© Gonzaga plays at BYU for the first time as a conference foe of the Cougars (Photo: SWX)SPOKANE, Wash. -
Separated by a single game for first place in the West Coast Conference, Gonzaga and BYU will settle things on the court Thursday night in Provo.
The Bulldogs and Cougars have been eyeing each other all season long. At one point they were both in the AP top 25: Gonzaga was at No. 22. BYU was No. 23. Even still, the two teams are neck-and-neck in the conference standings, and with just a few more games to go the title is still there for the taking.
"It's not necessarily the game we've been looking forward to because it's always 'one game at a time', but now that it's here I hope it's something our team is really excited for," said head coach Kelly Graves.
"It's huge," said point guard Taelor Karr. "every game from here on out gets bigger and bigger and more important. BYU is a great team. We know that coming in. We're really going to have to play a lot better defense than we have been playing lately, and really stay with our team chemistry and work our offense."
Gonzaga has won the past seven West Coast Conference regular season championships. BYU would love nothing more than to spoil the streak in this, their first year in the conference. The Zags are 10-1. The Cougars are 9-2.
Thursday's game starts at 6 p.m. and will televised on BYUtv.
