The opening statement did nothing to erase the reasonable doubt in Dick Bennett's mind.

On his debut -- unofficial, as it was an exhibition game -- as the new head basketball coach at Washington State, Bennett made his way down the backstage ramp at Friel Court and looked up to see 1,208 souls dotting the roughly 6,000 available seats, not counting the thousands in the upper reaches covered with black plastic.

The opening statement did nothing to erase the reasonable doubt in Dick Bennett's mind.

On his debut -- unofficial, as it was an exhibition game -- as the new head basketball coach at Washington State, Bennett made his way down the backstage ramp at Friel Court and looked up to see 1,208 souls dotting the roughly 6,000 available seats, not counting the thousands in the upper reaches covered with black plastic.

This is the part he's having difficult time grasping. Not the talent level, not the long-odds recruiting, not the scheduling challenges. It's the daunting disdain people have come to have for basketball at WSU.

"That was disappointing," Bennett admitted the morning after, "considering I just got a call from Wisconsin and they had their first exhibition game and had 17,000 fans. What we had was a nice `concert' crowd.

"I know that those are things which, at this point, we have no control over. If we can play some good basketball, I know the interest will grow -- gradually."

At this point, however, gradually is a torrent for WSU.

That's why, first-night turnout notwithstanding, it is not unreasonable to suggest that there is a new level of optimism and anticipation about college basketball at all four of the Inland Northwest's NCAA Division I schools -- a confluence that hasn't occurred since, well, ever. Or at least not since Eastern Washington joined the D-I ranks 20 years ago.

At WSU, that optimism and anticipation is tied solely to the arrival of Bennett, who accepted an offer to come out of the retirement he retreated to after taking Wisconsin to the Final Four in 2000 -- and who rebuilt virtually from scratch programs at Wisconsin, Green Bay and Stevens Point. Even though Cougars basketball had flatlined, Bennett's national reputation has provided the first blast of the cardiac paddles to get it going again.

At Gonzaga, obviously, it's an entirely different scenario -- not just optimism but a runaway rabidity born from the Bulldogs' NCAA Tournament runs dating back to 1999, and culminating now with a team put together by coach Mark Few that cracked the preseason Top 10 and a new arena due to open for the 2004-05 season.

Over at EWU, the hopes and aspirations of the Eagles and their growing number of fans were crystallized by an appearance in last season's National Invitation Tournament -- a postseason first for Eastern, where coach Ray Giacoletti returns a team capable of making a very necessary next step to the NCAAs.

At Idaho, it's impossible to pinpoint a single symbol for increased good feelings. The Vandals aren't welcoming a new coach, building a new palace or coming off a postseason appearance. But they have made tangible gains on the court in two years under coach Leonard Perry and have an incoming recruiting class that has gained national notice, and that's as good a place as any to start.

Since EWU's jump to Division I for the 1983-84 season, there has never been a year in which all four of the area schools produced winning records. Three of the four reached that standard from 1992 through 1994 (when Eastern was awful) and most recently in 1998 (when the Cougars began to bottom out). You have to go back to 1982, when EWU was still a Division II member, that all four schools were over .500.

It's a stretch to suggest it's going to happen this year, with Bennett's reclamation job being so massive. But, again, mere optimism is a step in the right direction. Of course, at this point in time, it is one thing to be optimistic and quite another to be Gonzaga.

If the Zags' season-opening loss to St. Joseph's served to tone down the hyperbole, temporarily, all it takes is one look next door to The Kennel to see what the Bulldogs have built -- and are building.

The still unnamed 6,000-seat arena rising from what used to be Gonzaga's baseball field is both symbol and substance of the Zags' climb in the college basketball world -- and jolt to the sensibilities.

"It's the largest and most expensive building the university has ever undertaken," acknowledged athletic director Mike Roth, "so the significance both in a basketball sense and otherwise is tremendous."

Yet unlike many signs of "progress" among collegiate athletic programs around the country -- whether they be new buildings, conference changeovers or steps up in class -- Gonzaga's new structure is as much about meeting a demand as it is about ambition.

"I know I couldn't rank them," said Roth. "There was definitely a demand for more seats here. We just did our ticket distribution for our next game against Idaho and we had to turn students away. Only in a couple of instances in the last five years has the public even been able to try to buy a ticket in our building. The Georgia game, which we're playing downtown, is sold out.

"Coupled with that is the desire to grow the program. We have a tremendous staff and we've done some things to retain them, and they've obviously done some amazing things in the way of attracting great players and people. The only thing within our control that we hadn't done was have a facility of comparable stature."

With its opening still a year away, the new arena's three highest-priced seating areas are sold out. Only about 900 seats remain.

Perhaps the only glitch to this growth is one of timing. With its No. 10 ranking to enter season, Gonzaga is obviously fielding its most talented team -- and wouldn't it have been fun to have it open the new arena? Much -- perhaps too much -- has been made of Eastern's three straight losses in the Big Sky Conference title game, which have kept the Eagles out of the NCAA Tournament. But even if it was more subtle than a journey into Bracketville, last year's NIT appearance follows a familiar blueprint.

Even Gonzaga got its postseason start in the NIT.

EWU's first appearance on that stage was a wild adventure. Sent to Laramie to play Wyoming, the Eagles got caught in the worst blizzard to hit the northern Colorado region in 90 years and wound up on a 72-hour expedition that ended with a 78-71 loss -- but the real victory was in credibility.

"The NCAA is the big one, but the NIT is a real reward," said Giacoletti. "The kids can feel proud about something. They can see that NIT watch on their wrist and feel a sense of pride. And it does put you at a different level.

"In any other league, second place gets you into the NCAAs. Where we fall on the food chain, that isn't the case, but getting invited to the NIT was a tangible step for our program and helped reinforce the other steps that we've made the past few years."

By putting together their fourth straight winning season and fifth in six years, the Eagles saw their attendance at Reese Court jump nearly 600 a game to an all-time average high of 2,645. Like any program builder, Giacoletti would like to have seen a more dramatic increase -- but noted that the most important steps have occurred within the locker room, anyway.

"I wouldn't say things have gotten crazy out here," he said, "but I do sense a different spirit -- more from just our guys that are in the program. I think there's at least a mentality now, a definition in our own minds about who we are in the big circle of Division I basketball. We're not hoping anymore, we're expecting to go out and beat people. It takes a long time to try and convince people of that." Perry finds himself several steps behind Giacoletti in that process. The Vandals haven't had a winning season since 1999, but the 6-21 team he took over went 13-15 a year ago and broke into the Big West Conference's upper division. With four starters returning and that strong incoming class, obviously expectations have jumped, as much as that scares Perry to death.

Progress can be seen in Idaho's losses, too. After a couple of unsightly blowouts in Moscow at the hands of Boise State and UC Irvine in 2002, last year Idaho's home defeats came by 5 points, 6, 9, 4, 7 and in overtime.

"Maybe the best thing we've accomplished is having teams knowing they can't come in here and it's an automatic win," said Perry, a Vandal player himself in 1990 and 1991. "You're going to have to buckle your seat belt in here."

That would be even more the case if Idaho can boost attendance at Cowan Spectrum -- the basketball sub-cluster inside Kibbie Dome that has done wonders for game atmosphere ("it's not a barn anymore," said Perry). A year ago, Idaho averaged 2,174 customers per game. Naturally, in a historical perspective, all Vandal teams compete against the ghosts of 20 years ago, when Don Monson's program might put five times that many in the dome for a home game.

"It's something we have to earn, we know that," said Perry. "We can be entertaining and play hard and people appreciate that, but winning is the bottom line.

"I know it's more difficult to get fans to come today. At Eastern, Ray should be handling sellout problems with what he's done with the program. Gonzaga's success speaks for itself, but I don't ever recall them playing in an empty gym. And Dick Bennett's name alone should -- should -- put 7,000 butts in the seats at WSU. We have our work cut out for us, but I hope to get it back to the point we had it at when I played here. If we continue to make good progress, I think people will respond." While Bennett's hiring was certainly a coup for WSU, few people will buy a ticket to watch him sit on his stool at courtside and conduct business. Like Perry, Bennett grasps the bottom-line relationship of winning to fan interest, and though "talk like that scares me," he said, "it's the truth."

With his Big Ten background, what Bennett does have difficulty grasping is just how the interest level at WSU could have fallen so precipitously.

"I assumed because it was a Pac-10 school and it plays against programs like Arizona and UCLA and others with storied histories, there would be a similar kind of interest," he said. "But I don't know if there are enough pure basketball fans. From the times I've spoken and the questions I've gotten, I'm just not sure of the basketball interest."

And yet he knows it's there, 75 miles to the north.

"It can be awkward in an area of good basketball if you happen to be considered a program from a major conference and you are the worst of the programs," he said. "I know what it's like to be Gonzaga, because that's what it was like for us at Green Bay. We were the best program in the state and that included Wisconsin and Marquette. In those years, Wisconsin refused to play us and it was hard for them -- they were the butt of many jokes, as I'm sure we are.

"But in the long run, having nothing but good programs in your area is great for basketball."