm a Gonzaga student. That would explain the festive sweater vest and the backwards University of North Carolina cap.

5. I'm an Eastern Washington University student. Think you can pick up my tab?

6. I want to kiss you like A-Rod kisses himself. Do you do HGH?

7. I bowl better than the president. I might even be able to bowl in the regular people Olympics.

8. I'm a Jedi Master in bed. In other words, call me Darth Virgin.

9. Put your number on my board, Yes! Your chances at getting her number are fly, fly away!

10. I'm a ginger. Absolute worst pickup line. ever.

Epic Photo: Duke sucks, well we hope Duke sucks tonight

Duke tips off tonight again Villanova in the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA Tournament and we hope they lose (Well just me, I don't know about Casey, his fiancee is a Denver Broncos fan... you never know). Just look at the photo up there? How can you root for a team that looks like a collection of players that should be matching up in chess matches.

By the way, if you watch this game on CBS - look in the stands for Villanova fans because apparently they all look like Paulie from the "Rocky" movies. No joke. Even the women.

And don't forget Gonzaga tomorrow. I certainly won't pass up the opportunity to bash them any way I can. They already proved me wrong like three times this year. Will they continue to make me look like a complete idiot?

Epic Video: The slipper still fits!

Since it's NCAA Tournament time, I thought I'd give all you Gonzaga fans a treat from that magical 1999 run. Those were the days...

Scouting the Akron Zips

It's tournament time again for Gonzaga, and due to their relatively high seeding (4) they'll be playing a team some of you may not of heard of, the Akron Zips.

RECORD: 23-12
SEED: 13
LOCATION: 207, 934 (which is very Spokane-ish)

INTERESTING FACTS:
- The university's mascot is "Zippy", a kangaroo. Zippy is one of only a few female college mascots in the United States.
- Their main rival in football is Kent State University.
- This is the Zips first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1986.
- Their soccer team was once ranked No. 1 in the nation.
- Casey likes Kangaroos.
- Jeremy Pargo eats Kangaroos.
- Their football stadium is called the Rubber Bowl. Not sure if they'll change it to the Trojan Bowl.
- The Zips have competed in the NCAA Division III, II and became a Division I member in 1980.
- Head coach Keith Dambrot coached Lebron James when he was the head coach at St. Vincent - St. Mary High School.

So with those facts and tidbits, we're sure we've now convinced you to pick the Zips in your NCAA bracket. Okay that may be a lie. Does Patty Mills play for them?

Things that the WCC is good at

(1) Losing to Gonzaga
(2) Awarding the Conference MVP trophy to somebody that looks like Chunk from the Goonies.
(3) Having the conference tournament in Las Vegas which totally fits in with the whole Private Catholic School setting.
(4) Producing NBA point guards that kick butt.
(5) Producing NBA players with terrible fashion sense.
(6) Always there for a good laugh.

Where are all the college baseball fans?

Football and basketball rule the pocketbooks of universities, and rightly so, they attract thousands upon thousands of fans.

But what about college baseball?

It's been relegated to a status lower than minor league baseball even though it has produced some of the game's brightest stars.

I would assume that college baseball hasn't quiet earned the respect that football and basketball have because:

1. Minor and major league baseball tickets are much more affordable than their football and basketball counterparts, and games are much more frequent, so why go to a college game when you can usually find the pros playing in a town near you (Seriously, they have a minor-league team in Missoula, that means there HAS to be a town near you.)

2. Think it's bad now in college basketball with kids going one and done? The much less-important MLB draft has a pretty strong mixture of high school and college prospects. And here's the catch - probably the most talented kids go directly to the minor leagues but that doesn't necessarily mean that they'll be a success in the pros - but the risk could prove to be a huge payoff. So college baseball loses some of its best young prospects to the draft and then the college kids who get drafted, usually end up in the minor leagues and once they actually make the big leagues you've forgotten they've even played in college.

3. It's baseball, there's no big singular game like football that causes Lou Holtz to spit out his dentures. It's a season-long process and no one pays attention until Super Regionals and the College World Series.

So for the most part, college baseball takes a back seat and that's why some major schools don't even have baseball programs. Which is a shame - I remember feeling cheated when EWU didn't have a NCAA baseball program after being a Pac-10 member in the 1980s.

Perhaps its this feeling that has caused Casey and I to go baseball crazy. Casey is interested in the University of Oregon's baseball team, and I'll definitely keep you updated with the Cougs, Zags and Whitworth.

And don't forget the Spokane Indians and Riverhawks too. We'll cover them with weekly updates as well.

How I'm entertaining myself in this sports depression

This is the absolute worst time of the year for a sports fan. Football is over. Baseball is still months away. Basketball is in its mid-season lull and ESPN starts showing indoor high school track meets.

So I've been passing the time doing these things.

1. Rooting against Gonzaga. After squeaking by San Francisco (a team that has only one win in the WCC Conference) by five points, I've decided that if I wanted to root for a team that's uninspired, unathletic and going to lose in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, I'll become a Duke Fan.

(By the way, last night at the All-Star bar in the Spokane Valley, some of my friends and I were taking in the NBA Skills Competition on the 20+ big screens at the establishment. One thing about the NBA is they certainly know how to do All-Star weekend, better than football and baseball, and the dunk contest was absolutely amazing.

First, we had Dwight Howard dunking on an 11-foot hoop after changing into a cape and small jersey in a phone booth, and then we had for UW star Nate Robinson don a green jersey, shoes and basketball to dunk over Howard and win the slam dunk competition. Wow. What a show.

However, midway through the competition, the bar changed the channel over on most of the screens they had to the game before the Gonzaga-USF matchup. That would Texas State vs. Lamar. This was a good 15 minutes before the Zag game started, obviously a ploy to appease the Gonzaga fans gathering in the bar. We were forced to the "small" flat screen in the corner of the bar to watch the dunk contest. We eventually started rooting for Texas State and Lamar to go into overtime just to piss off Gonzaga fans. It was close but Texas State edged Lamar 71-67 in regulation.

And then once the Zag game started, my friends and I started rooting for USF because Gonzaga fans feel the need to clap, cheer and whoop everytime their team scored points a few minutes into the game against one of the worst team in the WCC. They're hopeless. They're pathetic. They don't realize their team is bad.)

2. Reading Spring Training Tid Bits like this... "New closer Francisco Rodriguez arrived Saturday and jumped right into the Mets-Phillies rivalry, proclaiming New York "the team to beat" this year thanks to a revamped bullpen that includes setup man J.J. Putz, an All-Star closer in 2007 with Seattle." - ESPN.com

AHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA... K-Rob is going to have some issues picking up all those saves when his team trails by three runs thanks to the middle relief of Putz. Did the Mets watch any film of Putz in 2008? Guess not.

3. Getting ready for a tryout with the Spokane Shock. Remember a couple days ago when I said I hated has-been high school athletes who complain about the professionals. Well, this is all you guys' chances to prove me wrong by trying to make the roster of an af2 team. What's that? You don't like Arena Football? It's more athletic than sitting on the couch complaining about Shaq's free throw form.

4. Paying respect to the WSU Cougars season. After their loss to the Oregon State Beavers last night its going to be tough for them to make it to the post-season outside of the Pac-10 Tournament. Which stinks, because I'd rather watch them than Gonzaga.

Whitworth Weekly Update: Way too many cats!

One thing the Whitworth Pirates aren't is overrated, unlike some other cross-town college basketball teams, cough, Gonzaga, cough.

You see, Gonzaga has what you would say is a cat problem. They've got too many cats in the house to make them feel better about themselves. Their are way too many homer fans and media members that pander to the Zags every move until Tournament time, then they exit early. Wowee.

But at least they don't have 118 Cats. Like this couple had in trailer park.

It took three hours for about 15 masked workers and police officers to remove 118 cats from a couple's reeking home in the Lowry Grove Mobile Home Park in St. Anthony on Tuesday.

Another dozen or so cats couldn't be captured because they were hiding in mounds of dolls and debris in the trailer and will have to be live-trapped, said Keith Streff, senior investigator of the Animal Humane Society in Golden Valley. One cat escaped and three were left with the couple, the limit permitted by city ordinance.

Authorities have seen such cases before.

The woman fits the classic profile of an obsessive-compulsive animal hoarder, "which is sad for both animals and owners," Streff said. In 2002, Humane Society workers removed 72 cats from the same couple's residence when they lived in Coon Rapids, he said.

So you heard it hear first. Gonzaga University is like that cat lady. They had obsessive compulsive fan disorder, which leads to their Final Four hopes stinking like urine and tuna.

But moving on to the Whitworth men's basketball, they play three roads games in the next five days with the marquee matchup against league-leading Puget Sound. Currently the Pirates are tied for second in the conference with 17-4 overall and 7-3 league mark, so a win over the top team would definitely do well for the rest of the season. A sweep of the weekend would put them in very good shape heading into the postseason tournament.

And even though this is the third highest win total under head coach Jim Hayford's tenure, you wont hear a big fuss about it. Such is the life of a Division III program.

Luckily they don't have cats though.

UConn is pretty good

So No. 2 UConn put the hurt on No. 8 Gonzaga today 88-83 in overtime, Eastern Washington lost by 30 points to Washington and WSU plays Idaho tomorrow.

Can't hardly wait.

The Zags had a full crowd at Key Arena behind them but it wasn't enough as the Huskies turned up the defense in the waning seconds of regulation and overtime. Pargo couldn't seem to be able to hold onto the ball either. All Gonzaga's three point shooters fouled out when they really needed them.

All in all, it wasn't the greatest outings for the Zags and they only lost by five points to second-best team in the country. You can't be too discouraged, this is a talented team, they're just going to need to play better under pressure.

With the game on the line, they fell apart. Does that sound familiar? Anyone remember Adam Morrison crying at center court, because I do. However, I think this team is considerably better than that Sweet Sixteen Squad.

Once they get rolling in the WCC schedule, they'll get into the perfect attitude for the NCAA Tournament.

... and I really don't want to talk about the Eagles right now.

Reasons why you're still single...

You watched the entire broadcast of No. 7 Gonzaga's 84-42 victory over Texas Southern.

... and you thought it was more intriguing than the Zags-WSU blowout.