No late game lead, no problem for this year’s confident Zags
BOISE, Idaho — It was closer than most thought it would be, a 13-seed looking for the upset against a 4-seed, but what prevented the Cinderella UNGC story? The confidence Gonzaga has down the stretch.
With a two point lead with under two minutes remaining Thursday morning, the Josh Perkins stepped up to nail a deep two-point jumper early in the shot clock, tying the game.
Then, after a very tough shooting night, redshirt freshman Zach Norvell Jr. drilled a three to take the lead, one example of the numerous times Gonzaga has proved their resiliency in adversity.
“We always stick together and we always do what we can to have confidence in each other ourselves and in our system,” said Kispert. “And i had a thought in the back of my mind and new we were going to pull it out and i really thought we did.”
“It wasn’t tough,” said Perkins. “We’ve been there before and we knew that it’s March. Anything can happen and you never know when adversity can hit and I’m just glad we stuck with it and stuck together and that’s what matters in times like this.”
An Ohio State rematch coming up for the Zags on Saturday after the Buckeyes went down to the wire with South Dakota State in their first-round matchup.
COPYRIGHT 2023 BY KXLY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.
