By RYAN COLLINGWOOD

Staff Writer

As Gonzaga's lead against Xavier ballooned in Saturday's West Regional final, so did the elation in Quentin Hall's living room.

Hall, his wife and three young children watched from their home in the Bahamas as the Bulldogs crossed the Final Four threshold for the first time.

"The little boys were jumping up and down. It was a very emotional moment for me," Hall said during a phone interview Thursday with The Press. "It almost brought tears to my eyes."

Eighteen years earlier, Hall, a former Gonzaga and North Idaho College guard, came tantalizingly close to the same feat.

The fiery, 5-foot-8 Bahamian was a memorable figure on the Bulldogs' 1999 squad which made an unforeseen run to the Elite 8, vaulting the little Spokane Jesuit school into the national spotlight.

Tenth-seeded Gonzaga and Hall's collegiate career came to a close in a 67-62 loss to eventual national champion UConn, a day in which Hall scored a team-high 18 points.

The West Coast Conference power has punched its ticket to the tournament every year since, the fourth-longest active streak in NCAA Division I hoops.

After Gonzaga's milestone triumph Saturday, Hall was inundated with texts, calls and social media messages.

"Be proud today, brother. You and your crew started this!" one friend posted to his Facebook wall.

Hall, now a 40-year-old coach and teacher, sees the same cohesiveness with this year's team as the breakthrough ’99 club.

"You can just see the spirit among them. It's incredible," Hall said. "We were good friends, and you can tell that they're good friends. You see the camaraderie, and that doesn't happen overnight."

But can the Zags win a national title?

"They gotta deal with South Carolina first," Hall said of Gonzaga's upcoming Final Four matchup Saturday. "I put my mind frame into how they should be thinking: Can't think ahead."

Consider it a coach's mentality.

Hall, who also coaches the Bahamas Junior National team, has helped develop such Bahamian talent as former Oklahoma star Buddy Hield, the sixth pick in the 2016 NBA Draft. Hall was a member of that squad in the mid-’90s when Gonzaga noticed him at a tournament in Las Vegas.

Academically, though, he would have to take the junior college route before enrolling at Gonzaga.

GU, then directed by coach Dan Fitzgerald, placed Hall at nearby North Idaho College.

"I remember getting off the plane in Spokane, and it was so cold," said Hall, who played professionally in Europe for seven years. "I remember (then NIC assistant coach and Coeur d'Alene native) Brian Hancock coming to pick me up. He made me feel so welcome. I met some great people at NIC."

At NIC, Hall averaged 8.6 points and 3.6 assists under Rolly Williams, the final season of the coach's decades-long tenure. The summer before his sophomore year, though, Hall was dismissed by new head coach Hugh Watson for an undisclosed rules violation.

He finished his juco requirements at Yakima Valley Community College with head coach Leon Rice. The man would go on to become a longtime Gonzaga assistant. Rice is now the head coach at Boise State.

Hall is one of three former North Idaho College products to play on a Gonzaga tournament team. Paul Rogers, a 7-foot Australian, played one season for the Cardinals before making the move across the state line, helping the Bulldogs reach their first NCAA tournament in 1995. He was selected in the second round of the 1997 NBA Draft by the Los Angeles Lakers.

Winston Brooks was an NIC point guard for the 2000-2001 season before transferring to GU, helping the Bulldogs reach the 2002 and 2003 NCAA Tournaments.

Hall was a junior on the last Gonzaga team to feel the sting of an NCAA Tournament snub in 1998. The Bulldogs went 24-10 and won the WCC regular season title, but settled for an NIT berth after getting bounced in the conference tournament.

"We deserved to be in the NCAA Tournament that year, but it didn't happen." he said. "But I got to experience the tournament the next year.

“Growing up in the Bahamas, your dream is to play in that tournament. With this year's (Gonzaga) team you see that sense of urgency in their faces that we had."