Gamecube doesn’t have enough RAM to preload everything at startup like that, you have to go through the menus and pick a game mode and map to load.
Surely if it needed that startup load anyway, then Sakurai wouldn’t be saying he turned the license down in order to get players in the game faster. I’m going to trust Sakurai’s word here!
Pannenkoek does have a few videos documenting stars that can be beaten with No Joystick Allowed strats (these are old and there are more on the secondary UncommentatedPannen channel but I don’t see a playlist compiling them). A full run is definitely not possible, but at least some stars are doable.