Maurice Watson was splitting defenders all night in the win over Georgetown (Brad Williams/WBR) CLICK TO BUY
Since he first stepped on campus, Maurice Watson Jr. has not been shy about his expectations for himself or the Creighton basketball team he leads onto the floor every day. On Tuesday night against the Georgetown Hoyas he walked the walk, scoring a career-high 27 points (20 in the second half), tied his season-high with seven rebounds, and dished out four assists in 39 minutes, turning in what was easily his best game in a Bluejay uniform.
“He controlled the game right from the tip,” Georgetown head coach John Thompson III said. “There’s no other way to put it. Not just with his scoring, but how he played and got the ball to his teammates. He doesn’t make mistakes.”
Instead of looking for his shot early, the junior point guard out of Philadelphia, deferred to his teammates. He found junior guard Isaiah Zierden for an elbow jumper, then hit freshman guard Khyri Thomas with a lob in transition to push the Bluejays out to a 6-3 lead. A 3-pointer by Georgetown senior guard, and leading scorer, D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera gave the visitors a 10-9 lead, but Watson responded by finding Zierden for a 3-pointer to give Creighton a 12-10 lead with 15:14 left in the first half. The Bluejays would not trail the rest of the period.
After pulling down five rebounds to go along with his three early assists, Watson got into the scoring column with a 3-pointer from the top of the key to push the lead out to 19-13. Another basket from beyond the arc by Zierden gave Creighton its largest lead of the half at 29-19 with 10:15 to go.
When Georgetown cut that lead in a half a few minutes, Watson went back to work, driving in and scoring off the glass, then knocking down a jumper to keep the Bluejays in front.
Trailing 36-27, with 5:41 left in the half, the Hoyas went on a 9-0 run to tie the game before Creighton’s fifth-year senior center, Geoffrey Groselle, scored off the glass with under a minute remaining to send the Bluejays into the locker room with a 38-36 lead.
Despite shooting 48.3% from the field and only turning the ball over three times, Creighton head coach Greg McDermott was anything but comfortable at halftime after watching a nine-point lead all but disappear before the break thanks to Georgetown’s red-hot 8-of-13 shooting from 3-point territory in the first 20 minutes of action.
“I was concerned, because that stretch at the end of the first half we led 36-27 and we only scored one basket the last eight or nine possessions,” McDermott said. “I thought we had an opportunity there to maybe open it up.”
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Ronnie Harrell played key minutes in the win (Brad Williams/WBR) CLICK TO BUY
That concern only grew coming out of the locker room as the Hoyas scored nine of the first 13 points to begin the second half and take a 45-42 lead with 15:41 remaining. A couple of freshman answered the run for the Bluejays as Thomas tied the game with a step-in 3-pointer from the right wing, then with the team again trailing by three points, Ronnie Harrell Jr. came off the bench and buried a wide open three-pointer from the right wing to tie the game at 48-all with 12:45 to play.
Harrell only played 12 minutes, but he scored five points, grabbed five rebounds, dished out an assist, and didn’t turn the ball over once in his time on the floor. He was part of an effort from the Creighton bench that produced 27 points, 13 rebounds, and only turned the ball over twice in 74 minutes.
“Coach Mac says it a lot — some nights one guy might be off, so you have a few guys that can come in and pick up their slack,” Harrell said. “That’s what makes us dangerous is that you can’t really just key in on one guy when we have a few guys that can make it happen.”
With 10:59 remaining in the second half, the Bluejays still found themselves behind, 56-53, but just like in the first half they had a big run in them that would help them take over the game. A jumper by Watson with 10:13 to play started a 10-0 run that gave Creighton a lead they would never relinquish. On the next possession he drove into the lane and dropped off a pass to junior center Zach Hanson along the baseline. Hanson went to the rim, scored, drew the foul, and converted the 3-point play to put his team in front 58-56 and ignite the crowd of 16,425 at the CenturyLink Center.
“We kind of settled down, and our crowd got into it,” Watson said. “That made us get hyped. Our crowd got us pumped, and I think that’s what propelled us to go on that run.”
Hanson, who scored seven points, grabbed three rebounds, and blocked a shot in 16 minutes off the bench, capped off the 10-0 run by finishing an alley-oop from Isaiah Zierden with a thunderous slam dunk to make it 63-56 with 8:01 left to play. Hanson scored five of the team’s 10 points during the pivotal run, and echoed Harrell’s sentiment of Creighton’s depth and what the reserve players bring off the bench when their number is called.
“We always talk about how we have so many guys that can step up,” Hanson said. “I think a lot of people stepped up tonight. My job personally, and everybody that comes off the bench, when we get called to go in we have to bring a lot of energy and be able to execute. That’s all we try to do.”
Smith-Rivera cut the lead down to five with a layup, then found junior forward Reggie Cameron in transition for an easy basket to pull within three at 63-60 with 6:56 remaining.
From that point on it was all about Maurice Watson Jr. Creighton’s co-captain and floor general sliced up Georgetown’s defense and scored 11 of his team’s final 16 points to finish the game with his new career-high of 27 points. It was a his was his second 20-point game of the season. After trying to get others involved early in the first half, some of his teammates advised him to be a little more selfish.
“There were a couple times where I had some shots that I didn’t take, because I wanted to get some other guys involved,” Watson said. “That’s what I do. I tend to give up shots for my teammates, but James, Isaiah, and Khyri told me, ‘listen, we need you to be aggressive, and we need you to score and put pressure on the defense.’ My shot was going tonight. I get my confidence from my teammates. They put their trust in me, and they see all the hard work that I put in, and they want me to be more selfish sometimes. I tend to argue with them a lot about that, but it was going for me tonight. Tomorrow it could Isaiah, then next day it could be James or Cole. I credit my teammates for giving me the confidence to take those shots tonight.”
Coach McDermott was able to smile after Creighton was able to get a win over Georgetown. (Adam Streur / WBR)
His head coach didn’t find his performance to be all that selfish, instead praising his ability to read and react to the defense Georgetown was throwing out there during a given play.
“For the most part I think he made the right reads,” McDermott said. “They really challenged him to finish at the rim, and he made enough plays and enough passes out of there. When he’s coming off the that ball screen at 15 feet, and he can pop into that shot, he’s really difficult to guard, because that guy gets down hill as anybody.”
“I’m really proud of him. He’s worked hard, he’s stayed with it. Obviously there have been some growing pains between him and I, and him trying to figure out our system and where his shots come from, and what our offense is all about. He’s continuing to grow and get better, and he certainly looked like he belonged out there tonight. He was the best the player on the floor.”
Over the final seven minutes, Watson outscored the Hoyas, 11-6, all by himself as Creighton’s much maligned defense flipped the switch in crunch time, forcing Georgetown to miss their next seven shots from the field until Cameron’s layup with four seconds left made the final margin of 79-66.
“We talked in the locker room about how those last six or seven minutes we really defended at our best,” Hanson said. “I think we just kind of proved to ourselves that in the Villanova game, and the games that come, if we can defend like that we’re going to put ourselves in a really good position to win most games.”
For Watson, reaping the rewards of good defensive execution will make it easier for the Bluejays to follow the coaching staff’s lead from now on when they ask for that extra effort.
“It makes us believe in our coaches more,” Watson said. “They tell us if we just do this much more or 20% more, 30% more, trust yourself, have pride, then you’ll get the results. We showed the tenacity that we have in practice every day in those last six minutes. Now that we’ve showed this we have to transfer it to 40 minutes, and I think that will make us a better team defensively.”
After watching Villanova shoot a scolding hot 68% from the field on Saturday night — the highest mark by a Creighton opponent since January 22, 1987 — Greg McDermott was pleased with the way his team picked themselves up off the canvas and responded against a tough Georgetown squad.
“That’s a heck of a win against a very good basketball team,” McDermott said. “It’s been a tough few days for us, because we got embarrassed because of the efficiency of Villanova’s offense against our defense. I thought tonight, when the game was being decided, we showed a little grit. When this team shows that grit and that toughness we’re a different team.”
The win improved the Bluejays to 11-5 on the season overall, and 2-1 in the Big East Conference. The loss dropped the Hoyas to 9-6 overall and 2-1 in conference play. Next up for Creighton is a 1:00 p.m. battle at Seton Hall (12-2, 2-0) on Saturday, which will televised on Fox Sports 1 immediately following Georgetown’s next game, which will be at home against DePaul (6-9, 0-3) at noon.
Listen to Postgame Audio:
Creighton Head Coach Greg McDermott, Maurice Watson and Zach Hanson
Georgetown Head Coach John Thompson III and D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera
Ronnie Harrell