After talking with college basketball analysts around the country, former Gonzaga All-American Dan Dickau shares the national media's perspective of the Gonzaga Bulldogs heading into the 2023-24 season.
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00:00 Hey everybody, it's Christian Pedersen joined by Dan Dickow back for another episode of
00:04 the Gonzaga Nation podcast.
00:05 You're catching us on a mailbag edition.
00:08 That's where we bring the fan submitted questions to Dan Dickow for the insight and knowledge
00:14 that only a Gonzaga alumni legend can bring.
00:18 Dan, a lot of questions in a lot of different categories.
00:22 So I'm just going to draw randomly here and it seemed like there was a couple of different
00:27 Gonzaga players making preseason award watch lists and people were asking what does this
00:32 one mean?
00:33 What does that one mean?
00:34 So can you just give a general summary and overview of some of the nods and nominations
00:37 that Gonzaga players have received recently?
00:39 Yeah, so I mean in years past, you know, with especially with Drew Timmy on the team there
00:46 there were awards that fans started to become aware of preseason all-american preseason
00:53 player of the year.
00:55 And these are great and all but you know to be honest guys would rather have that award
01:00 and that recognition at the end of the year.
01:02 I think the one that's unique to pay close attention to early on there's actually two
01:08 to pay close attention to early on and those would be the wooden award watch list where
01:14 you start with 50 players or so at the start of the year and then it whittles down over
01:19 the course of the year to 30 I think then to 25 and then you have your final wooden
01:25 award all-americans at the end of the season including your player of the year.
01:29 The other one that I think is pretty unique and it's great to be a part of this list early
01:34 on in the season just for the recognition and then it gets whittled down positionally
01:39 for one player of the year and that's three Gonzaga players that have been recognized
01:46 for the preseason in regards to this and that would be Graham Ekay is named to the Carl
01:52 Malone player of the year award list.
01:54 So that would essentially be the best power forward in college basketball this season.
01:59 Anton Watson is on the Julius Irving award watch list and then Ryan Nembhardt for the
02:07 point guards is on the Bob Cousy list.
02:09 So pretty pretty impressive the fact that Gonzaga has three players on those prestigious
02:17 now there's also one for the centers and there's also one for for shooting guards but those
02:21 are the three positions that Gonzaga has players on which when you think about it's pretty
02:26 impressive in the fact that Anton not necessarily known as a scorer but he does impact the game
02:32 in many ways is on this list and then the two transfers that were so highly valued Ekay
02:38 and Nembhardt making it onto those positionally respective watch lists is pretty cool.
02:46 It certainly feels like if you're going to fill the vacuum of Drew Timmy and Chet over
02:51 the last three years.
02:55 You might as well do it with a variety of people on the floor being nominated for being
02:59 one of the best at their positions in a various different amount of positions and not just
03:03 have like oh three guys fighting over the point guard position.
03:05 So I think it seems like Gonzaga is decently set question coming in for us on X people
03:11 wanted to know kind of a summary of merging here of two questions people want to know
03:17 what's the vibe that you are getting from the national people that you are talking to
03:22 you've had a couple different national names on the show and they want to know if people
03:27 really are in on Gonzaga on a national level or if it's going to be a year where they're
03:32 going to have to fight some narrative of being overlooked again.
03:35 Yeah, no, you're right.
03:37 If you haven't listened to some of the conversations that I've had, you know, we've had Fran for
03:42 Schillest at Greenberg J.
03:44 Bill is Casey Jacobson Chris Walker.
03:47 Doug Gottlieb on on recently to kind of give us their thoughts on the college basketball
03:53 preseason and then also where Gonzaga stacks up when you talk to all these guys who are
04:00 as dialed in as anybody nationally.
04:03 They like this Gonzaga team.
04:05 The big question is, is, you know, and this is looming over everybody that follows Gonzaga
04:10 regionally and locally is how do you replace Drew Timmy?
04:14 Well, you got a pretty good piece in Graham EK and then you also have a great, you know,
04:20 replacement piece in the backcourt in Ryan Nembhard.
04:23 So, you know, you've got a great start with two guys coming in to fill unbelievably important
04:32 roles, Graham EK, fill in, quote unquote, filling Drew Timmy's role.
04:37 I mean, when you look at the stats, just the numbers of what Drew Timmy did the last couple
04:44 of years, and then you just look at the numbers that Graham EK had two years ago at Wyoming.
04:50 If you didn't know exactly what Drew Timmy did at Gonzaga, you wouldn't be able to pick
04:56 whose numbers were whose.
04:58 That's how good Graham EK's numbers were.
05:00 And then in regards to Ryan Nembhard, you know, every good team I think needs two ball
05:06 handlers, two primary decision makers.
05:09 And that's now what Gonzaga has with him and Nolan Hickman.
05:13 I mean, Ryan Nembhard had 30 in the NCAA tournament last season.
05:18 So he's experienced.
05:20 He's another ball handler.
05:21 I think it allows the pressure to be lifted off of Nolan Hickman's shoulders a little
05:26 bit.
05:27 I think those two are tremendous additions.
05:29 I just think when you talk to these national guys, they don't discount Gonzaga, even when
05:38 you lose a guy like Drew Timmy, even when the year before you had lost a guy like Chet
05:43 Holmgren or the year before, Jalen Suggs.
05:46 They just believe and they know that Coach Few and staff do such a good job of tweaking
05:52 things year in and year out.
05:54 And the fact is with the transfer portal now, you can replace experience with more experience
06:02 pretty quickly, as opposed to hoping that your freshmen and/or your redshirts can get
06:07 up to speed in the early part of the season.
06:09 Maybe a slightly different visual product on the floor, but a relatively comparable
06:15 just in terms of the productivity and the national prominence potential.
06:19 Yep, exactly.
06:20 Love that.
06:21 I'm stoked.
06:22 I, hey, I'm all for infecting the national narrative.
06:27 I think that you, if you every national television hit you get, you should be wearing a Gonzaga
06:33 related tie and or pin or something like that.
06:37 See if we can't get a little Gonzaga Nation one made up for you, Dan.
06:40 Thank you very much.
06:42 Anything that we maybe didn't ask, but the people need to know this week, I believe that
06:46 I think it's fair enough to say that basketball will be back at the end of this week, whether
06:53 or not you consider preseason games of the scrimmage or this X or Y or Z, the real actual
07:00 start of the season, it's back this week.
07:02 So what do you got for the people?
07:04 Well, I think the question, and I know it didn't come in our mailbag, but I've gotten
07:09 it a lot when I've been kind of just out and about.
07:12 We've had questions about, hey, is the Gonzaga game against Lewis and Clark State on TV?
07:19 Yes, it's on local KHQ.
07:21 It's not on the route syndication, which once we get to the regular season, the games will
07:26 be on.
07:27 But the nice thing with that Gonzaga or sorry, the WCC partnership with ESPN is that if you
07:35 are out of area, you can still watch the game through ESPN plus.
07:40 So the game will be broadcast.
07:41 It'll be myself and Richard Fox as the analysts and your favorite Greg Heister is the play
07:48 by play.
07:49 My goodness, it's bad.
07:50 I told you, folks, it's back.
07:52 Check that out so that you can be serenaded by the sweet tones of Greg Heister and Dan
07:57 Dekau bringing you the start of the twenty twenty three twenty twenty four college basketball
08:03 season.
08:04 Dan, thank you very much for checking in.
08:05 Make sure you guys search and subscribe to Gonzaga Nation wherever you get your podcasts.
08:09 If you're brand new to us, that's how you get everything sent directly to your phone.
08:12 You can also follow us on social media at Fan Nation Zags.
08:16 That's where you can send in your questions.
08:18 We do the mailbag every single week to make sure you guys have a voice on the show.
08:23 You can also hit Dan up himself, like he said, around town or just tweet at him at Dan Dick
08:28 out twenty one on all the socials.
08:30 Dan, thank you very much for checking in with us.
08:32 We'll talk to you guys next time.
08:33 Absolutely.
08:34 Looking forward to it.
08:35 [BLANK_AUDIO]