Cowboys wrangle win from Lopes

Saturday, February 21

Phoenix, Ariz.

6 p.m.

Grand Canyon

17-10,10-6Mountain West

Wyoming

15-12,6-10Mountain West

Wyoming

Grand Canyon

Photo by: David Kadlubowski

2/21/2026 9:59:00 PM | Men's Basketball, Paul Coro

Box Score Photo Gallery

GCU takes 4th home loss of season despite Williams' 29

By: Paul Coro

There are no nights off in the Mountain West, but there are off-nights.

The actions of not playing at the level that won Tuesday night at San Diego State resulted in Saturday night's consequences of Grand Canyon allowing a late 12-0 run and losing 70-65 to Wyoming on Saturday night at Global Credit Union.

Phoenix, AZ Feb.121 2026: Then Lopes ffall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena. David Kadlubowski/GCU

Phoenix, AZ Feb.121 2026: Then Lopes ffall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena. David Kadlubowski/GCU

The Lopes (17-10, 10-6 Mountain West) matched the program's most home losses in a season under sixth-year head coach Bryce Drew despite GCU junior guard Makaih Williams scoring a season-high 29 points as he blasted past the 1,000-point career mark.

Nevada defeated first-place Utah State 80-77 at home Saturday night to tie GCU at 10-6 for fourth place, which gets the last Mountain West Championship first-round bye. With four regular-season games remaining, the Wolf Pack holds the head-to-head tiebreaker on the Lopes.

GCU's costly loss came because Wyoming's depth domination overcame Williams' scoring. Four Cowboys substitutes gave their team a 34-2 advantage in bench scoring, similar to the 41-2 bench scoring onslaught Nevada posted when it beat the Lopes on Jan. 27.

"The numbers speak a lot," Drew said. "We had some guys scared to shoot. They were open on some penetration for 3s and they were scared to shoot it. We had some guys that didn't rebound the basketball. WE had some guys that didn't get 50-50 balls that you have to get to win in February. We had some guys not strong with the ball. When you're not strong with the ball, you get turnovers and that led to a majority of their points in the first half. those are a lot of plays that boil down to aggressiveness and toughness."

The shooting was nearly even and so was the score at halftime despite Wyoming outscoring GCU 12-4 in points off turnovers. The Lopes shot 33% in the second half until a wild scramble of three consecutive makes in the final 19 seconds that was too little, too late to prevent the Cowboys (15-12, 6-10) from recording their only road win besides a Dec. 30 victory at last-place Air Force.

GCU took its first – only – second-half lead with 4:21 to go, when graduate power forward Nana Owusu-Anane (nine points, 12 rebounds) made two free throws as the Cowboys put the Lopes in the double bonus.

Phoenix, AZ Feb.121 2026: Then Lopes ffall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena. David Kadlubowski/GCU

Wyoming immediately answered with the third 3-pointer of the game from Estonian 6-foot-9 freshman Simm-Marten Saadi, a 30% 3-point shooter who had not made multiple 3s in a game since Dec. 6 against Dartmouth.

"That one really hurt," Drew said. "Pick-and-pop 5s (centers). Efe (Demirel), that's a tough matchup for him. Usually, he capitalizes on the offensive end. Today, unfortunately, he couldn't capitalize enough down there to offset it."

After Demirel lost the ball, Wyoming added an old-fashioned 3-point play with GCU graduate power forward Wilhlem Breidenbach fouling Cowboys senior point guard Leland Walker on a 3-point finish.

As GCU went scoreless on seven consecutive possessions after taking the lead, Walker backed up the Wyoming bench's work by hitting a key pull-up jumper that put the Cowboys ahead 62-55 with 1:16 to play.

Williams had a tip-in and two 3s in the final 19 seconds to reduce Wyoming's lead to 68-65 with 3.4 seconds to go. But an easy Cowboys inbound and two Walker free throws iced a Wyoming win that continued the trend of the visiting prevailing in each of GCU's and Wyoming's four meetings.

"We talked about it before the game about with consistency with this group," Drew said. "I would like to say that we reached a consistent level, but I really thought tonight was going to be a big test to see if we were going to be that consistent team and to see if we could do it three times in a row.

"We did it two road games in a row. We come back home, and we don't do what we did on the road the last two games. We've talked about it since November. We got a great crowd. It's so fun to be here and play. Sometimes, you need gut checks. Sometimes, you need a heart check to get rebounds and to get 50-50 balls and be stronger with the ball."

Phoenix, AZ Feb.121 2026: Then Lopes ffall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena.

Phoenix, AZ Feb.121 2026: Then Lopes ffall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena.

Wyoming, the Mountain West's top offensive rebounding team, met its average with 12 offensive boards. That area was converted better by GCU, which used 10 offensive rebounds to have a 14-6 edge in second-chance points.

The Lopes could not find an offensive rhythm from the get-go, going 2 for10 from the field and making five turnovers over the first eight minutes. They climbed out of an 18-10 hole by keeping the Cowboys to one made field goal over nine minutes of play.

That put GCU ahead 28-24 until Wyoming secured a halftime tie with Saadi's follow score and freshman guard Nasir Meyer's driving bank shot in the half's final 42 seconds.

"We had on the board before the game, 'Be strong with the ball,' " Drew said. "Unfortunately, in that first half, we had nine turnovers. They basically just took it out of our hands. We either dribbled it right to them, or they just swiped down and took the ball."

Wyoming led for 29 minutes of the game with difference-making efforts from four reserves:

Saadi scored a career-high 13 points in 15 minutes;
Junior guard Uriyah Rojas tallied nine points and four rebounds in 25 minutes;
Sophomore power forward Abou Magassa grabbed eight rebounds in 15 minutes;
Junior forward Adam Harakow scored seven points and was a plus-11 in 13 minutes.

"We wrote two things on the board defensively protect the paint and offensively play for each other," Wyoming head coach Sundance Wicks told gowyo.com. "You want to be playing your best basketball in March and the Pokes are trying to get hot right now. We are worried about playing for each other and that was a happy locker room. All the toughness categories we won tonight and winning plays down the stretch."

GCU senior guard Jaden Henley was the only Lope besides Willliams to score in double digits. He tallied 15 points, five rebounds and five assists but also made five turnovers. Williams and Henley took three-fifths of the team's shots, with the other Lopes going 6 for 21.

"Disappointing," Drew said of the bench impact differential. "34-2 is not good. You're not going to win games that way. These are players that need to come in and play better for us. They need to make shots. They need to impact winning plays. They need to get 50-50 balls. There are a lot of things out there that didn't happen tonight that you need. It's not just the points, but it's the other things out there that you need to be able to win in February.

A GCU win could have pulled the Lopes within a game of second-place teams San Diego State and New Mexico (12-4 each), with the series tiebreaker on the Aztecs.Instead, GCU must outplay Nevada over the final four regular-season games to avoid being in the eight-team first round.

The Lopes stay home for a 7 p.m. Wednesday game against UNLV, which defeated GCU 80-78 on Feb. 7 at Thomas & Mack Center. The Runnin' Rebels (14-13, 9-7 MW) won 91-66 at Air Force on Saturday.