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Morning After: Wragge Hits 7 Threes in First Six Minutes as Creighton Ambushes #4 Villanova 96-68

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[Box Score]

Key Stats: Creighton makes a school and Big East record 21 three pointers, and dishes out 25 assists on 33 made baskets. CU builds a lead as high as 41 points — FORTY-ONE!!!!! — on the road against Villanova.

Favorite Moment: With about 14:00 to play in the game, Devin Brooks ripped down an offensive rebound amidst five Villanova defenders under the rim, the shortest guy on the court somehow managing to succeed amidst the trees. and kicked it out to Ethan Wragge.

You know what happened next.

Quick Recap: Twice in the last week, Creighton has played well enough to beat anyone in the country. They’re unrated because sandwiched in between those two wins was a clunker at Providence, but don’t let that distract from the brilliance of the other two games. Last Tuesday, they buried the struggling Butler Bulldogs beneath a 32-6 run that featured baskets on 14 straight possessions, combining their usual offensive efficiency with stifling defense. On Monday, they annihilated the #4 Villanova Wildcats in Philly with an avalanche of three-pointers in one of the most ridiculous displays you’ll ever see.

Over the last 20 years, Creighton’s blown out a lot of teams with relentless offense execution, usually three-pointers, but never on this big of a stage, and never to this extent. I’ve seen almost all of those games, and this one literally had me cackling — nay, laughing maniacally — out loud because it was so absurd, so amazing, that cheering was an insufficient reaction.

This was such a comprehensive, ruthless shooting display that the normally loquacious Greg McDermott was nearly speechless in his postgame interview with Fox’s Bill Raftery. “That…was incredible,” he said with the sort of wide-eyed, breathless look that told a national television audience that it wasn’t hyperbole, as if they needed confirmation.

What made it even more remarkable was that the Bluejays were scorching the nets from the get-go — they didn’t ease into things, they didn’t take a few possessions to get the feel for how Villanova was defending them, they ambushed the #4 team in America on their home court before the Wildcats knew what hit them.

Villanova won the opening tip, and James Bell put up a three which missed; JayVaughn Pinkston corralled the rebound, put up a second shot, and when it missed, too, Doug McDermott cleared. They ran in transition and found Ethan Wragge open for a three, which he swished. 40 seconds later, he nailed a second three after a turnover by Ryan Arcidiacono to give CU a 6-0 lead. Three pointers by Jahenns Manigat and Doug McDermott followed on the next two possessions, while Villanova tried to keep up with buckets by Daniel Ochefu and Darrun Hilliard. It was 12-5, Creighton, when Wragge nailed his third three-pointer to grow the lead to 10, prompting a timeout by Jay Wright in an attempt to slow down The Lumberjack.

Unfortunately for Wright and the Wildcats, there were still a lot of t(h)rees left to be chopped down, and The Lumberjack had barely broken a sweat. Wragge buried a three at the 16:13 mark and another with 15:49 to go, sending the teams into the first media timeout with Creighton in front 21-5.

Would he cool down after a break? Nope. On the Jays’ first possession after the timeout, Wragge swished another three — his sixth straight without a miss — and 44 seconds later, he buried another. At the 13:55 mark of the first half, Wragge had already made seven three-pointers, was one point shy of his career-high in points, and the Bluejays had jumped out to a 27-8 lead. Three-pointers by Manigat and McDermott, and the first two-point basket of the game (!) followed, giving the Jays 35 points on 16 possessions, or a little over 2 points per possession, which is embarrassingly good in a video game, much less in real life against this caliber of opponent.

Villanova attempted to come back, as you knew they would, because they’re too good and too proud to go down without a fight on their home floor. After Creighton was up 47-19 with seven minutes to go, the Wildcats ended the half on a 22-7 run to slice the lead to 54-41 at the break.

The ‘Cats had withstood the barrage, and down just 13, probably felt good about their chances to come back. 13 points is nothing over 20 minutes of basketball, especially for the fourth-rated team in America, a squad with the weapons and depth to make 13 points evaporate in half that much time.

Creighton wasn’t having any of it. They built their lead in the first half on a barrage of three-pointers, but they broke Villanova’s back in the second half with tremendous defense. Over the first 15 minutes of the second half, they allowed just 10 — you read that right, TEN — points to the second-highest scoring team in the Big East. Meanwhile, they continued scoring almost at will, putting together a 38-10 run to open the half en route to a 92-51 lead at the 5:33 mark, punctuated by a ferocious dunk from freshman Zach Hanson.

The second-half run was more impressive than the first, because once Villanova clawed their way back into the game, the Jays’ stepped on their throats and refused to allow them to get any closer. They displayed a killer instinct, taking the opportunity to not just win, but win convincingly.

By the end of the night, all sorts of records had been tied or set. Ethan Wragge tied Kyle Korver’s ten-year old record for most three-pointers in a game with 9, and he broke the record for most threes by a Villanova opponent. As a team, Creighton broke the school-record for most three-pointers in a game with 21, one better than the previous mark of 20 set against UT-Chattanooga in 2005. CU’s 21 three-pointers also broke the Big East record for most threes in a game.

Was it the biggest win in school history? That’s not a fair assessment to make this soon after the game; the bias of recentness makes it impossible to fairly gauge. This morning, it sure as hell feels like it was, but the previous wins over Top 5 teams were big, too — toppling #5 New Mexico State in 1970 was a program-changing win in its’ time, as was beating Larry Bird’s Indiana State team on the road in 1978. For now, it’s enough to know that it was a historic night, the most memorable win (so far) in a season full of memorable wins, and arguably the greatest offensive explosion in a three-year span full of offensive explosions.

What’s most astonishing to me is that this wasn’t an aberration. Creighton has had runs like this, halves like this, in other games this year — and they likely will again. National media painting this as a fluke, or as something that isn’t repeatable, clearly haven’t been paying attention. The Bluejays possess the best offense in the country, and from time to time, they’re not just the best, they’re unbeatable.

Quotables:

“Really proud of the team. On a short turnaround, playing a team as good as Villanova, we were razor-sharp on both ends of the floor with our focus. Obviously, Ethan got it going, and I’ve said it all along, I think he’s one of the best shooters in the country. If you’re going to leave Doug in the post, and leave Ethan to stand there behind the arc, teams are going to pay for that. I loved what we did on offense, loved our unselfish approach to the game, but defensively, we held a team that’s been pretty good all season to below 40% shooting. We won the rebounding battle on their court. We did everything we had to do to win, and I’m really proud of my guys.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“After Villanova regained some momentum at the end of the first half, we talked about defense and focused on defense at halftime. We talked about continuing to move the basketball. We had a great possession to start the half that lasted a minute, and Jahenns hit the layup at the end. They scored on only two of their first 12 possessions to start the second half. Unlike the problems we had at Providence, where we really got beat up, they were 2-8 to start the game and 2-12 to start the second half. That portion of the game cost us the game at Providence, and tonight it won us the game.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“I’ve never seen anything like Ethan’s start to the game. But then, I’ve seen things in practice from this kid that I’ve never seen before, either. We’ve talked about it before, he’s such a great teammate, that there’s nobody happier for Ethan than that group of guys sitting in the locker room. He’s earned it all. He’s a great teammate, and it’s good when good things happen to good people.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“We talked about it in the locker room after the Providence game, about how quickly we needed to turn the page from that one. So unbelievably proud of the guys in the locker room today. We all came as one, we fought from the start, and even though we made a bunch of threes to start the game, even if we didn’t do that, we held them to five points by the first media timeout so we did a great job defensively. That will be overlooked a little because of our offensive numbers, but we played great defense. This shows how much we’ve improved from our California trip. We let one loss beat us twice, but this time we bounced right back.” -Jahenns Manigat on 1620AM Postgame

“I’ve seen four of five different times over the years where Ethan’s just completely on fire like that. Usually it’s in like summertime pickup ball, or in a summer league game, or in practice early in the season when new guys are still getting used to guarding him. The way he was shooting the ball tonight, how could you not feed him? That’s exactly what we were trying to do; we’d drive inside, the defense would collapse and leave Ethan standing by himself. And you know how Ethan is, a hand in his face is not enough to be discouraged.” -Jahenns Manigat on 1620AM Postgame

“I was a little upset with the way I shot the ball at Providence, and just overall with the way my shot was coming off, so I spent some extra time getting a few shots up before the game. I was talking to the coaching staff about it, and they each had something that they wanted to critique, but as a shooter you can’t think about all that. You just have to go out there and let it fly.” -Ethan Wragge on 1620AM Postgame

“Going back to my Eden Prairie days, I’ve never had a start like that. With how clean my first look was, I was kind of surprised. I got it away and from there I was rolling. My shot didn’t feel any different in warmups — it’s always feeling pretty consistent — but you don’t get that feeling of being in the zone until gametime anyway.” -Ethan Wragge on 1620AM Postgame

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