Provo • For the fourth straight season, BYU’s basketball team will end the regular season in 2018 with a game against the mighty Gonzaga Bulldogs.
Nobody in Provo is complaining about that, seeing as how BYU has knocked off Gonzaga three consecutive times in Spokane, which has to be some sort of record.
The West Coast Conference released its 2017-18 men’s and women’s basketball conference schedules on Tuesday. This is the second year that the race will stretch over a nine-week span, with no byes, and no travel partners.
Conference play begins on Dec. 28 and concludes on Feb. 24 (with BYU hosting 2017 national runner-up Gonzaga at the Marriott Center). The Cougars will be playing the Zags twice in three weeks, because they are at The Kennel in Spokane on Feb. 3.
Last year, BYU upset Gonzaga 79-71 in Spokane to hand the then-No 1 Zags their first loss of the season. Gonzaga went on to the NCAA Tournament’s national championship game, where it lost to North Carolina.
Another WCC team that should be in the Top 25, Saint Mary’s, will visit BYU on Dec. 30, a mild bummer for the Cougars because students will not be on campus. BYU travels to Moraga on Jan. 25, having not won there since 2014. Saint Mary’s blew BYU out three times last season and returns most of its team from last season.
The Cougars will open the conference season at home against Portland, which will be part of a five-game home stand that starts with Utah on Dec. 16 and also includes Idaho State and Texas Southern.
In February, the Cougars will play three straight road games — at Pepperdine, at San Diego, at Portland — before returning home for the season finale against the Zags.
Prior to traveling to Gonzaga on Feb. 3, the Cougars will play at Loyola Marymount on Feb. 1. Meanwhile, GU will be waiting on the Cougars because it will play San Diego on Feb. 1.
BYU’s 2017-18 Men’s Basketball Schedule
Nov. 1 — Westminster
Nov. 8 — Colorado College
Nov. 11 — Mississippi Valley State
Nov. 15 — at Princeton
Nov. 18 — UT Arlington
Nov. 21 — Niagara
Nov. 24 — vs. Alabama at Barclays’s Center Classic, New York
Nov. 25 — vs. UMass at Barclay’s Center Classic, New York
Nov. 29 — at Utah Valley University
Dec. 2 — at Utah State
Dec. 6 — Illinois State
Dec. 9 — vs. Weber State at Beehive Classic, Salt Lake City
Dec. 16 — Utah
Dec. 21 — Idaho State
Dec. 23 — Texas Southern
West Coast Conference Games
Dec. 28 — Portland
Dec. 30 — Saint Mary’s
Jan. 4 — at San Francisco
Jan. 6 — at Pacific
Jan. 11 — Pepperdine
Jan. 13 — at Santa Clara
Jan. 18 — Loyola Marymount
Jan. 20 — San Diego
Jan. 25 — at Saint Mary’s
Jan. 27 — Pacific
Feb. 1 — at Loyola Marymount
Feb. 3 — at Gonzaga
Feb. 8 — Santa Clara
Feb. 10 — San Francisco
Feb. 15 — at Pepperdine
Feb. 17 — at San Diego
Feb. 22 — at Portland
Feb. 24 — Gonzaga
March 1-6 — at West Coast Conference Tournament, Las Vegas