Gonzaga Basketball: Where should the Bulldogs rank nationally as a program?

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LAHAINA, HI – NOVEMBER 21: The Gonzaga Bulldogs players and coaches pose for a photo after winning the 2018 Maui Invitational against the Duke Blue Devils at the Lahaina Civic Center on November 21, 2018 in Lahaina, Hawaii. (Photo by Darryl Oumi/Getty Images) /

After beating the No. 1 ranked Duke Blue Devils, Gonzaga Basketball is once again apart of the national conversation.

In light of some recent pondering over the history of the Gonzaga Bulldogs, I’d like to ask you to take a minute to think in your mind the historically elite of the college basketball world? I’ll help you out: Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, Kentucky, Indiana…

How’d the rest of the list play out? I’m guessing you might’ve gone out to California for UCLA, took a quick trip tack on Arizona before heading to Louisville and took a road trip to Georgetown, Syracuse and UConn.

It’s noticeable that all of these programs are historically great programs with a rich tradition for winning on a micro and macro level and have done so for some time now. That’s why they’re considered among the elite of the sport, right?

Well…why isn’t Gonzaga thrown in there as well?

Now stay with me, this isn’t an article jumping to conclusion after Gonzaga flew out to Maui and dethroned this already fabled stable of Duke Freshman. If anything, it’s bringing a topic to the forefront that should be addressed.

Ever since 1999 when Mark Few took over, the college basketball scene has witnessed one of the greatest runs of consistency in the sport. The team has eclipsed over 20-wins each season for almost two decades, with their worst season from a record standpoint being 25-10 in 2011.

With that in mind, the Bulldogs still won their regular season conference title outright and won the WCC conference tournament. The season would ultimately fall victim to BYU and Jimmer-sanity that engulfed the nation that year, but all-in-all, not terrible.