CWU is looking to pull off the biggest upset in school history when they tip off against Gonzaga Thursday, Nov. 1. Its may be only scheduled as an exhibition game, but it offers a chance for the young CWU men’s basketball team to prove that they belong.

CWU finished 15-13 overall last year and 10-10 in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference. There are many storylines to follow, but none more anticipated than the debut of new CWU head coach Brandon Rinta.

Rinta coached at Lewis-Clark State College (LCSC) for seven seasons. He accumulated a 164-62 record and guided LCSC to three Frontier Conference regular-season titles that also included five National Association Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) Tournament appearances. Officially hired for CWU on April 18, Rinta is excited about the upcoming matchup.

“What we might be able to draw out of this more than a regular exhibition game is being able to play at the level we want to play in a crazy environment,” Rinta said. “We’ll play in lots of them this year and this will be a good test run.”

Gonzaga opened up the preseason ranked 3rd in the AP top 25 rankings for DI basketball. They have been to every NCAA Tournament since 1999 and are fresh off of a sweet sixteen appearance last season. The success is obvious and has many players anxious to get the game started. CWU 6’4 guard Andreas Brown will be asked to matchup with the size that the Zags have on the perimeter.

“We have to make as little mistakes as possible,” Brown said. “We have to run our sets correctly and play as hard as we can.”

CWU may have caught Gonzaga at the right time, as forward Killian Tillie re-aggravated his ankle injury during practice and required surgery. The 6-foot-10 french forward who averaged 12.9 points last season will be out for up to eight weeks.

The young CWU team has 10 new faces this year, four of them being incoming freshmen. Chemistry is going to be tested early on and it may be a huge factor on whether CWU walks out of the Kennel with a win.

“The players have been showing up with a workman like attitude every single day,” Rinta said. “There’s going to be some juices flowing.”