Mark Few

Gonzaga University head coach Mark Few has established himself as one of the most successful coaches in NCAA Division I basketball annals in his 25 seasons at the helm, and in the process has made Bulldog basketball a household name across the country. He served as an assistant coach at GU for 10 seasons prior to taking the reins of the program. Few has put together one of the most dominating runs in NCAA history, especially in the West Coast Conference. The Zags have won or shared 22 regular season league titles in his 25 seasons (all but the 1999-2000, 2011-12 and 2023-24 seasons) and taken home the conference tournament championship 19 times. The Bulldogs won or shared 11 straight West Coast Conference regular-season titles from 2000-11 and from 2012-23, which are the third-best streaks all-time in the NCAA Division I ranks behind UCLA’s 13 Pac-10 Conference titles from 1967-79 and Kansas’s 14 Big 12 Conference titles from 2005-18. Few led Gonzaga to the national championship game in the program’s first-ever Final Four in 2017, and again in the second Final Four in 2021. Under Few, GU has appeared in five Elite Eight appearances and 13 Sweet 16 appearances. He has coached 22 All-Americans, nine Academic All-Americans, 102 all-conference selections, 17 WCC Players of the Year, 10 league newcomers of the year and nine league defenders of the year. Few has also cultivated NBA talent, including current NBA players Domantas Sabonis, Kelly Olynyk, Zach Collins, Rui Hachimura, Brandon Clarke, Jalen Suggs, Corey Kispert, Chet Holmgren, Andrew Nembhard, Julian Strawther and Anton Watson. He also helped recruit and develop Dan Dickau, Richie Frahm, Adam Morrison, Jeremy Pargo, Elias Harris, Austin Daye, Rob Sacre, Ronny Turiaf, Kevin Pangos, Filip Petrusev, Killian Tillie and Joel Ayayi, all NBA players. Morrison was the highest-drafted player in GU history when he was taken No. 3 overall by the Charlotte Bobcats in 2006, but Holmgren was taken second overall by the Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2022 draft.

Entering the 2024-25 season, Few is:

• the winningest active coach by percentage at .836 (688-135)

• second fastest to 700 wins in NCAA Div. 1 history, reaching the milestone in 840 games

• top 15 among active Division I coaches for most 20-win seasons with 25, never having won less than 20 games in a season

• first for most consecutive 20-win seasons for active coaches with 25

Few won a gold medal with Team USA at the Summer Olympics in Paris. He was an assistant coach for Team USA on the 2023 FIBA World Cup and the 2024 Olympics. The staff included Head Coach and Golden State Warriors Head Coach Steve Kerr, Miami Heat Head Coach Erik Spoelstra and Clippers Head Coach Tyronn Lue. Few boasts plenty of USA Basketball experience. Serving as an assistant coach at the 2018 USA National Team minicamp, Few was named an assistant coach for the 2019 USA Men’s Select Team, a team that helped prepare the USA World Cup Team prior to playing in China. He returned in 2021 as an assistant coach for the USA Men’s Select Team to help prepare the gold medalist U.S. Olympic Team prior to playing in Tokyo. He served as head coach of the 2015 U.S. Pan American Men’s Basketball Team, a squad composed of collegiate players, and led the team to a bronze medal. He also was an assistant coach for the gold medalist 2012 USA U18 National Team and a court coach for the 2009 USA Men’s U19 World Cup/World University Games Team training camp.

Few will receive the John R. Wooden Award “Legends of Coaching” Award, presented by Principal Financial Group, in 2025. The “Legends of Coaching” honor recognizes coaches who exemplify Coach Wooden’s high standard of coaching success and personal integrity.

For all that Few has accomplished on the court, his achievements off of it are equally impressive. In 2002, Mark and his wife Marcy initiated the Spokane branch of Coaches vs Cancer. The Fews’ annual event would become the largest Coaches vs Cancer fundraiser across the country. Quietly and without fanfare, Few has created a culture of giving at Gonzaga. In 2007, Gonzaga began hosting the Ronald McDonald House Charities Classic. For six seasons, these annual games helped raise over $750,000 for Spokane’s Ronald McDonald House. Building on their success with Coaches vs Cancer, the Fews and others in the Spokane region launched the Community Cancer Fund in 2014 to keep more money in the local market while devoting more resources to cancer patients, their families and the local organizations that serve them. In the last six years, the Community Cancer Fund has raised over 17 million dollars bringing the total raised over 18 years between the organizations to well over 25 million dollars. Among the highlights, the charity established a 3-million-dollar endowment to fund Camp Good Times, a week-long summer camp for kids with cancer. The Community Cancer Fund worked to increase lodging options for cancer patients and their families traveling to the region for treatment, which included the completion and opening of a 5-million-dollar Hospitality Center at Kootenai Health and a campus expansion of Spokane’s Ronald McDonald House.