Under Mark Few, Gonzaga is 43-24 in the NCAA Tournament and an impressive 21-3 in the first round. But as I mentioned earlier, at least in recent history, Gonzaga has been a high seed, so we would expect them to stroll into the second round more often than not. Let's break down Gonzaga's tournament performance under Few in different seed tiers.
When I think NCAA tournament seeding, I think of the seeds in seven different buckets based on their likelihood of winning their first round game. For the unfamiliar, in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, 1 seeds play 16 seeds, 2 seeds play 15 seeds, and so on down to 8 seeds playing 9 seeds.
Gonzaga has never been lower than a 12 seed in the NCAA Tournament under Few, so we can ignore the bottom two seed tiers. We'll go through the other five in order beginning with those Gonzaga teams that entered their first round game as heavy favorites. I have also included Gonzaga's record under Few in subsequent rounds of the tournament to get a more robust view of their performance.
Gonzaga has generally done quite well under Few as a top two seed, posting a 20-7 straight up record, while advancing to two final fours, and finishing a perfect 7-0 in the first round.
As a 3 or 4 seed Gonzaga has also done well. Though, as we would expect, they have not done as well in this role as they have as a 1 or 2 seed. Still, Gonzaga is perfect in the first round (5-0) and has advanced to the Sweet 16 four times and the Elite 8 once.
Gonzaga has only been a mid-level favorite two times in two and a half decades under Few. Small sample size is an issue here, but this also marks the first of Gonzaga's first round defeats.
Gonzaga has been in a toss up game in the first round seven times and has won five times. However, in this seed range, they are 1-4 in second round games, having advanced past the first weekend just once when seeded here.
Finally, befitting the progress the program has made under Few, Gonzaga has only been a true underdog seed just three times under Few (most recently in 2016). They are a perfect 3-0 in this role under Few and have advanced to the Sweet 16 twice.
Under Few, Gonzaga, like most college basketball teams, has performed better when they have had better seeds (duh). Gonzaga is 30-12 in the NCAA Tournament under Few as a top four seed, including a perfect 12-0 in the first round. Obviously, the Bulldogs are not a top four seed this year. However, even when they have not earned a high seed, the Bulldogs have taken care of business in the first round, posting a 9-3 record when seeded 5 through 12. As someone who may be a little biased towards Few and Gonzaga, most of those first round defeats can be explained away. The first occurred 23 years ago when the Bulldogs were a 6 seed and lost to Wyoming. The second came when Gonzaga entered the NCAA Tournament with their most regular season losses under Few (10). And the third came against Steph Curry. Gonzaga has not lost in the first round since George W. Bush was president.
Gonzaga enters the NCAA Tournament with eight losses. Assuming they do not win the national championship, they will finish with nine losses, which would be their most since 2011. However, all the efficiency metrics rate (KenPom, Bart Torvik, and BPI) rate them as a fringe top ten team. Advance the Bulldogs past the first round in your bracket without hesitation. Their potential second round game with Houston should be a classic and could be quite unfair to the top seed in the Midwest Region. However, as I mentioned earlier, Gonzaga is just 1-4 in second round games under Few when seeded between 7 and 10. I think their run of consecutive Sweet 16s will end at 9.
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