No. 8 Gonzaga pulls away from Santa Clara in battle of WCC unbeatens
Graham Ike scored a season-high 34 points on 13-of-17 shooting and collected 11 rebounds to lead No. 8 Gonzaga to an 89-77 victory over Santa Clara on Thursday night in West Coast Conference play at Spokane, Wash.
Emmanuel Innocenti scored 13 points as the Bulldogs (17-1, 5-0 WCC) notched their 10th consecutive victory. Braden Huff added 12 points as Gonzaga won the showdown between two squads that were unbeaten in WCC play.
The Zags defeated Santa Clara to improve to 52-6 in the all-time series.
Allen Graves had 18 points and nine rebounds for the Broncos (13-5, 4-1), who won their first four conference games by an average of 22.8 points. Christian Hammond added 14 points, Bukky Oboye had 12 and Brenton Knapper tallied 11 points.
Saint Mary's (15-2, 4-0) also is unbeaten in WCC play.
Gonzaga shot a stellar 57.6% from the field and was 6-of-16 from behind the arc. The Bulldogs shot 60.6% in the second half.
Santa Clara shot 43.1% from the field but was just 7-of-26 from 3-point range.
Gonzaga led by four nearing the midway point of the second half before delivering the knockout punch with a 17-0 run.
Huff started it with a putback and Jalen Warley followed with a dunk to make it 63-55 with 10:07 left.
Ike later made a layup to push the lead to 15 and he finished off the surge with a dunk to make it 76-55 with 6:39 remaining.
The lead topped out at 80-57 on Innocenti's fastbreak dunk with 5:44 left before the Broncos greatly thinned their deficit in the final minutes.
Gonzaga scored the final eight points of the first half to knot the score at 37. Ike had 16 points in the half on 6-of-9 shooting.
Santa Clara used an 11-0 burst to grab a 37-29 lead. Graves capped the run with a putback with 2:52 left in the half.
Tyon Grant-Foster scored five points during the half-ending run, and the Bulldogs continued the momentum by scoring the first five points of the second half.
Santa Clara recovered to take a 45-44 lead on a 3-pointer by Oboye with 17:46 left.