Key Stats:
Creighton outrebounds Georgetown 33-24, which is good. Creighton outrebounds Georgetown 16-4 on the offensive glass, which is amazing. Creighton scores just three points off those 16 offensive rebounds, which is terrible. CU makes four of their first eight 3-point attempts, then makes just one more the rest of the game — a 1-17 stretch of futility.
Standout Performance:
Devin Brooks was back in the starting lineup for the first time in a month, and made the most of it, scoring 11 points with 7 rebounds (three of them offensive) and two steals. He was just 2-7 from the floor, but made 6-8 free throws and had at least five instances by my count where he drove into the paint, dished it out to an open teammate, and that player failed to make the shot. He had just one assist, but could easily have had five or six.
Recap and Analysis:
The first 15 minutes of Saturday’s game was fantastic. Offensively, they had good spacing, good ball movement, created looks for one another, and knocked them down, with three different players making threes (Isaiah Zierden, James Milliken, and Rick Kreklow). Devin Brooks slashed to the rim and created. Zach Hanson demanded the ball and converted when he got it. Defensively, they chased Big East preseason Player of the Year D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera around the perimeter, forced him to use ball screens to get open, and minimized his impact on the game. They made Josh Smith work hard for everything he got, using double (and sometimes triple) teams to force him into tough shots or bad passes, and in those first 15 minutes, he had as many turnovers (2) as field goals (2). And when Isaiah Zierden knocked down a three with 7:37 to play in that first half, it gave Creighton a 21-15 lead.
Less than two minutes later, the lead was gone, thanks to turnovers on consecutive possessions and defensive lapses on the other end. First, Geoff Groselle couldn’t handle a pass in the paint and had the ball stolen away by Smith-Rivera, who fed Tre Campbell in transition for a bucket. Then Kreklow turned it over, and Smith-Rivera nailed a three to cut the lead to 21-20. On the next possession, the Jays missed not one but two open looks from deep, and after a pair of free throws by L.J. Leak, the lead was gone.
They’d regroup and build a new five point cushion, 29-24, with 2:57 left after jumpers by Hanson and Zierden, and a slashing layup and a pair of free throws from Devin Brooks. But then just like Wednesday night at Providence, they didn’t finish the half and the game got away from them. Georgetown went on a 9-2 run over the final three minutes, scoring on four straight possessions, and took a 33-31 lead into the locker room. They carried that momentum into the second half, scoring on nine of their first 11 possessions, and built a 54-44 lead at the under-12 timeout. The Jays were never closer than nine the rest of the game.
Creighton did an admirable job of taking away Georgetown’s top two scoring options, in particular Smith-Rivera, who came into the game averaging 15 points, and scored just five on 2-6 shooting thanks to stellar defense from Austin Chatman. However, they were lit up by a trio of freshmen led by Tre Campbell, who entered the game with a career high of seven points and a 25% shooting percentage. He made 5-7 from the field, and three of four from three-point range, in scoring 13 points. Fellow freshman L.J. Peak scored 14 points on an identical 5-7 from the floor, and Paul White — also a freshman — added 10.
In the second half, Georgetown shot 75% from the field, making 19 of 26 shots, while Creighton made just 8 of 30 (26%). It was another case of the Jays playing better in other facets of the game when their shots were falling. Over the first 15 minutes of the first half, when their three-point shots were going in, they played better defense, they took better care of the basketball, they rebounded better, and they were winning. Once their three-pointers stopped falling, they started giving up easy looks on defense, making poor decisions with the basketball, and playing much less aggressive.
25 of their 52 shots came from behind the arc, and they made just 20% of them, including just 1-12 in the second half. Meanwhile, Georgetown had a similar balance of threes-to-twos (19 of their 42 shots came from three point range) but they made 8-19 — and 6-10 in the second half — and barely missed from inside the arc, going 9-10 on two-point baskets in the second half.
Yes, there’s more to Creighton’s struggles than just not making shots, but because everything else they do apparently goes south when their shot-making ability does, that’s what it boils down to. The good news is, 9 of their 16 remaining Big East games are at home, and they traditionally shoot — and therefore play — much better at home.
Quotables:
“The difference between the first half and the second half, shooting wise, was mechanics. As a shooter, you can make a couple, but if you can’t get away from the defender, you’re not going to make the shot. And obviously, I haven’t shot well the last three or four games, so I’m just going to get back into the gym and keep shooting until I can get out of this slump.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“In the second half, we lost a little bit of focus, defensively. That’s what I think happened, because we fought the whole game. Coming out of halftime, they were the more aggressive team. They caught us on our heels. We have to figure something out coming out of halftime so we can have a bit more focus, where we can be the aggressors.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“We weren’t going to leave D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera, or let him get an open look. Early in the game, we lost him a couple of times in transition, but for the most part we contained him. We weren’t going to shoot under screens on him, we were going to chase him, and make him use ball screens to get open, because we watched a ton of film on him and knew that would give us the best chance. I thought Austin did a great job on him.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“Shooters go through slumps. If you talk to any of them, they’ll tell you that they all go through them. And as a collective group, we’ve lost our focus a little bit. We had some troubles, obviously, we had a guy get suspended for a little bit, and I think that’s kind of thrown us mentally off. I think we need to regroup here, and get back in the gym and figure it out.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“In the gym, I try to simulate getting my shot off quickly, under pressure of a defender closing in quickly, all the time. I’ll start off by just catching and shooting, and working on that to make sure I have it. Once I get the mechanics down and it feels good, I work on game speed. I catch and get rid of it as quick as I can. Someone will be waving a broom or something to bother or distract my vision, and that’s how we simulate the length and athleticism of some of these guys. They contest every jumper, so you have to tip your cap to them. As a shooter, though, you can’t let it bother you.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“We’re putting too much pressure on ourselves individually. You just gotta go play basketball. You can draw up the greatest scouting report in the world, and you can everything diagrammed, but you still gotta go play. We just have to do a better job of feeling loose out there, instead of ‘Oh, we have to do this and this and this.’ For the most part, it’s just getting back and locked in.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“You just have to be the best leader that you can. I’m going to try to do everything I can, if I see somebody down, to pick them up. Little things like that, just talking to them, making sure they’re alright, and leading like that.” -Isaiah Zierden on 1620AM Postgame
“I felt like we started the game exactly the way I wanted us to start. Offensively, we moved the basketball, we had a good balance between inside and out, we got a few baskets in transition. Defensively, we took away a lot of their first and second options and made them go to something or somebody they didn’t necessarily want to. But then at the end of the first half, Tre Campbell really hurt us. We did a great job on their big two — Smith-Rivera for the entire game, and Smith for all but the last 10 or 12 minutes. And if you would have told me that would have been the case, I would have really liked our chances. I wasn’t factoring in a 5-25 performance from three-point range, though. We’re just putting ourselves in such a hole…it’s just so hard for us to get anything going when we get open shots and we can’t knock ’em down. I really thought that today our shots were even a little bit better than the ones we got at Providence, except for a few late shot clock situations where we forced some things.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame
“The last two or three minutes of the first half, and the first five minutes of the second half was really the difference in the game. We have to figure out a way to come out of the locker room with a little more zing than what we’ve shown lately, because that part of the game has really killed us this year. I’ve got to get my arms around why that is.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame
“As a coach, from a shooting standpoint, I just have to stay positive. They have to know that I believe in them, and that I want them to shoot open shots. We’re throwing it inside a little bit more, and we’ve had some success when it’s gone in there, but our guards aren’t really built — a few of them are built to attack — but we don’t really have a lot of slashers on this team. The guys that can get into the paint need to do that and spray it to the guys that maybe don’t do that as well, and shoot the rhythm threes. Right now, we’re not making shots.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame
“On turnovers, though, to turn it over ten times in the first half but only four in the second, that’s happened to us a lot this year where we’ve had one half that’s a lot worse than the other. It’s never like six and six, it’s always more like 11 and three, or 10 and four like we had today. And a lot of them are foolish mistakes — dropped passes, offensive fouls, travels, and we’ve just got to try to clean that stuff up.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame
“I don’t question our guys effort. I thought we competed today. For us to come in here and get 16 offensive rebounds, and I know we didn’t make second-chance shots, but our guys were hustling. Our blockouts were good. We held them to four offensive boards. But their secondary players, their freshmen in particular, really stepped up and made a huge impact on this game.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame
“We just have to stick with this team. We have to make our home court as tough as everybody else in the Big East seems to have made theirs. Butler won at St. John’s today, but that’s the only road win through the weekend so far. We’ve got a DePaul team coming in that’s probably feeling better about themselves than any DePaul team we’ve ever played, coming off two wins at home, and they beat a very good Xavier team today. We’ve got to let this soak in, try and learn from it, and really study it as a coaching staff and see if there’s things we can do to put our guys in better spots to be successful. We did a couple of new things, a few new wrinkles that I thought we had some success with, but we’re going to have to continue to figure out ways to put these guys in a position to be more successful offensively. And then we need to keep demanding perfection on the defensive end, and with our ability to take care of the basketball. For us to be successful, those two things have to be a constant, so that on the nights when the shots aren’t going in, which was the case at Providence in the first half and tonight in the second half, we’re still right there. We need to play 40 minutes of basketball in games like that when the shots aren’t going in. We weren’t able to do that on this road trip. Hopefully that will turn around when we return to some of our best friends at the CenturyLink on Wednesday.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame
And Now, Here’s What You Had to Say:
After the game, we asked our followers on Twitter how they felt about the game, the team, the season, whatever — we left it intentionally open-ended. Here’s some of the response we got, which run the gamut of emotion and opinion.
So, how are folks feeling?
— White & Blue Review (@whitebluereview) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview the jays need to come home. If they can get the next two at home, and build confidence again, that the ship can be righted — volume. tweeter (@jpwilson1982) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview chatman can’t be the primary scorer. He is out of his element being shoot first. We have good shooters, who can #LetItFly
— volume. tweeter (@jpwilson1982) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview we lost to two tough teams on the road. We lost to those same two teams last year on the road, too. Too early to panic. — Rob Wisler (@UwereRobbed) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview Awful, we had the lead in both this weekends games and lost it. Hoping for a late season team gelling and run of W’s.
— John D. Austin (@jd_austin) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview ready for recruiting. Still think they will do ok at home, struggle on road. — Jeremy Hauer (@jeremyhauer) January 4, 2015
“@whitebluereview: So, how are folks feeling?”I knew road games would be hard, young team per say to handle road play in the BigEast.
— Steve Stimson (@armylifer35) January 4, 2015
“@whitebluereview: So, how are folks feeling?” I predicted 500 this, just disappointed in our D. 3 ball will come but need inside game more — Steve Stimson (@armylifer35) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview win, lose will always support this team. Easy to be a fan when everything is rosey. Time to step up Jays fans.
— Bleeds Blue (@CUAlum81) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview hard to expect much, looking to futurr — Tyler Anderson (@TylerA_Anderson) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview Those were 2 road Ls last year, too. Need to feed post better, particularly on roll to basket off high ball screens.
— Danny Sullivan (@sullivan_dr) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview Didn’t expect to win either game this week. Most BigEast teams are more athletic and more talented than the Jays this year — Jerry Lampe (@mizzoujay) January 4, 2015
@CUAlum81 @whitebluereview Amen!!
— Kosta Katsiris (@KostaKat) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview I’m a little frustrated. We need to be more aggressive and find easier ways to get baskets. — Will Schademann (@WillSchademann) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview I got confidence that this team will improve as the season goes on. We need to get back home.
— Tom Seline (@omahasweetest) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview tough front end of the schedule…hopefully it balances out!
— Chris Douglas (@capnwigglez) January 4, 2015
@whitebluereview LOVE the JAYS.
— Janet Grant (@JanetGrant44) January 4, 2015