Gonzaga men’s college basketball has been one of the great phenomenons in sport over the last 25 years or so. The Bulldogs have qualified for 24 consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances, which is the second-longest streak in the nation (since we won’t count cheating Kansas in our tally). Yet in a continued effort by the sports media to lie to its readers in order to get more Internet traffic flowing, Gonzaga is getting buried.

To wit:

We realize the reports of Gonzaga’s alleged demise were published before the team’s last two victories, but even a quick glance at KenPom’s projections a week ago would have told any astute observer the Bulldogs’ mathematical profile was still in the Top 30 of the nation—regardless of whether the school wins its conference championship or not. So why all the doomsday reporting about one of the nation’s best teams?

Good question. We know the NCAA itself doesn’t want a small school winning the national championship, and Gonzaga is the ultimate small school with its sustained success over the last quarter century. But one of the reasons March Madness thrives with its TV ratings is because it is not college football: the little guys have a chance, even if only on paper, to win it all, and many small schools have come close to it recently.

So perhaps trying to pimp the notion the team won’t make it in 2024 drives Internet traffic and advertising revenue for those pathetic news outlets linked above, but are those rags that desperate?! Evidently. Clickbait is dishonest journalism, and shame on these “professionals” for taking the Fox News route to more traffic and ad revenue. The state of modern sports—and its media coverage—just continues to decline in 2024.