There is only one top-10 matchup on Saturday’s schedule — a non-league showdown in Seattle between two big brands. On one side, Kentucky. On the other, Gonzaga.
Tip is scheduled for 10 p.m. ET.
The game is providing a Q1 opportunity for both programs. Making it even more compelling is the fact that it’s a matchup between two coaches who have become friends over the years; UK’s Mark Pope told a nice story earlier this week when discussing Saturday’s counterpart.
“I’ve got to know Coach [Few] pretty well,” Pope said. “He’s been a great friend. He’s one of the best people in the business. Special person. I’ll never forget, my first head-coaching job at Utah Valley, we did a buy game at Gonzaga [in November 2016], and I had known Coach as an assistant, and so we went up there to play. It got away from us like you would expect it would at the end. So we’re there, you’re early in your coaching career, you’re trying to collect yourself in the locker room after the media and everything. I finally walk out of the locker room, and Coach Few is … there’s nobody left in the building, and Coach Few is just waiting there to talk.
“That’s just who he is, man,” Pope continued. “He’s just really special — and what he’s done in basketball has been almost unfathomable. And I love him. He puts together unique teams, a unique product every single year. He’s so good. He’s got a really distinctive style. They know exactly who they are. You can almost take the names off the jerseys and you would [still] know you’re watching a Gonzaga game by the way they play.”
That’s obviously high praise for Few, who really has done unfathomable things at Gonzaga — a private, small, Jesuit school in Washington that had won exactly one game in the NCAA Tournament before Few replaced Dan Monson after the 1998-99 season. Since then, Few has completed 25 seasons at Gonzaga, never missed the NCAA Tournament and advanced to two national title games while appearing in nine straight Sweet 16s. This is all stuff that might never be duplicated once Few, now 61, decides to conclude a career that will someday be recognized by the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame.
Kentucky is No. 6 in Saturday morning’s updated CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 daily college basketball rankings. Gonzaga is No. 8. The Zags are listed as 6.5-point favorites against UK, according to FanDuel Sportsbook.