Audrey Faber had an impact on Friday night (Spomer / WBR)
A short-handed Marquette team came swinging on Friday night at D.J. Sokol Arena, but Creighton countered with a 28-4 run that spanned nearly 12 minutes of game time in the first half to proved to be enough of a cushion to withstand a furious fourth quarter rally in a 71-65 win over the 13th-ranked Golden Eagles to improve the Bluejays to 14-14 overall and 8-9 in Big East play with one regular season game remaining.
Creighton committed 16 turnovers and gave up 10 offensive rebounds in the second half alone, but when they absolutely needed someone to make a play, they made it, and when they needed a stop, they got it. They knew how much this one mattered in a season full of as many down as ups, and that’s why they bent, stretched, and strained, but never broke.
“It’s hard because you built that lead and you’re watching it go away,” senior forward Audrey Faber said, “but I think we did a really good job this game in our team huddles [on the court] and stayed together. That’s just talking things over, what works, what doesn’t work. We were listening, and I think we all just bought in and were so determined to win. Our huddles were really good, and everyone on the team was locked in.
“I feel like we were all just so bought into the game and focused. I didn’t even really notice [any fatigue] all that much. Adrenaline kicks in obviously, but we all knew how big of a game this was for us. We didn’t have time to be tired.”
Despite losing senior forward and two-time All-Big East selection Erika Davenport (11.9 ppg, 9.4 rpg, 59.5% FG) to a season-ending knee injury last weekend, the D.J. Sokol Arena crowd of 1,111 watched the Golden Eagles sprint out of the gates to take an early lead on Friday. Seniors Danielle King, Natisha Hiedeman, and Amani Wilborn each buried a 3-pointer in front of Creighton’s bench on Marquette’s first three possessions to build an early 9-5 lead, but Creighton seniors Audrey Faber and Jade Owens knocked down jumpers on consecutive possessions to tie the game.
While the seniors got the evening’s festivities underway, it was freshman guard Rachael Saunders that sparked a game-changing run off the bench for the Bluejays with just under three minutes left in the first quarter. With the game all squared up at 13-13, Saunders set a flare screen to get Faber free for a three. The senior from Clive, Iowa buried a shot while a Marquette defender knocked Saunders to the floor trying to close out on the shot. The foul was called, the shot counted, and Saunders would then cut to the basket, catch the in-bounds pass from Faber, and lay it in for a five-point possession. After getting a stop on the defensive end, Saunders leaked out in transition and buried a three-ball of her own from the right corner to extend the lead to eight.
On the final possession of the opening quarter, Saunders got reigning Big East Player of the Year Allazia Blockton to pick up her second foul of the night on a hard close out. Although the freshman only converted on one of the three free throw attempts, the damage was done as she had ignited a 13-0 run to the end the period, and had the opposing team’s best player in foul trouble.
“She’s really been big for us lately,” Faber said. “She made the plays that we needed her to make. When you’re playing a team like that it’s not just going to be your starting five. You need people off the bench to come in and she did … she made really big plays, and that just takes a load off of the people who play more minutes.”
Creighton’s onslaught continued into the second quarter. A deep 3-pointer by senior guard Brooke Kissinger and a pair of free throws by Faber gave the Bluejays a 33-13 lead with 6:38 left to play before halftime.
“Creighton was scoring at will,” Marquette head coach Carolyn Kieger said. “When we’re not getting stops, we can’t run, and we can’t push the tempo that we want to. Literally Creighton, and Faber in particular, got anything they wanted. It was way too easy. We didn’t disrupt the pass, we didn’t get tips or deflections, we didn’t make them uncomfortable. They were just running their offense and they were getting exactly every look that they wanted.”
The Golden Eagles would rally to trim the deficit to nine, but a couple more free throws and a jumper by Faber stretched it back out to 13 at halftime, and it never got within single digits again until the final minute of the game.
The Bluejays got thumped on the glass — giving up 10 offensive rebounds — and committed 11 live-ball turnovers against Marquette’s tenacious full-court pressure defense, but they got enough run-stopping buckets from a host of contributors offensively, along with a few crucial stops on the defensive end to the back-to-back Big East regular season champs have a shot to win the game.
“We prepared really well this week, and we had to dig in when it got tough and when it got close there at the end,” junior forward Jaylyn Agnew said. “In the huddle, Flan asked us who’s the tougher team, and we had to take that upon ourselves and say that we were, and then we had to go out and do it.”
Jaylyn Agnew was in double-figures for the Jays in the win (Spomer / WBR)
Audrey Faber played all 40 minutes for the Jays, and finished with a game-high 24 points on 8-of-13 shooting to go along with seven rebounds and five assists. Agnew joined her in double figures with 15 points, while also chipping in six rebounds, five assists, and two steals. Sophomore guard Temi Carda wasn’t far behind the “Splash Sisters” with 11 points, six rebounds, a game-high six assists, and a pair of steals as well. Sophomore point guard Tatum Rembao had eight points and five rebounds in 20 minutes off the bench, while Saunders finished with six points — all during that crucial 13-0 run to the end the first quarter.
Hiedeman and Wilborn were the only players in double figures for Marquette as the duo combined for 43 points on 40 field goal attempts. Senior point guard Danielle King was just 3-of-13 from the field, but had eight points and a game-high 10 rebounds in 31 minutes suffering what appeared to be a significant leg injury underneath her own basket, and was eventually carried off to the locker room by a team trainer.
The Golden Eagles fell to 23-6 on the season, and now have some work to do before the NCAA Tournament if they want to put themselves back in position to potentially host a first weekend regional.
The Bluejays, on the other hand, have suddenly worked their way back to .500 on the season with three straight wins, and at 8-9 in Big East play now have an outside shot at avoiding the play-in game in next weekend’s Big East Tournament at Wintrust Arena in Chicago, Illinois. Perhaps more importantly, the win over the 13th-ranked team in the country not only gave Creighton its first win over a top 15 opponent in program history, but it adds some substance to the growing belief that they are still capable of making a run to the NCAA Tournament despite enduring a season that seemed destined to be derailed by one uncontrollable circumstance after another.
“With Audrey and Jaylyn, we’ve told them, ‘look, you have played in NCAA Tournament games and now that we’re getting a little healthier, we’ve got a chance to be as good as anybody at the end of the year,'” Creighton head coach Jim Flanery said. “[The win over Marquette] is a testament to the whole team. It’s not just Audrey and Jaylyn, it’s everybody coming to practice. It’s Gracey [Griglione] and Morgan [Turner] and Chloe [Dworak], kids who don’t get to play but come to practice with a good attitude and push the kids who are going to play, and build them up, because that’s important.
“Audrey didn’t want her senior year to look like this. Jaylyn didn’t want her fourth year to look like this. But when they can go to practice and people like Payton and Rachael and younger players are building them up and staying positive and making practice fun and competitive, that’s a huge thing that I feel like our program has that probably not everybody else has. I told our kids that and I’ll tell them again tomorrow. It’s because everybody has stayed positive and been on board.”
Creighton will practice on Saturday morning, then return to action for Senior Day on Sunday afternoon against a DePaul team that is 22-7 overall, 13-4 in the Big East, and currently ranked 24th in the Coaches’ Poll. The Bluejays defeated the Blue Demons 85-82 in the first meeting this season back on December 29 in Chicago. The rematch in Omaha is scheduled for a 1:00 p.m. tip-off at D.J. Sokol Arena and will be broadcast on Fox Sports 2.