Maurice Watson and the Bluejays did not have a good night as a team (Adam Streur / WBR) CLICK TO BUY
It was a must-win showdown in Omaha, Nebraska at the CenturyLink Center for two Big East teams, but only one side acted like it on Wednesday night. Marquette used a 19-4 run at the end of the first half and start of the second to build a 15-point lead, then survived a furious comeback by the Creighton Bluejays to earn a 66-61 road win to improve to 18-10 on the season and 7-8 in conference play.
“This was a great win for us,” Golden Eagles second-year head coach Steve Wojciechowski said. “This is a very difficult place to play. Obviously I’m new to the Big East, but I admire Creighton and their fan base for the way they come out and support their team. It’s a great place to play, and it’s a very difficult place to win. That makes me even more proud of our guys to be able to gut it out. It was a very gutsy win by our guys.”
Creighton head coach Greg McDermott didn’t share his counterparts sentiment in regards to his own team. With just four games remaining in the regular season entering Wednesday, McDermott didn’t feel like his Bluejays, who fell to 17-11 overall and 8-7 in Big East play, prepared like a team with a sense of urgency leading up to their second meeting with the Golden Eagles in the last week and a half.
“Tonight we had nothing,” McDermott said. “Nobody wanted to guard. Nobody wanted to share the basketball. We had to resort to zone in the second half, because our man-to-man defense was pitiful and the zone obviously gave us a chance to win the game. We executed some things in the zone pretty well. We had a couple opportunities when we tied it. We came out of a timeout, got a wide open shot and missed it.”
“But we haven’t practiced the best the past week or so. I’m not sure we really want to practice that much. Sometimes in life you get what you deserve, and we deserved this, because from our seniors all the way down to our freshmen, for whatever reason they think they’ve arrived and they weren’t much interested in practicing. Obviously that’s my responsibility, because I let it happen. I let guys walk away from me in practice. I let them stand by the trainer. I let them talk back to me. That’s unfortunate, because we had a chance to do something special here and tonight we didn’t have it.”
Freshman forward, and potential NBA lottery pick, Henry Ellenson got off to a hot start for Marquette, scoring six points to help the Golden Eagles take a 17-9 lead with 13:26 left in the first half. Creighton junior forward Cole Huff equaled Ellenson’s stretch by scoring eight of his team’s points during a 10-0 run that put the Bluejays in front 19-17 with 10:28 to go in the opening half.
On Marquette’s ensuing possession, Ellenson buried his first 3-pointer of the night to retake the lead. Then after a two-handed dunk by Creighton senior center Geoffrey Groselle, Ellenson’s layup with 9:33 remaining in the period produced the fourth and final lead change of the game.
With the score even at 27, junior guard Jajuan Johnson scored Marquette’s next nine points to help them take a 39-29 lead into the locker room. Johnson, who scored just three points in the first meeting against Creighton, a 65-62 loss back on February 13th, led all players with 13 points in the first half, and finished the game with 15 points, nine rebounds, and led the Golden Eagles with four steals in 36 minutes on Wednesday night.
A basket down low by junior center Luke Fischer followed by another 3-pointer from Ellenson helped to give Marquette it’s largest lead of the game at 46-31 after just about three minutes had ticked off the clock in the second half.
“One of the things that we focused on in practice was our end of half and start of half,” Wojciechowski said. “I thought we ended the half well to go into halftime with a 10-point lead. Then we were able to extend that lead at the start of the second half, and obviously that separation was huge for us.”
Cole Huff tried to get things going for the Bluejays and had a nice run in the first half. (Brad Williams / WBR) CLICK TO BUY
After failing over and over to defend in their half court man-to-man, Creighton switched to a zone defense and started to chip away at the deficit. The Bluejays also threw in some 3/4 court pressure that disrupted the rhythm and timing of Marquette’s red hot offense. With the Golden Eagles sputtering out on that end of the floor, their 15-point lead disappeared. Creighton’s recent struggles from the 3-point line continued in this game as they misfired on their first 13 attempts from beyond the arc. That slump ended when junior guard Isaiah Zierden buried a wide open look from the right corner to cut the deficit to four points, and again when he connected from the left wing to tie the game at 56 with 4:17 to play.
That would be the last 3-pointer that mattered for the Bluejays as Marquette sophomore guard Duane Wilson drove the lane and scored in traffic to kick off an 8-2 run that gave the Golden Eagles a 64-58 lead with under 10 seconds remaining. Wilson scored eight points in the second half, and they came at big moments for Marquette, none bigger than his layup to put his team up 60-58. He finished the night with 14 points to go along with three assists and three steals.
“We didn’t handle their 3/4 court press as well as we wanted to,” Wojciechowski said. “We weren’t playing with a true point guard in there, so at times it can take us a little bit longer to adjust to a change in defense. Duane was able to make a couple baskets and some huge plays where he kept us with a one or two possession lead while there was enormous game pressure on us. We had a 15-point lead with the ball and the momentum of the game changed, which is somewhat to be expected in a game like this. Duane’s baskets were huge, absolutely huge.”
Ellenson sealed the deal at the free throw line after a 3-pointer by Creighton point guard Maurice Watson Jr. cut the deficit to three with 3.3 seconds left. Marquette’s star freshman posted his 16th double-double of the season as he led all players with 22 points and 10 rebounds in a game-high 38 minutes of action.
“Henry is a matchup nightmare,” Greg McDermott, who recruited him out of high school, said. “He can go inside. He made a couple threes tonight. That mid-range game in the middle of the zone, he hit a couple big shots at critical times when the game was being decided there. He’s a heck of a player; a great talent.”
Maurice Watson and Cole Huff were the only Bluejays to finish in double figures, scoring 14 and 12 respectively, but they needed 29 shots to combine for those 26 points. As a team, Creighton shot 60.5% inside the arc, but were abysmal from beyond it. They finished 3 of 21 from 3-point range and are now shooting 30.1% from distance in Big East play, good for last place in the conference.
“It is what it is at this point,” Huff said of the team’s struggles in that area. “There is only so many times we can say we had an off shooting night. When it’s 75% of the season it’s not an off night. It’s how we’re shooting the ball, it’s in our DNA. There are guys getting in the gym and getting extra shots up, and maybe for some reason, maybe the bright lights, or wanting it to go in too bad, but whatever it is it’s not getting the job done. We’re still playing the same way. We’re getting open looks, and that’s why we’re here is to shoot the ball, but we better figure something out.”
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See photos from photographers Adam Streur and Brad Williams of the game
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Greg McDermott didn’t dismiss the importance of the 3-point shot and it may result in the team’s success, but despite being able to knock down the same shots in practice they are running out of time and games to show they can hit them when it matters most.
“I’ve said it all year, but the problem is we’re running out of year. I feel like if we come out of it we’ve got a chance to go on an unbelievable run, but sometimes you are what the numbers say you are,” McDermott said. “We chart a lot of stuff in practice, and the numbers in practice are a long ways away from the numbers in games, and they are guys who have made shots for us before, and have made shots in their career before. The last thing I want them to do is be hesitant. I want them to be confident, but that confidence comes from preparation, and they’re going to have to get in the gym here in the next couple days to get ready for the stretch run.”
Along with trying to put his finger on the team’s 3-point shooting woes, McDermott also plans to hone in on the next couple of practices and make sure the Bluejays are better prepared as they close out the regular season with a home game against last place St. John’s (8-20, 1-14) followed by road games at No. 5 Xavier and No. 24 Providence.
“My thoughts are we try to figure out a way to have a good practice Friday and Saturday, because we have not practiced with the urgency that you would think a team would practice with given the situation that we are in,” McDermott said. “We’ve got some guys that can’t practice for injury reasons, and certainly that’s disruptive, because you’ve got guys playing out of position in practice since you don’t have healthy bodies on the floor. We have to manage that the best we can to try get through these last two weeks and into the Big East Tournament. It’s the last home game on Sunday for James and Geoff. They’ve meant a great deal to this program, and obviously St. John’s is playing better basketball than when we saw them the first time which seems like years ago. We let one get away at home tonight, and didn’t play the brand of Creighton basketball that I expect our teams to play.”
Tip-off for Creighton’s home finale against St. John’s is set for 1:37 p.m. and will be televised on Fox Sports 1.
Listen to Postgame audio with Greg McDermott, Isaiah Zierden, Cole Huff, Zach Hanson and Marquette head coach Steve Wojciechowski