Coming off their biggest win of the season over #13 Marquette on Friday night, the Creighton men’s soccer team earned another quality result with a 0-0 draw at Tulsa on Tuesday. The humid and rainy weather throughout the match created several chaotic moments given how fast the ball was moving across the pitch, but both back lines and goalkeepers held up throughout the 90 minutes to earn their respective clean sheets.
“It was tough conditions for both sides,” Creighton head coach Johnny Torres said. “I thought both sides looked a little tired in the first half, although I think Tulsa had the better of the play. But what great fight our guys showed to come out in the second half. I thought we were the better team in the second half — there were some chances to come away with three points, but nonetheless that’s a very good Tulsa side. I think they’ll be in the conversation at the end of the season to play in the [NCAA] Tournament.
“It’s still a good result for us to come out here under these conditions against such a good program and come out with one point.”
Tulsa entered the night with a 20-0-3 record at home in the regular season over the last three-plus years. Creighton was the first team to shut them out at Hurricane Stadium since West Virginia in the Sweet 16 in November 2021. A big reason for that was the play of team co-captain Mark O’Neill and his back line of senior Luke Mitchell, reigning two-time Big East Freshman of the Week Andrija Savic, and first-year goalkeeper Blake Gillingham who transferred in after spending his freshman season at Santa Clara in 2022.
Tulsa tested O’Neill’s right side over and over again in the first half, but the fourth-year junior out of Louisville, Colorado won every battle with savvy tackles in front of the 18-yard box, an end line header on an open net shot, and several blocks and deflections on crosses and shots in the final third. As a result, only five of Tulsa’s 14 shots over the course of the match ended up on target.
“A very good performance from Mark and I’ll tell you what, this trio at the back that’s been playing there for the last couple games in Savic, Mitchell, and O’Neill … they’ve been tremendous,” Torres said. “Those guys are a solid block for us at the back, and we have a lot of confidence in them. They are pillars back there for us.”
Since getting the nod in net, sophomore Blake Gillingham was once again up to the task, sometimes in spectacular fashion, to preserve a result for the Jays. After making five saves in his first career start as a Bluejay in a 2-1 win over Marquette last Friday night, the third-year sophomore shot-stopper made four saves against the Golden Hurricane to help CU move to 2-3-3 on the season. Down the stretch as Tulsa ramped up their pursuit of the game-winner, Gillingham made a kick save and smothered the redirect in one sequence, then a few minutes later laid out to the post to punch away another dangerous chance to record the second shutout of his college career.
“He has some qualities that definitely help our side,” Torres said of his young goalkeeper. “I’ve always said that if the goalkeeper makes the saves he’s supposed to make, but also one or two that he’s not supposed to make it’s going to help you elongate your season. Blake did that tonight.”
Offensively, Creighton struggled to break down Tulsa defense and create quality chances in the first half. That allowed the Golden Hurricane to build momentum going into the locker room. After halftime, however, the Jays were much crisper on the ball and applied more direct pressure on Tulsa’ defense for longer stretches in the second half. CU generated four of their seven corner kicks and eight of their 10 shots after halftime.
“In that first half I think we were a little bit more selective in when we wanted to press, and I think that gave them the upper hand,” Torres said. “Although, in the first three quarters of the first half I felt like a lot of the possession that they had was in their half [of the field], which we were okay with. But when you look at the last 10-12 minutes of the half, that’s when they were able to progress through us and have some opportunities on goal and broke us down quite a bit.”
“In the second half, we weren’t quite as selective in regard to our press. We just wanted to get on the front foot, step our lines up, and be more aggressive in our press. I thought we did a good job of executing that in the second half.”
Tulsa carried a 25-match regular season unbeaten streak at home into Tuesday night’s contest. With the shutout, the Jays became only the fourth team to earn a draw on Tulsa’s home field since 2020. Next up, Creighton jumps back into Big East play with a Saturday afternoon matchup at DePaul on tap. The Bluejays and Blue Demons (1-4-2) are set for a 1:00 p.m. kickoff on Flo Sports.
