Dawson Garcia’s loyalty to the suddenly surging Gophers has finally yielded some success

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Dawson Garcia held up the phone that was handed to him in the happy chaos on Minnesota’s homecourt to record a brief shoutout to the fans, as dozens of them squeezed behind him into the shot in the aftermath of an upset of another Top 25 team.

“We’re building something!” Garcia yelled above the din of the Williams Arena crowd.

Evidence of progress for the Gophers has finally become public, and their loyal star Garcia has had his fingerprints all over it. He’s third in the Big Ten in scoring at 19.7 points per game, 11th in rebounds and 13th in blocks.

“The dude makes every single play, and it’s not just in the game, it’s every single day in practice,” teammate Parker Fox said. “His energy is never off. His vibe is never off, and he’s never negative when he could be in situations. He’s never thinking about what’s next. He’s thinking about right now.”

The 6-foot-11, 230-pound Garcia could have gone pro somewhere or picked a different program for a bigger NIL payout, but he returned to his beloved home state program for a fifth season of college basketball for moments like that win against then-15th-ranked Oregon on Saturday in which he had 31 points.

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And the victory over then-20th-ranked Michigan on Jan. 16 secured in overtime with his buzzer-beating swish from near half court.

And the first road win against rival Iowa in 10 years tucked in between.

“He’s the reason why I came back too,” said Fox, a Minnesota native himself who’s in his fourth year with the Gophers and eighth overall after starting his career at the NCAA Division II level at Northern State in South Dakota. “That means a lot to me when we’re able to share those moments, put my arm around him and just kind of look at the crowd when people were storming the court. That’s the most special thing in the world.”

Coach Ben Johnson and his staff have essentially started over in each of his four seasons at his alma mater, with the Gophers being annually gutted by the transfer portal. Garcia, who was a third team All-Big Ten selection in 2023-24, staying put made a major impact even if that hasn’t been apparent in the standings.

Minnesota (11-9, 3-6) hadn’t beaten a ranked team under Johnson until last week.

“Court-storms were in mind, winning big-time games were in mind, and doing it with guys who love to play the game of basketball and for the University of Minnesota as well,” Garcia said. “There’s definitely moments that you dream of as a kid, and once they come you just want to press on even harder and just go even harder to make more memories happen.”

The next opportunity comes quickly: at seventh-ranked Michigan State on Tuesday. Garcia’s streak of five straight 20-point games will be tested by the Spartans.

“He’s forced with his play everybody to elevate and have a new standard,” Johnson said, adding: “When you give yourself up to the game like he has, you get rewarded and good things happen.”

Garcia, who was a 2020 McDonald’s All-American out of Prior Lake High School, played first at Marquette and transferred after one year North Carolina. After losing his spot in the starting lineup, Garcia left the program at midseason for family reasons with his father and grandmother ailing from COVID-19. His grandmother died. North Carolina advanced to the national championship game, but Garcia preferred to stay home. Johnson was more than glad to take him.

Three years later, Garcia and his close friend Fox are trying to finish strong. After the trip to Michigan State, eight of Minnesota’s final 10 games on the conference schedule will come against teams in the bottom half of the league. There are also home games left against No. 18 Illinois (Feb. 8) and No. 17 Wisconsin (March 5), giving the Gophers a couple of additional chances to revel in those ranked-opponent upsets.

“You bring in so many new guys in this new era of the portal, with the amount of money that’s being thrown around to kids these days, it’s really hard to make a team and make it kind of a flawless transition,” Fox said. “How do you do that? There’s no formula for it. Nobody’s written a book on it yet, so I think just for us, it’s just trusting that and realizing that if we show up every day, we have more than enough.”

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