Mahaney lifts Gaels to huge win
St. Mary’s trailed for 36:17 against Gonzaga on Saturday night and freshman Aidan Mahaney missed nine of his first 10 field-goal attempts.
A gritty performance by the Gaels — and a transcendent one by Mahaney — lifted 18thranked St. Mary’s to an improbable 78-70 win over the 12thranked Zags in a filled-to-thegills University Credit Union Pavilion.
Mahaney, who hit a gamewinning jumper with less than one second left at BYU the previous Saturday night, took over this game in the late going and overtime. He finished with a team-high 18 points and in the final five minutes of regulation and first 2½ minutes of the extra period, he scored or assisted on 19 of 21 St. Mary’s points.
The Campolindo-Moraga alum talked about how he was able to dominate the final minutes of a game after he had struggled so mightily for the first 33 minutes.
He referenced “the countless stairs, countless miles and countless laps” he has run. He added “the countless shots I’ve put up. Just work, just trusting your work, and that’s how I get my confidence to be able to do that.”
St. Mary’s head coach Randy Bennett said Mahaney, who finished 8-for-19 from the floor, “just has ‘it.’ … A lot of guys would fold on that, and just kind of hang their head and just kind of finish the game like that. That’s where he’s kind of special is he’s got great belief and he really, really competes to win.”
The Gaels (21-4, 10-0) extended their winning streak to 12 games and opened a two-game lead over the Zags (19-5, 8-2) in the WCC. St. Mary’s also got 15 points and 11 rebounds from center Mitchell Saxen (Bennett said Saxen had a “sneaky good game”) and 14 points from Alex Ducas.
Last year in Moraga, the Gaels knocked off No. 1 Gonzaga 67-57. Saturday night’s loss might have been tougher to take for the Zags.
On Saturday, Drew Timme (game-high 23 points) went 1for-2 at the foul line to open the scoring in overtime. Mahaney then fed Ducas for a layup that made it 63-62, Gaels. It was their first lead since they owned a 4-3 edge two minutes into the game.
They were up 65-64 a minute later before Mahaney — who finished 1-for-8 from beyond the arc — banked home his lone 3 of the game. Hey, whatever it takes.
On the Gaels’ next possession, Mahaney made an excellent pass to Saxen for a layup that made it 70-64. The Zags got no closer than four the rest of the way.
Mahaney said he and his fellow freshmen might have had a little too much adrenaline at the start for such an important game with such an electric crowd.
“We have never played in anything like this,” Mahaney said, adding, “We were ready to compete all night and we did it for 45 minutes.”
The Gaels trailed by 11 in the first half and were down by eight with 6½ minutes to go before Mahaney — who was 1for-10 from the floor at that point — drove the left side of the lane and twisted for a short jumper and got fouled by Rasir Bolton. Mahaney hit the foul shot to complete the three-point play.
Moments later, Logan Johnson knocked down a 3 to cut the Zags’ edge to 51-49.
Soon thereafter, Johnson fouled out, but Mahaney was just getting started. He scored eight consecutive St. Mary’s points — all on drives — to tie it 57-57 with 3:22 left.
Julian Strawther put the Zags back up on a floater with 2:15 left — but that man Mahaney answered again. A left-handed scoop shot off the glass with 1:41 remaining made it 59-59. That was 10 straight St. Mary’s points by Mahaney.
“We tried everybody on the roster on him and he hit them over our best defender, which is Anton (Watson). He hit three of them over him,” Gonzaga head coach Mark Few said. “Those are tough shots and he hit them, so he deserves a lot of credit.”
With a chance to take the lead with less than a minute remaining, Mahaney’s shot from beyond the arc was off the mark. On the ensuing possession, Strawther dropped home another floater to make it 61-59. Then with less than 10 seconds left, Mahaney drove the lane and made an excellent bounce pass to Saxen, whose layup tied it again.
Strawther misfired on a long jumper before the buzzer, and the game headed to overtime, in which the Gaels outscored the Zags 17-9.
Bennett earned career win No. 500 on Thursday night in a 68-59 decision over USF. Following Saturday night’s thriller, he was asked which win he’ll remember more 25-30 years from now, 500 or 501.
“501, for sure,” he answered. “I was telling the players in there, ‘Hey, 501 was a lot better than 500.’ Five hundred was great but I’ve been in a lot of games, a lot of big games, all that, but I don’t know if I’ve been part of one that was a more special basketball game than that.
“The atmosphere, the environment, the quality of the two teams — it was fun to be part of.”