Gonzaga arrived at Climate Pledge Arena on Saturday night for a neutral-site rematch with Seattle U, this time playing in front of a crowd that leaned heavily Redhawk red. The building was loud, even if a sizable portion of the city’s sports attention was likely tied up a few blocks away with the Seahawks dismantling the 49ers. The bigger development, though, landed before the opening tip. Starting center Graham Ike was ruled out with ankle soreness suffered in Wednesday’s win over Washington State, leaving Gonzaga without either member of its elite frontcourt and turning the night into an immediate stress test for Mark Few’s depth chart.
The Zags ultimately won 71-50, and shockingly, looked even sharper than the version of this team Seattle U dragged into overtime two weeks ago. This time, playing without either offensive anchor, the Zags stepped up and comfortably beat the spread.
Gonzaga cycled through nearly every rotation combination on the board by halftime. Noah Haaland logged minutes at the four. Jalen Warley slid into small-ball center duty. Even redshirt freshman Parker Jefferson was suited up on the bench as an emergency option if the rotation reached true crisis mode. The question entering the night centered on who would step forward in Ike and Huff’s absence. The answer came collectively: a full-roster defensive commitment and enough offense from enough places to either keep the game within reach or walk out of Seattle with a win.
Seattle U entered the night at 13-6 and already had proof it could go toe-to-toe with even a fully healthy Gonzaga. That context makes this performance even more encouraging. Short-handed and forced into experimentation, the Zags looked more energized, more physical, and played with far more urgency than they did when these teams last met.
With Braden Huff sidelined for the next 4-8 weeks with a left knee injury and Graham Ike joining him on the inactive list, sophomore Ismaila Diagne stepped into the starting lineup and logged his first real minutes of the season. He finished the half with seven rebounds, five of them on the offensive glass, and made a clear defensive impact through sheer physical presence. Offensively, his role was almost invisible. Diagne attempted only two shots and rarely even looked at the rim, kicking the ball back out of coverages that Ike and Huff routinely punish with footwork and touch. Gonzaga effectively played four-on-five in the half court whenever Seattle U loaded up on the perimeter.
That physical edge showed up on the defensive end across the roster. Gonzaga set the tone early, holding the Redhawks under 35 percent from the field and forcing nine turnovers on six steals. Jalen Warley again served as the ignition switch, blowing up dribble handoffs, jumping passing lanes, and diving after every 50-50 ball in sight.
Freshman Davis Fogle also logged extended minutes in the frontcourt, where his defensive motor showed through constant ball pressure and the ability to use his length to pin ball handlers in space. Offensively, he was quiet to begin things, but would go on to warm up real quick.
It was Mario Saint Supery that carried Gonzaga’s offense for long stretches in the first half, attacking downhill and finishing the half with 9 points on 3-of-4 shooting. Gonzaga struggled to generate anything from deep, with Steele Venters and Adam Miller both missing some clean, in-rhythm looks that usually stretch a defense. It was another tough half for Tyon Grant-Foster, who could not buy a whistle on his drives, absorbed contact on nearly every attack, and still found a way to end the half with a baseline alley-oop that brought the bench to its feet.
They tried to build out a comfortable cushion, but every Gonzaga push met an immediate response. The Redhawks hit timely jumpers, applied steady pressure to Gonzaga’s thin frontcourt, and kept the game within reach the entire half. On one hand it was immensely reassuring to watch this group maintain its edge without its two most essential scorers. On the other, it felt like the wheels could come off at any moment if Seattle started connecting from outside or really working on the Zags’ thin and undersized frontcourt.
After 20 minutes, Gonzaga led by eight and had passed the first real stress test of its depth, carrying urgency and edge into the locker room.
The second half opened in a deep freeze. Gonzaga and Seattle U combined to miss their first six three-point attempts over the opening three minutes, with both teams clearly trying to speed the game up and generate early offense while struggling to convert anything clean. The pace was there. The buckets were not.
Then Mario Saint-Supery flipped the switch.
By the ten minute mark of the second half, Saint-Supery had drilled a pair of deep threes, handed out a pair of quick assists, and singlehandedly turned the game from a slog into a track meet. First came another alley-oop lob to Tyon Grant-Foster. Then a baseline drop-off to Davis Fogle for a thunderous dunk. Possession by possession, he pulled Gonzaga out of the mud and dragged the offense into rhythm.
One theme never changed, though. Gonzaga could not buy a whistle at the rim. Grant-Foster kept attacking off the bounce and kept getting sent to the floor without a call. A couple of the landings looked brutal, downright dangerous. The frustration was visible but he kept on pushing, possession after possession. That’s Tyon in a nutshell.
With Warley, Saint-Supery, Fogle, Grant-Foster, and Emmanuel Innocenti on the floor, Gonzaga finally found a lineup that could push the offensive pace and still execute the defense on the other end. The group ran off a surge that ballooned the lead to 16 with six minutes left, scoring from everywhere, owning the glass to finish possessions, and closing off the perimeter on the other end.
From there, things got really fun. Positionless basketball. Opportunistic cuts. Relentless pressure. Hard rebounds. A point guard playing with his foot on the gas and scorers looking for their own shots all over the floor. Gonzaga even dusted off the rare Saint-Supery–Braeden Smith pairing to close the game, freeing Mario to keep attacking off the ball while Smith handled the table-setting.
Fogle and Warley kept doing Fogle and Warley things in the game’s final stretch. Fogle finished with 14 points, six rebounds, and three steals. Warley added 14 points of his own, went 4-of-5 at the line, and filled the box score with six rebounds, four assists, and four steals. Tyon Grant-Foster finished with nine points and nine rebounds in 25 minutes off the bench. But if had gotten the calls he should have been at the rim he would have comfortably finished in double figures.
But this one belonged to Saint-Supery.
“El Principito” finished the night with 20 points in 24 minutes. He knocked down three of his five attempts from deep, dished four assists, grabbed two steals, and sparked the stretch that finally broke the game open.
Seattle U came in with a frontcourt built to punish teams inside: conference shot-blocking leader Will Heimbrodt, a true seven-footer in Austin Maurer, and a 6’10” center in Houran Dan coming off the bench. And yet, somehow, even without its starting frontcourt, the Zags won the rebounding battle 44-24, grabbed 13 offensive boards to Seattle’s six, outscored the Redhawks 40-24 in the paint, and held Seattle’s starting power forward to 1-for-10 shooting.
Even more impressively, they did it on a night when Steele Venters and Adam Miller combined to shoot 1-for-8 from the field and finished with as many turnovers as rebounds. The Zags played without their starting frontcourt, got three total points from its veteran deep threats, and had to rely on a walk-on for big first half minutes. They still won. By a lot.
The margin came from first from its defense, pace, and ball pressure, and later from the speed and chaos of a lineup of rangy three-level scoring threats all built to get buckets. It came from Warley blowing up possessions, from Saint-Supery bending the game with speed, from Davis Fogle flying around on both ends, from Grant-Foster refusing to stop attacking. It came from a group that never lost its edge even when the whistle refused to cooperate.
This was a banged-up team, on the road, without its two most essential players, playing against a big and physical frontcourt that had already proven it could push Gonzaga to the brink. And the Zags responded with urgency, physicality, and composure. Gonzaga played small against a big team and won the paint. That alone makes this one different.
There are plenty of wins that look good on a résumé, but this one felt foundational. This was a gutsy, gutsy win from an extremely deep and dangerous team.
