No. 3 Zags give up late lead, get outclassed by West Virginia in OT

PARADISE ISLAND, Bahamas — Three time zones away and 3,000 miles from home, a Gonzaga team that hadn’t faced much resistance in its first five games of the season finally came across some choppy water in Wednesday’s opener against West Virginia at the Battle 4 Atlantis.

Turbulence arrived early for Gonzaga and followed the nation’s third-ranked team through 40 minutes of regulation — and five more in overtime — before the Bulldogs were left staring at a deficit too large to overcome in the final minute of an 86-78 upset loss to the Mountaineers at Imperial Arena.

The result sets up a matchup many expected to see on Thanksgiving Day in the Bahamas, albeit not in the loser’s bracket, with Gonzaga (5-1) facing No. 14 Indiana (4-1) at 11:30 a.m. after former GU center Oumar Ballo and the Hoosiers were trounced by Louisville 89-61 in an earlier game Wednesday.

A first-place trophy at the Battle 4 Atlantis was still in play for Gonzaga with 25 seconds left in regulation.

In a game that featured 14 lead changes, the Zags hadn’t met their standard on either end of the floor, but still had control of a 71-66 lead thanks to a timely scoring flurry from Braden Huff inside.

From there, it was one miscue after another for Gonzaga, which gave up a long 3-pointer to Tucker DeVries and turned it over on the following possession. With his feet straddling the halfcourt line, Nolan Hickman narrowly avoided a 10-second backcourt violation, but couldn’t hold off defensive pressure from DeVries, who picked the ball away from the Gonzaga guard and drew a foul driving to the basket.

“That game came down to kind of execution at the end,” Gonzaga coach Mark Few said.

“I just should’ve jumped up there and used that timeout when we sat there struggling against the press. That one was on me.”

DeVries’ free throws tied the game at 71 with 5.9 seconds left and Gonzaga’s Khalif Battle lost possession of the ball while driving at the hoop, sending the Bulldogs to their first overtime since a 2022-23 loss at Saint Mary’s.

“We wanted (Battle) going downhill,” Few said.

Downhill would also be an apt way to describe Gonzaga’s play at both ends once the overtime period started.

Unable to funnel the offense through Huff — the strategy that rescued GU down the stretch of regulation — the Zags went stagnant, shooting just 2-of-10 from the field and 0-of-4 from the 3-point line in overtime.

During the same stretch, West Virginia made 3-of-5 field-goal attempts and continued to get to the foul line, making 9-of-10 shots .

“They executed, we messed up some switches, we weren’t very connected defensively and then we had some trouble scoring,” Gonzaga’s Ryan Nembhard said. “They were just a better team in overtime. We have to learn from this. We have two more games (and) we’ve got to flush this one and move on to the next two.”

Huff, whose 30 minutes doubled the total of starting forward Graham Ike, scored 19 points to lead the Zags and made 9-of-14 shots from the field.

Ike struggled in 14 minutes, scoring just five points on 1-of-6 shooting from the field. Battle scored 16 and Hickman added 13 for Gonzaga. Nembhard had 12 assists and just one turnover, but GU’s point guard struggled from the field, going 1-of-10.

Javon Small had a game-high 31 points for the Mountaineers, making 9-of-18 shots from the field. He also hit 4-of-10 from the 3-point line and 9-of-11 from the free-throw line.

Most of Small’s production came in the second half after the transfer guard scored just eight points on 1-of-6 shooting from the floor during the opening half.

He followed with 18 points in the second half and five in overtime.

DeVries, the son of WVU’s head coach, also overcame a slow start on the offensive end to finish with 16 points, six rebounds, four blocks and four assists. The Mountaineers’ Amani Hansberry scored a career-high 19 points and pulled down eight rebounds.

“Really, our entire game plan was to not make this a transition game,” first-year WVU coach Darian DeVries said. “As much as we love to run, this was a game where we just thought they were better at it than us and we needed to find a different strategy if we wanted to come out on top tonight.

“I thought our guys did a great job really throughout both halves of really trying to control the tempo and play at the pace we wanted to play.”

Gonzaga’s loss was the sixth this season by a team ranked inside the top five of the AP Top 25 poll. According to ESPN’s Jeff Borzello, that’s the third most in a season before December since the AP poll debuted in 1948-49.