Upcoming Event: Men's Basketball at Baylor on October 10, 2025 at 2 p.m. (MST)
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Grand Canyon University Athletics
Photo by: David Kadlubowski
Care to dance? Lopes relive run to NCAAs
4/14/2023 2:00:00 PM | Men's Basketball, Paul Coro
Behind-the-scenes look delves into GCU's 2nd NCAA tournament appearance
The Grand Canyon men's basketball players took the GCU Arena court with little fanfare on March 13. The purple arena seats, usually filled with fans emitting a cacophony of sounds, roars and chants on game nights, were empty that Monday evening, as was the oddly tranquil 25,000-student campus for spring break.
The calm at sunset countered the Lopes' recent whirlwind.
Two nights earlier, GCU won its fourth game in five days to capture the WAC Tournament title and its second NCAA tournament berth in three seasons.
About 24 hours earlier, the Lopes gathered on the same Arena floor to await the unveiling of their Big Dance partner on the screen. That morning, GCU teammates Walter Ellis (Master of Business Administration) and Jovan Blacksher Jr. (Bachelor of Science in Sports Management) received official word of completed degrees.
But after a six-game, 11-day winning streak culminated in a purple rain of confetti for the Lopes' purple reign, the familiar frenzy of the game day routine resumed when four familiar snare beats boomed from the Arena speakers and refreshed their spirits.
The ball is tipped … and there you are …
Accompanying GCU's prepractice stretches and warmups: "One Shining Moment," the iconic NCAA tournament anthem that student manager Trey Miles called up to tingle the skin of college basketball junkies. Center Aidan Igiehon stretched his hands 7 feet wide, while power forward Gabe McGlothan became Luther Vandross in basketball shorts, mouthing the lyrics with zeal.
The NCAA tournament is a restricted ride that GCU has begun to take frequently, making it to college basketball's holy grail in two of its first five tries at the Division I level. But this year's experience was already different.
When GCU first made the field in 2021, it was during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nothing about the journey was normal. Organizers contained the WAC Tournament championship crowd to hundreds of fans, and the Lopes flew directly from Las Vegas to a one-city, multisite, limited-attendance tournament in Indianapolis.
This time, the magic moment of celebrating a WAC title began with GCU students finding their way inside the Orleans Arena court's ropes to join embracing players. The team celebration continued to the locker room, where players doused head coach Bryce Drew with water upon his entrance, and it lasted until the early morning at the team hotel, where Drew donned a "Binge Jesus" T-shirt after calling his team's achievement "a God story" in postgame interviews.
"God has had His hand on this whole journey and this whole culture," McGlothan said. "It's nice to look back and see God's beautiful plan unfold."
The tourney tornado continued as GCU boarded a bus to the airport about 38 hours after its first practice on campus. Instead of its tight bubble group of 2021, the Lopes flew this time with dozens of their friends – GCU band members, cheerleaders, dancers and their leaders, as well as staff family members.
But
Cinderella's shoes were left behind for the Big Dance. Twelve giant bags of shoes, uniforms and practice gear didn't make it from the bus to the charter flight on the tarmac, putting GCU in scramble mode for its evening practice in Denver and titillating college basketball media with an off-day storyline.
Drew called his older brother, Scott, whose Baylor team, serendipitously, also was playing in Denver to the delight of their parents, Homer and Janet, and sister, Dana.
"It's a wonderful life," said Homer, who was the Valparaiso coach 25 years earlier when Bryce added to March Madness lore with "The Shot" that upset Mississippi.
Scott offered Baylor's practice jerseys, later quipping with reporters, "We charge them by the hour."
But the jerseys were so damp that the GCU managers wound up doing laundry dryer duty for Baylor while pivoting to the practice jerseys of Regis University, where the Lopes practiced for two days in Denver.
Less than 48 hours before the NCAA tournament game, GCU players walked through its preparations for powerhouse Gonzaga with some players in socks and others in "Regis Hoops" jerseys. Thirty minutes into the practice, GCU managers and staffers returned from fighting rush-hour traffic and checking four stores to buy shoes for players, except for size-16 Yvan Ouedraogo.
"It was good for us because everybody got a new pair of shoes," Lopes sophomore guard Ray Harrison said the next day when meeting the media in the Denver Nuggets' arena.
Once GCU equipment manager Alyssa Shepherd hustled to make a commercial flight to Denver with the gear, the Lopes were operating as normally as could be on game-day eve.
After another private practice at Regis, the Lopes went to Ball Arena for their tournament car wash of stops — locker room interviews, a press conference, meeting with national media who broadcast the game and a 40-minute practice for the public as the overhead screen showed first-day games, including Princeton's upset of Arizona in progress as the Lopes worked out.
The site was apropos for Ellis, who wandered a Nuggets locker room hallway lined with franchise legend photos, including one of his father, LaPhonso, who was excused from his ESPN GameDay analyst work to attend his youngest son's career-ending regional.
"It's real sentimental for me and my family," Ellis said.
After one last sleep with door hangers reading, "Dreaming of cutting down the nets," the Lopes kept to their downtown hotel on game day.
The morning walk-through was in a meeting room with managers laying out the key and 3-point line with blue tape on the carpet. Logan Landers continued his weeklong impersonation of Gonzaga All-American Drew Timm in a 1,000-square foot room where players could still smell their breakfast's bacon and would hit their heads if they jumped.
Locked into the coaches' words, the players clapped between segments as each assistant delivered schemes for particular areas.
"Let's go, let's go, let's go," players extoll each other as if the score is 78-78 and they are breaking the huddle with 20 seconds remaining.
The room transformed two hours later with chairs placed in a circle for team chapel, a game-day ritual in which staff members rotate delivering the Word four hours before tip-off in a program that intersperses faith at every turn.
On the final game day of the season, assistant coach Casey Shaw held a leather-bound Bible in his hands and told the team, "You're not alone," as he shared the story of Joshua leading the battle at Jericho, a city fortified by walls. He asked where they had seen God's work this season.
Players gave testimonies, including freshman Derrick Michael Xzavierro simply saying, "I feel good," after the Indonesian was in a hospital for seven weeks this winter because of complications with a collapsed lung.
"This is holy ground we get to step on, and we get to give a praise performance," Shaw said. "God told Joshua to take off his shoes, and for us, he didn't even put them on the plane."
The Lopes' "One Shining Moment" ended in a first round-loss to Gonzaga, the nation's No. 9 team, but GCU caught attention for enthusing its hundreds of purple-clad fans by leading most of the first half. The Lopes lost 82-70.
"There's no reason for anyone to have your head down when you walk out of here," Drew told his team in the postgame locker room.
"You guys left with all of your pride. You left with respect from the opponent, respect from everyone who watched on TV, because of how hard you guys played and how together you played the whole time . . . This is how great programs start, and we're going to be a great program."
The calm at sunset countered the Lopes' recent whirlwind.
Two nights earlier, GCU won its fourth game in five days to capture the WAC Tournament title and its second NCAA tournament berth in three seasons.
About 24 hours earlier, the Lopes gathered on the same Arena floor to await the unveiling of their Big Dance partner on the screen. That morning, GCU teammates Walter Ellis (Master of Business Administration) and Jovan Blacksher Jr. (Bachelor of Science in Sports Management) received official word of completed degrees.
But after a six-game, 11-day winning streak culminated in a purple rain of confetti for the Lopes' purple reign, the familiar frenzy of the game day routine resumed when four familiar snare beats boomed from the Arena speakers and refreshed their spirits.The ball is tipped … and there you are …
Accompanying GCU's prepractice stretches and warmups: "One Shining Moment," the iconic NCAA tournament anthem that student manager Trey Miles called up to tingle the skin of college basketball junkies. Center Aidan Igiehon stretched his hands 7 feet wide, while power forward Gabe McGlothan became Luther Vandross in basketball shorts, mouthing the lyrics with zeal.
The NCAA tournament is a restricted ride that GCU has begun to take frequently, making it to college basketball's holy grail in two of its first five tries at the Division I level. But this year's experience was already different.
When GCU first made the field in 2021, it was during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nothing about the journey was normal. Organizers contained the WAC Tournament championship crowd to hundreds of fans, and the Lopes flew directly from Las Vegas to a one-city, multisite, limited-attendance tournament in Indianapolis.
This time, the magic moment of celebrating a WAC title began with GCU students finding their way inside the Orleans Arena court's ropes to join embracing players. The team celebration continued to the locker room, where players doused head coach Bryce Drew with water upon his entrance, and it lasted until the early morning at the team hotel, where Drew donned a "Binge Jesus" T-shirt after calling his team's achievement "a God story" in postgame interviews."God has had His hand on this whole journey and this whole culture," McGlothan said. "It's nice to look back and see God's beautiful plan unfold."
The tourney tornado continued as GCU boarded a bus to the airport about 38 hours after its first practice on campus. Instead of its tight bubble group of 2021, the Lopes flew this time with dozens of their friends – GCU band members, cheerleaders, dancers and their leaders, as well as staff family members.
But
Cinderella's shoes were left behind for the Big Dance. Twelve giant bags of shoes, uniforms and practice gear didn't make it from the bus to the charter flight on the tarmac, putting GCU in scramble mode for its evening practice in Denver and titillating college basketball media with an off-day storyline.Drew called his older brother, Scott, whose Baylor team, serendipitously, also was playing in Denver to the delight of their parents, Homer and Janet, and sister, Dana.
"It's a wonderful life," said Homer, who was the Valparaiso coach 25 years earlier when Bryce added to March Madness lore with "The Shot" that upset Mississippi.
Scott offered Baylor's practice jerseys, later quipping with reporters, "We charge them by the hour."
But the jerseys were so damp that the GCU managers wound up doing laundry dryer duty for Baylor while pivoting to the practice jerseys of Regis University, where the Lopes practiced for two days in Denver.
"It was good for us because everybody got a new pair of shoes," Lopes sophomore guard Ray Harrison said the next day when meeting the media in the Denver Nuggets' arena.
Once GCU equipment manager Alyssa Shepherd hustled to make a commercial flight to Denver with the gear, the Lopes were operating as normally as could be on game-day eve.
After another private practice at Regis, the Lopes went to Ball Arena for their tournament car wash of stops — locker room interviews, a press conference, meeting with national media who broadcast the game and a 40-minute practice for the public as the overhead screen showed first-day games, including Princeton's upset of Arizona in progress as the Lopes worked out.
The site was apropos for Ellis, who wandered a Nuggets locker room hallway lined with franchise legend photos, including one of his father, LaPhonso, who was excused from his ESPN GameDay analyst work to attend his youngest son's career-ending regional."It's real sentimental for me and my family," Ellis said.
After one last sleep with door hangers reading, "Dreaming of cutting down the nets," the Lopes kept to their downtown hotel on game day.
The morning walk-through was in a meeting room with managers laying out the key and 3-point line with blue tape on the carpet. Logan Landers continued his weeklong impersonation of Gonzaga All-American Drew Timm in a 1,000-square foot room where players could still smell their breakfast's bacon and would hit their heads if they jumped.
Locked into the coaches' words, the players clapped between segments as each assistant delivered schemes for particular areas.
"Let's go, let's go, let's go," players extoll each other as if the score is 78-78 and they are breaking the huddle with 20 seconds remaining.
The room transformed two hours later with chairs placed in a circle for team chapel, a game-day ritual in which staff members rotate delivering the Word four hours before tip-off in a program that intersperses faith at every turn.
On the final game day of the season, assistant coach Casey Shaw held a leather-bound Bible in his hands and told the team, "You're not alone," as he shared the story of Joshua leading the battle at Jericho, a city fortified by walls. He asked where they had seen God's work this season.Players gave testimonies, including freshman Derrick Michael Xzavierro simply saying, "I feel good," after the Indonesian was in a hospital for seven weeks this winter because of complications with a collapsed lung.
"This is holy ground we get to step on, and we get to give a praise performance," Shaw said. "God told Joshua to take off his shoes, and for us, he didn't even put them on the plane."
The Lopes' "One Shining Moment" ended in a first round-loss to Gonzaga, the nation's No. 9 team, but GCU caught attention for enthusing its hundreds of purple-clad fans by leading most of the first half. The Lopes lost 82-70."There's no reason for anyone to have your head down when you walk out of here," Drew told his team in the postgame locker room.
"You guys left with all of your pride. You left with respect from the opponent, respect from everyone who watched on TV, because of how hard you guys played and how together you played the whole time . . . This is how great programs start, and we're going to be a great program."
Players Mentioned
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