Every March, school basketball captures the nationwide consciousness. For a number of weeks, dwelling rooms, workplaces and campuses throughout the nation flip towards the courtroom, watching younger individuals compete underneath strain, check their limits and rise collectively in pursuit of one thing larger than the sport itself.
But, at a time when a lot of the protection of faculty athletics veers towards skepticism, if not outright negativity, this March second reminds us of why we love and assist this sport, why we commit a lot time to it, and why it drives what we do the remainder of the 12 months.
Especially at Jesuit establishments like Gonzaga, whose mission statements herald and privilege the formation of the complete particular person (the physique, the thoughts and the spirit), school athletics is rarely solely about successful video games. Being a part of a group entails shared effort and shared accountability: studying learn how to belief others, persevere via setbacks, and develop alongside individuals who maintain you accountable. It means celebrating victories collectively, going through disappointments collectively, and studying life-long classes in between.
This mindset persists at Gonzaga University, the place excellence is pursued not solely on the courtroom, however all through the student-athlete expertise. In Gonzaga Athletics, we all the time describe successful in the classroom and neighborhood, together with competitors. This excellence isn’t just aspirational; it’s measurable. Just this previous fall, for the sixth time in the final seven semesters, Gonzaga student-athletes earned a department-wide GPA of three.50. A file 201 earned President’s or Dean’s List honors whereas concurrently competing at the Division-I degree.
For practically 140 years, Gonzaga’s success has been rooted in neighborhood. St. Ignatius of Loyola’s motto, Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (for the larger glory of God), reminds us that training is in the end about service to our native and international neighborhood. That spirit is mirrored in the greater than 3,100 hours of neighborhood engagement contributed by Gonzaga student-athletes final educational 12 months, with a further 1,738 hours accomplished simply in Fall 2025. These outcomes mirror self-discipline, time administration and a tradition that expects college students to carry the identical focus to the remainder of their lives that they bring about to competitors.
When individuals come collectively round a shared mission, extraordinary issues occur. That perception is deliberately nurtured as we speak via Zags360, Gonzaga’s whole-person strategy to student-athlete formation, which brings collectively educational assist, psychological well being, bodily wellness, management improvement, neighborhood engagement and extra, underneath one unified imaginative and prescient.
This whole-person assist appears to empower our student-athletes not solely to carry out, however to persevere. Through the athletic and educational expertise, they be taught lifelong classes as they put together for exams after late practices, contribute to group tasks between highway journeys, and maintain themselves accountable to teammates and classmates alike.
This time of 12 months, Gonzaga’s males’s and girls’s basketball groups embody this excellence and these values on a nationwide stage. The NCAA Tournament shines a brilliant mild on their expertise, self-discipline, and resilience. Yet what makes these groups particular extends effectively past the bracket. They symbolize the broader scholar expertise and serve to encourage our neighborhood.
Leaders like Women’s Basketball Head Coach Lisa Fortier set the instance for college students. Fortier’s public journey via breast most cancers with willpower and charm impressed her group and the neighborhood. She set the tone for a 2024-25 season outlined by resilience, and her group responded by capturing its eleventh West Coast Conference regular-season title. This season, the group continued to construct on this success by successful the WCC match and incomes its tenth journey to the NCAA Tournament underneath Coach Fortier and her employees.
The males’s basketball group, which made Gonzaga a family title practically three a long time in the past, makes its twenty seventh consecutive look in the NCAA Tournament, extending the third-longest lively streak in the nation and fourth all-time. In a season marked by accidents and different challenges, Head Coach Mark Few’s usually high-scoring squad distinguished itself in a brand new method: as an elite defensive unit. The group ended the season ranked ninth in the nation in KenPom’s Adjusted Defensive Efficiency, exhibiting a bunch that’s in-sync, with a visual dedication to working along with a “we” over “me” mentality reflective of the Jesuit ultimate of being individuals with and for others. These groups have triumphed in opposition to accidents, setbacks and restricted sources and have proven the grit and willpower that it takes to maneuver ahead.
My personal expertise in athletics has taught me important life classes about management, accountability, and accountability. These are classes upon which I rely day by day of my life as a priest who’s each a minister and an administrator. It provides me nice pleasure and pleasure to see our student-athletes thrive not solely on the courtroom, but in addition in the remainder of their lives. In all arenas, they proceed to develop and be taught. Instead of resting on their laurels, day in and day trip, these college students are placing in the work to symbolize their classmates and neighborhood on the courts with honor, steadiness, and grit.
These successes and progress come from studying learn how to adapt when circumstances change, learn how to lean on each other, and learn how to transfer ahead when the path just isn’t straightforward. They additionally present how essential it’s to lean on the neighborhood that helps our groups from the sidelines, due to the ardour and resilience they see firsthand. These are the identical classes Gonzaga college students follow day by day: in laboratories, school rooms and management roles all through Spokane and the area.
A Jesuit training calls us to mirror not solely on what we obtain, however on who we grow to be. When issues don’t go as deliberate, college students be taught resilience. They be taught to pause, mirror and recommit. They be taught progress typically emerges via perseverance. These are exactly the habits Zags360 seeks to domesticate in our college students – resilience, reflection and shared accountability – in competitors, the classroom, and life. But, this progress just isn’t just for our college students themselves. Our Mission turns us outward and reminds us training is in the end about service and impacting the neighborhood round us.
This previous week, the Gonzaga males’s and girls’s basketball groups claimed match titles in what marked their remaining West Coast Conference appearances. Some might even see this as the closing of a chapter. I see it as continuity. As Gonzaga prepares to enter the Pac-12 Conference as the solely full member with out soccer, we accomplish that grounded in a convention of excellence that has formed school basketball nationally whereas remaining deeply rooted in the Pacific Northwest.
A 97% commencement success price amongst student-athletes throughout all Gonzaga groups exhibits that when the cheering fades, Zags are prepared to guide, serve and contribute meaningfully to the world.
As March Madness unfolds, Gonzaga’s student-athletes will as soon as once more be prepared to point out the nation what it means to compete with coronary heart, humility and fervour. They usually are not separate from the remainder of our college students. They are emblematic of them.
That is the actual magic of March and of the constructive influence of fine school athletics. And it’s a mindset price celebrating, right here in Spokane and much past.
Read extra about Gonzaga’s holistic strategy to supporting student-athletes.
