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Every sporting event starts with the national anthem, so that’s what we are leading off with here because the one sung prior to Creighton’s 89-53 home win over UMKC on Thursday night at the CHI Health Center had a special twist to it.
Long time team athletic trainer Ben McNair has had the same routine hundreds of times in his tenure at Creighton, but the other night he had to make a little adjustment to pre-game preparations so he could offer some last-minute words of advice to the anthem singer before they took the court. That’s because this particular vocalist was McNair’s 15-year-old daughter, Hannah.
“The real wisdom came when she turned me down to do a duet,” the elder McNair said. “After that I said, ‘I think my job is done.'”
Hannah’s anthem — performed in front of a roughly 60 percent full arena — clocked in at just under a minute and a half and concluded with a smile from her and a round of applause from the teams on the court and the fans in the stands. She sang the national anthem at the College World Series this past summer, so nerves weren’t an issue on Thursday night despite it being “dad’s team” that was playing.
“I don’t really get nervous anymore,” she said. “I’ve done it a bunch of times, so it’s kind of muscle memory now. It’s just fun at this point. It’s just repetition. I’ve done it so many times and it’s the same song, so it’s just fun.”
Mitch Ballock’s all-around impact
Creighton’s sophomore sharpshooting guard has struggled this season to score as often as he gets scored upon, and that was a focus of his against UMKC.
“Mac’s been getting on me for a while for closing out too short and people have been dotting me,” Ballock said. “I’ve been giving up a lot of points and against Oklahoma they kind of went at me, so I kind of took it personal and had to lock in more on the defensive end.”
Ballock didn’t attempt a single shot from the field for the first time in his career, but he dished out five assists, hauled in six rebounds — five on the defensive glass — and more importantly held his various assignments to just four points on 2-for-7 shooting, including 0-for-3 from the beyond the arc. Not often will Ballock be featured in games where he doesn’t score from the field, but head coach Greg McDermott believes that his second-year guard not only made an impact, but took a step forward defensively.
“I thought he did some really good things,” McDermott said. “I’ve been hard on him, because I think there’s more there. I think he understands the game, I think he cares about the game, I think he respects the game. As a coaching staff we have to simplify it for him as best we can. He’s watched a lot of film, so it’s good to see a guy like that — who is known as a scorer — be able to impact the game defensively, on the backboards, and with the pass. That’s a sign, hopefully, of good things to come.”
Too many empty possessions for Creighton
Against the Roos, Creighton ended a possession with a giveaway instead of a shot on 18 occasions, tying a season-high in turnovers that they had just set two games prior in an 83-70 loss at Oklahoma. With Big East play now upon them, Greg McDermott’s team is trending in the wrong direction in the ball security department.
“I don’t know what we were doing, I really don’t,” McDermott said after the game. “We prepared for the pressure. Some of them were really inexplicable. Some of the decisions we made — trying to throw a pass that’s going to get through one out of five times and looks great if it does, but the other four times it’s going the other way … we just have to continue to clean it up. When you have a young team you’re going to have some areas that aren’t perfect, and that’s an area that’s not perfect and I’m not okay with, because our teams really haven’t turned it over much in the past. We have to get back to that.”
D-Rock’s impressive start
After spending 20 years on Creighton’s bench, Darian DeVries finally through his hat into the head coaching ring when he signed up to lead the Drake men’s basketball program last spring. Despite having to add 10 new players to the roster before the season, DeVries has his first team off to a 10-2 start after notching a pair of top 100 KenPom wins over New Mexico State and San Diego to take home the Las Vegas Classic championship last week.
With one non-conference game remaining for the Bulldogs before Missouri Valley Conference play starts, Drake’s strong start has not gone unnoticed by DeVries’ good friend and former boss.
“It’s awesome,” McDermott said. “I’m really happy for what he’s doing. He’s done a great job. The two fifth-year guys, Brady Ellingson and Nick Norton, have really done a good job for him, and the big kid that’s a senior is probably a little bit better and further along than he thought. And he’s getting some good role play from some other spots.
“He’s done a really good job putting that team together and I’m not surprised that they are doing well.”
Epperson’s injury update
Sophomore center Jacob Epperson didn’t dress for UMKC and missed his third game in a row after injury to his knee all season, and more recently to his back — which he suffered in practice prior to the Green Bay game in mid-December. Creighton hasn’t released a definitive timetable for his return, nor his next course of action in his recovery, but all of that should be settled shortly with Epperson’s family in town this week.
“His parents are actually scheduled to be in town tonight and for the game tomorrow,” McDermott said prior to the UMKC game, “so we’ll sit down and talk with them tomorrow once we get everything from the doctors and we’ll put together a plan moving forward.”
Epperson would be eligible for a medical redshirt considering the percentage of games he will end up missing this season should he ultimately opt to have surgery on the knee that has been causing him significant discomfort since practice started at the end of September.
“He hasn’t played in enough games so we could pursue a [medical hardship waiver] if it comes to that,” McDermott said. “Ideally we’d love to get him back on the floor with enough time left in the season where he can have an impact on us and also enough time to get himself back into game shape. We’ll have to weigh that as we move forward in our conversations with him and his parents.”