The Creighton women’s basketball team is riding high right now. In a season full of ups and downs, it appears everything is clicking together at the right time for the Bluejays. They are currently riding a five game winning streak and hope to make it a sixth straight win when they head to Drake on Saturday. Head Coach Jim Flanery is happy with where the team is at this point in the season.
“I think we are playing better than we have all year. That is understandable when you have two Juniors and one Senior. It wasn’t like I thought we would be where the men’s team was in December. I’m pleased that our kids have hung in there and that we had a great chance to be a great team in February if we kept working hard and didn’t let the adversity become too much.”
The Bluejays are finishing a three game road trip to end the regular season. Last weekend they went into Northern Iowa and destroyed the Panthers in front of a television audience and shot a season high 59.6%, the best shooting percentage since 1996. They then turned around and rained in 11-of-21 from the three point line to defeat Bradley.
“We played our best two back to back games we played this year,” said Flanery. “It wasn’t perfect but we continue to get better and our players are confident.”
Garrison has gotten to the charity stripe more in conference play (Spomer/WBR)
The offense has come alive for the Bluejays. Through the first 12 conference games, Creighton only averaged 60.1 points a game. During the five game winning streak, the Bluejays have averaged over 70 points a game. The difference has been the changes Flanery has made to the offense to open things up a little more. “We tried to get away from structure a little more. With a young team, I went back and forth on whether we should be more or less structured. In some ways a young team can benefit with a little more structure and some ways it hurts.”
While Ally Jensen, Jordan Garrison, McKenzie Fujan, and Carli Tritz all handle the ball on offense, they are not natural point guards and Flanery expanded on that. “We don’t really have a true point guard which makes it hard to play within structure. We are balancing two things–We are young, so it is hard to play out of structure, but we really don’t have a true point guard so it is hard to play with structure.”
Another key to the offense has been opening up the post area for the Bluejays. Sarah Nelson continues to impress on the front line as she has ten double-doubles on the season. “We aren’t running our post into the post and expect to score with the back to the basket, we have tried to get our post away from the basket a little more and things have opened up more,” said Flanery.
Fujan's assist to turnover ratio has improved the past few games (Spomer/WBR)
It is also the little things that individual players have done to improve themselves over the season. One of those is getting to the free throw line. “Take Jordan Garrison,” said Flanery. “She did not get to the free throw line at all during non-conference play, but since conference play has started, she has gotten there 20 times. I know it isn’t much but she has expanded what she can do.” Flanery also mentioned how Fujan’s assist to turnover ratio being significantly better over the past several games. It is the individual improvement of players over the season that has helped this team start to peak.
In Des Moines on Saturday, it may not be as easy as previous five games because of so many other factors involved. It will be senior day at Drake. Rachel Hackbarth is one of those seniors and a contender for the MVC Player of the year, averaging over 20 points and 12 rebounds in league play. Also at stake is seeding in next week’s Missouri Valley Conference tournament in St. Charles, Missouri. Creighton is currently in fourth place in the conference, but with a win, they could move up a seed or two depending on how Wichita State and Illinois State do. For the Bulldogs, they are fighting to stay out of seventh place and playing in the play-in games next Thursday night.
The Creighton women have a great opportunity this weekend and sometimes momentum can be everything. “It only takes one poor outing to have the confidence change,” said Flanery. “If we can win three road games in a row then that should tell us we can win three tournament games in a row. We have a chance to move up with a win. Anything you can do to keep confident is huge going into next week.”
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Notes:
- You can listen to the 2:05 tipoff on 1180 KOIL AM.
- Follow the live stats of the game.
- While scoring more points during this five game winning streak, the Bluejays are still the best defensive team in the league only giving up 58.1 points a game.
- Ally Jensen, who went 5-of-5 from three against Bradley, has moved up to 11th place in Creighton history with a 136 career threes. She is likely to overtake 10th place on Saturday.
- Creighton is only 8-20 all-time against Drake, but have won the last six of the last nine meetings.
- If they continue their winning streak to six on Saturday, it will be the longest winning streak they have ever had heading into the MVC Tournament. They have never had more than a three game winning streak heading into Chuck Madness.
- Read the rest of the Creighton game notes.