Friday afternoon in San Antonio, Creighton makes their 19th NCAA Tournament appearance, and 10th in the last 16 years. All too often in those 18 prior appearances, and especially in the ones since 1989, they’ve been the underdog. This year is different. Thanks to a stellar regular season that earned them a #3 seed, rarely before have they entered a tournament with such lofty expectations — or, perhaps more accurately, with a draw that made those expectations so realistically achievable.
First up on their journey to the second weekend and beyond is Louisiana, an automatic qualifier out of the Sun Belt Conference. They’re 23-11 on the season, and went 12-4 in non-conference games, including three losses to eventual postseason teams — a 76-63 loss at Arkansas, a 87-68 loss at Baylor, and a 113-74 trucking at Louisville. Those three defeats notwithstanding, this is a talented enough group to make this a more competitive game than your typical 3 vs 14 matchup (three seeds are 99-17 all-time against 14s, and have won 24 of the past 26).
They’re led by 6’3″ junior guard Elfrid Payton, a long, athletic point guard with a 6’7″ wingspan that allows him to play bigger than his height would suggest. As fast as any point the Jays have faced this year, Payton has a dynamite first step that allows him to explode past defenders and get to the rim pretty much anytime he wants to. As you’d expect, he fills the stat sheet up — Payton averages 19.1 points, 6.0 assists and 5.9 rebounds per game, while shooting 53% from the field.
Defensively, his length allows him to smother opposing guards or to serviceably defend smaller forwards, making up in quickness what he gives up in height. That’s why some have speculated he might draw the assignment of guarding Doug McDermott, at least occasionally. He averages almost 2.5 steals a game, and does a great job of harassing opponents into silly mistakes. Playing for the United States’ U19 team this past summer, Payton stated every game for the eventual Gold Medal-winning team, impressing scouts while showing his skills translated against better competition.
He’s not without flaws, though. His range is not very good — to be frank, on anything further out than about 12 feet, Payton is not the guy you want taking the shot. He makes just 26% from three-point range (13-50 this year) and air balled a 10-foot jumper late in their Sun Belt Tournament game against Georgia State. Those struggles extend to the free-throw line, where he’s an unacceptably-bad-for-a-point-guard 61.1%. That’s a very real issue, because he gets to the line a TON — Payton attempted 293 free throws this year, or 91 more than Doug McDermott.
He also doesn’t finish well with his left hand, and regardless of which side of the basket he drives to, he will almost always shoot with his right hand. That lack of ambidextrousness is something defenses have been able to exploit. Perhaps most importantly, though, Payton simply plays out of control at times. He averages 3.7 turnovers per game, has a penchant for making really silly mistakes, and can be forced into bad passes if you pressure him defensively.
6’9″ forward Shawn Long is their second-leading scorer, averaging a double-double with 18.7 points and 10.5 rebounds a game. He’s a fantastic interior player on offense, and had big performances in some of their biggest games, including 17 points and 12 rebounds against Louisiana Tech, 25 points against Louisville and 22 points and 12 rebounds against Houston. Especially for a 6’9″ player, Long has good range, and has made 32-75 three-pointers this year (42.7%).
He’s not a great defender, though, and he’s consistently in foul trouble, averaging 4.7 fouls per 40 minutes and 3.5 per game. It’s his inability to guard without fouling that makes it unlikely he’ll spend much time defending McDermott. He’s also a below-average free-throw shooter, making just 67% (120-177).
Their third-leading scorer is Bryant Mbamalu, a 6’2″ senior guard, and along with 6’5″ senior forward Eldridge Moore, they have two experienced players in key complementary roles. Mbamalu was the Sun Belt Tourney MVP after scoring 20, 23, and 13 points in the three games, averaging 18.6 points and 6.6 rebounds. Moore is their “glue guy”, a versatile player that can defend, can shoot when asked to, and plays big minutes without making mistakes.
Interestingly, their best three-point shooter isn’t any of those guys, though. It’s Xavian Rimmer, a 6’2″ junior-college transfer who makes 43.8% from long range (57-130). He made seven 3-pointers in the Sun Belt title game, which sounds Lumberjack-esque, but that’s completely out of character; his 12 attempts in that game were five more than any game since November and a career high, and his seven makes were also a career high and just the second time since the new year that he’s made more than three in a game.
The Ragin’ Cajuns are a diametrically different team than Creighton played in the first game of their past two NCAA Tournaments — unlike Alabama and Cincinnati, teams who preferred a rough-and-tumble style of play, Louisiana wants to run up-tempo and try to outscore you. They average 81.4 points per game on 46.7 percent shooting from the field, 37.0 percent three-point shooting and 67.1 percent accuracy at the line, which are excellent numbers. They also give 75.2 points per game, allow opponents to 49.2% from the floor and 33.2% from three-point range, and as we saw when we broke down the film earlier this week, they give up a plethora of wide-open looks. Sun Belt teams were unable to make them consistently pay for that deficiency, but against Creighton — the best three-point shooting team in America — they’ll be in huge trouble if CU shoots anywhere close to their average.
Creighton is 22-1 this season when scoring 70 points or more, and when they score 80 points or more, they’re 17-1 this year and 52-2 in four seasons under Greg McDermott. Keep in mind, Louisiana gives up an average of 75.2 points per game. They’re good, but unless they’ve figured out a way to defend over the past five days since their last game, they’re probably going home on Friday — no one has been able to succeed at out-scoring the Bluejays, and it’s not likely that the Ragin’ Cajuns will be the first.
About the Ragin’ Cajuns: In his fourth season as head coach, Bob Marlin leads his second school into the NCAA Tourney, as he took Sam Houston State there twice — 2003 (losing to Florida) and 2010 (losing to Baylor) … The Cajuns are making their sixth official appearance in the postseason, and first since 2000. Their lone win in the NCAA Tournament was an 87-83 decision over Oklahoma in the West Regional in Tempe, Arizona on March 20, 1992 … The Ragin’ Cajuns are 3-1 in overtime games, and are 7-3 in games decided by five points or less, beginning with a 73-69 win over NCAA Championship participant Coastal Carolina in the finals of the EA Sports Maui on the Mainland Classic in November.
One Big Paragraph with Lots O’Dots™: The Bluejays are 11-19 all-time in NCAA action, including an 8-10 record in its first game … This year, Creighton went 9-5 against teams that made the 2014 NCAA Tournament and 3-2 against NIT qualifiers … Creighton is the 12th Big East team in the last eight NCAA Tourney’s to earn a No. 3 seed. The last 11 teams went 25-10 with one national title (Connecticut) and seven Sweet 16 bids … Creighton is 25-0 this year when leading at halftime, but just 1-7 when trailing at intermission … Jahenns Manigat is nine points shy of 900 for his career … Grant Gibbs is 11 assists shy of 500 dimes at Creighton, which would make him the fourth player in school history to do so … Creighton owns a 2-3 record all-time in the West Region, including wins in 1991 (New Mexico State) and 1941 (Wyoming).
The RUN-DMD Show: Doug McDermott 11 points away from having 1,000 more points than any other player in Creighton history, as Rodney Buford scored 2,116 in his career. He is also 11 points away from 900 this season.
Sit back and think for a second — did you ever envision Creighton would have a player that would outscore Rodzilla by ONE THOUSAND POINTS? Of course not. That’s absurd. And yet, here we are.
Out of Context Ron Swanson Quote: “Never half-ass two things. Whole-ass one thing.”
The Last Time They Played: On November 17, 2010, Creighton beat Louisiana 63-58 in Omaha, the third game of the Greg McDermott Era at Creighton. They were just starting to refer to themselves as Louisiana instead of Louisiana-Lafayette, and that led to confusion as to who exactly the Jays were playing. In his postgame radio segment after the previous game, Coach Mac appeared to be preparing for the wrong team, as I joked about in the Primer before that game:
“He called the upcoming opponent ‘Louisiana-Monroe’ and said they played a Princeton-style offense which would be great preparation for the game with Northwestern the following weekend, as the Wildcats famously run that offense. Well, Louisiana-Monroe does indeed run the Princeton offense. Trouble is, that’s not who’s coming into Omaha tonight to play. Its Louisiana-Lafayette, or simply Louisiana, also known as “Louisiana’s Ragin’ Cajuns.”
You can excuse his confusion given their name-changing mess, something that continues to be confusing to this day as alluded to in Patrick Marshall’s chat with Ragin’ Cajuns’ writer-extraordinaire Joshua Parrott. Louisiana, or Louisiana-Lafayette, or whatever you want to call them, gave that 2010 Creighton team quite a battle — while the Jays led 34-28 at the half and won 63-58, it was close throughout. Kenny Lawson had a double-double with 15 points and 11 rebounds, while freshman Doug McDermott had 12 points and 6 rebounds in just his third collegiate game.
The Series: Creighton and Louisiana have met just four times previously, and only once since 1977 when ULL was known as Southwestern Louisiana. The Ragin’ Cajuns won 78-77 in Omaha in 1967 in the first meeting. In January of 1977 Creighton won 90-79 in Omaha, before losing 11 months later in Lafayette, 94-87. Creighton evened the series in 2010 with a 63-58 win in Omaha.
Greg McDermott is 1-0 against both Louisiana and their head coach, Bob Marlin. He is 2-0 all-time against current Sun Belt Conference teams (1-0 vs. Louisiana and 1-0 vs. Louisiana-Monroe).
Gratuitous Linkage: There’s been a lot of great pieces published this week previewing this game. The New Orleans Times-Picayune wrote that Elfrid Payton has the Bluejays full attention, while Grantland wrote that he’s an electric player with the best crossover in college.
This Date in Creighton Hoops History: On March 21, 2011, Creighton beat Davidson 102-92 in the second round of the CBI. That tournament gets scoffed at by a lot of folks — and the attendance that night of 4,832 certainly showed the lack of interest even among CU fans — but the extra practice time those six games gave Creighton were absolutely a key to the three NCAA Tournaments in three years run that the team is currently enjoying. It was also a key proving ground for the up-tempo offense they now employ; after averaging 66.7 points in 33 games entering the CBI, Creighton averaged 80.0 in six tournament games.
The 102 points they scored against Davidson was a season-high; freshman Doug McDermott scored 31 points on 8-12 shooting, 2-5 three-pointers and 13-14 free throws to go along with 10 rebounds. Antoine Young had 22 points and 9 assists, and Josh Jones had 21 points with two steals. Most importantly, though, was something Ott wrote about after the game:
Something special is happening…I’m not exactly sure what it is, but it’s something. A team that many times during the season seemed to struggle just to run offensive sets, let alone score in bunches, has shot better than 50% from the field and better than 40% from 3-point range in consecutive CBI games. A team that slugged through second halves of some Valley games has, for two straight games, brought a renewed energy to the court. And the key players in this short-lived evolution will, barring any unforeseen issues, don the White and the Blue on the Hilltop next season.
Though nobody knew it at the time, that something was the start of the best three-year run in program history. Here’s the HDNet recap of that game; video highlights start about two minutes in.
Completely Random, Totally Rad Music Video of the Day: This worked last year. Being superstitious, it’s time to roll it out again.
The Bottom Line: Creighton buries wide open threes early and often. Doug McDermott scores 30. Bluejays win.
Jays 83, Louisiana 69
