Senior Night carries weight of tourney seed

Saturday, March 7

Phoenix, Ariz.

6 p.m.

Grand Canyon

Fresno State

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3/6/2026 10:56:00 AM | Men's Basketball, Paul Coro

4 Lopes play final GCU home game with MW Championships 1st-round bye on line

By: Paul Coro

The Mountain West leader has lost five conference games. Four conference teams are tied for fifth place. When the last MW regular-season game ends Saturday night, there could be more tiebreakers than a Wimbledon final.

But all Grand Canyon needs to know for its 6 p.m. Saturday home finale against Fresno State is that a Lopes win earns a Mountain West Championship first-round bye.

A victory would also secure the Lopes' fifth consecutive 20-win season and give four GCU seniors and 7,000-ish fans the proper goodbye until many reconvene next week in Las Vegas.

Phoenix, AZ Feb. 21, 2026: Then Lopes fall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena.

Phoenix, AZ Feb. 21, 2026: Then Lopes fall 65-70 to Wyoming at Global Credit Union Arena.

"It's a really big game from a standings standpoint," Lopes head coach Bryce Drew said. "There are so many teams that are so close, and the tournament is wide open. You definitely want to have some momentum going into the tournament that you feel like you're playing good basketball."

GCU (19-11, 12-7 MW) will look for its fifth conference series sweep of the season when it takes on Fresno State (13-7, 7-12 MW), which the Lopes beat 68-57 in Fresno on Jan. 24.

That win was the last game for Lopes starting guard Caleb Shaw, who suffered a late-game ankle injury attempting a blocked shot on a breakaway. After missing the past 11 games, Shaw practiced with the team Thursday and Friday.

"It was nice to see Caleb practice," Drew said. "We'll see how he responds and what the medical team says. A lot depends on how he handles the load from practice. Our medical team has done a great job getting him to this point, so we'll trust them with what they see moving forward. We sure hope he can get back out there for us."

The Lopes expanded their rotation in Saturday's win at Air Force because the team also lost graduate power forward Wilhelm Breidenbach to a lower-leg injury, leaving six available players who have averaged double-digit minutes this season. Redshirt freshman center Dennis Evans responded with a career scoring high of 10 points, along with five rebounds and his sixth game of at least three blocked shots since January. Junior power forward Kaleb Smith also played a season-high 18 minutes and scored six points.

Breidenbach will be part of a unique Senior Night, in which he will be honored along with guards Jaden Henley and Brian Moore Jr. and power forward Nana Owosu-Anane after their first Lopes seasons. All four came to GCU in June as transfers but have thrived with Henley being mentioned as a Mountain West Player of the Year candidate and Owusu-Anane being considered for MW Defensive Player of the Year.

"It's for them, their journey and their road and their last official regular-season college game," Drew said. "In the past, you could probably say Senior Night was for the players but also for your fans to really appreciate them. Now it's probably leaning more toward the player just because it's hard for the fans in one year to really become attached as you would with a player you've seen for four years out there.

"You sure hope their experience was their best they've had in college, and that they want to call this their home and want to come back."

Henley is winding up his college basketball experience with career-high averages for points (17.9), rebounds (5.8), assists (2.8) and steals (1.5) while also shooting a career-best 47.1% from the field.

GCU's four seniors have accounted for 50% of tje team's points, 55% of its rebounds, 60% of its assists and 60% of its steals.

"For every senior on this team, we played every game like it was our last," Henley said. "We've given everything we have. We have a good group of seniors and a good group of guys on this team. We care for one another. When we got out there, you can feel that emotion and that competitiveness for each other."

CBB Analytics puts GCU's likelihood of being the 12-team conference tournament's No. 4 seed at 68%, with Nevada being the most likely No. 5 seed possibility at 60.4%. The Lopes could be as high as a No. 3 seed and a low as a No. 6 seed, depending on the outcomes of six remaining conference games that begin Friday night with UNLV at San Diego State.

If all favorites win the conference's regular-season finales, GCU would be the fourth seed and play Nevada as the fifth seed Thursday in the Lopes' first Mountain West Championship.

By the time the Lopes tip off with Fresno State at 6 p.m. Saturday at Global Credit Union Arena, the conference postseason picture will clear up with every other game completed except for Nevada's 7 p.m. home game against Air Force.

"Our goal obviously was to win the regular-season championship, but you've got to move forward," Henley said. "Our main goal and the biggest thing that matters is making the (NCAA) Tournament for us."

The conference cannibalism has reduced its usual number of prospective NCAA Tournament at-large teams, leaving GCU in need of capturing next week's Mountain West Championship to advance to its fifth NCAA Tournament appearance in Drew's six seasons. Earning a tournament first-round bye with a Saturday win would lighten the load for that task to three wins in three days, starting with a Thursday 2:30 p.m. quarterfinal at Thomas & Mack Center.

"We're the sixth-best conference," Drew said. "You've got the conferences above us that are getting seven, eight, nine teams, and the conferences below us are usually getting one, possibly two. But we've had so many teams that just beat each other because our conference has a lot of good teams. We have so many top-100 teams. We don't have enough top-50s to get an at-large. We're right in that window. We're really good, but you're just barely short of getting like seven teams in."

Lope tracks

Henley's averages of 17.9 points, 5.8 rebounds, 2.8 assists and 1.5 steals have only been matched nationally by six other players in the nation, including Cameron Boozer of Duke and A.J. Dybantsa of BYU.
Henley, who ranks third in the Mountain West for scoring, has scored the fifth-most points by a Lope in a Division I season. He needs 26 points to tie Josh Braun's 2015-16 mark for fourth place.
Owusu-Anane, who ranks fourth in the Mountain West for rebounding, has grabbed the fifth-most rebounds by a Lope in a Division I season. He needs 17 rebounds to tie Gabe McGlothan's 2023-24 mark for fourth place.
GCU junior guard Makaih Williams ranks eighth in the MW for scoring in conference games at 15.9 per game, an uptick from his nonconference average of 10.7.
The Lopes lead the Mountain West in scoring defense (68.4 opponent points per game) and rebounding (36.4 boards per game). They rank 41st nationally for lowest opponent shooting (41.3%).
GCU is last in the Mountain West for 3-point percentage (31.3%) but has made 37.9% of its 3-point attempts over the past five games.
The Lopes are 9-0 when they shoot better than 35% from 3-point range and 16-0 in games they led at halftime.
Fresno State is coming off an 82-68 home win against San José State on Tuesday with 20 points from guard Jake Heidbreder, who is averaging 17.0 points per game.
The Bulldogs have the second-least fouls in the Mountain West at 16.8 per game and have held opponents to the second-lowest 3-point percentage (29.8%).
Fresno State makes the second-most turnovers in the conference at 12.6 per game.
In the teams' first meeting, Henley posted 23 points and 10 rebounds with Owusu-Anane adding nine points and 12 rebounds. Fresno State was led by 6-foot-6 freshman DeShawn Gory's 19 points and 10 rebounds before he fouled out.