Recap:
“It’s a relief to get a win.”
Greg McDermott closed his postgame radio interview with that line, and no doubt Bluejay fans felt the same way. Sitting at 9-8 overall and 3-3 in the league, coming off of a week where they led in the second half on the road against both UConn and Xavier but found ways to lose them both, and in need of a marquee win to begin to right the ship, they had built a huge lead over #19 Providence.
But with eight minutes left, the game was tied 54-apiece. The Jays’ 16-point lead had evaporated, three of their most important players were in deep foul trouble, and the Friars were heating up. The game was on the line, but the season might have been, too.
McDermott could sense it, and knew he had to roll the dice by putting Baylor Scheierman, Arthur Kaluma and Ryan Kalkbrenner back in despite their foul trouble. Scheierman had carried them offensively; Kaluma had done a terrific job defensively on Providence’s star Bryce Hopkins, while everyone else struggled to stay in front of him, much less defend him. Kalkbrenner had been, well, Kalkbrenner, dominating the paint on both ends.
“I think we felt like it was slipping away and we needed (Baylor Scheierman) and Art back on the floor,” McDermott said. “It’s really one of the first games this year that we’ve had to play with that kind of foul trouble. Really proud of the guys for the way they responded.”
The Jays had held on, barely, without Kaluma and Scheierman. But when Kalkbrenner went to the bench, too, a lineup with three bench players was overwhelmed by the Friars — their 54-47 lead was erased inside of two minutes.
Going back to Scheierman with four fouls, in particular, was risky.
“We went back with Baylor with four fouls sooner than we would’ve liked to,” McDermott said. “That’s a risky proposition if he fouls out with eight minutes left. But at that point we didn’t really have a choice.”
With them back on the floor, the response was emphatic and immediate. Though they tied it, Providence never took the lead, with Arthur Kaluma putting the ball on the deck on the next possession to put CU in the lead. The Friars tied it once more at 56, and then Kaluma scored again off the dribble, drawing a foul in the process.
“The message I said to Art in that timeout was, ‘Hopkins has three fouls, too. Don’t fade away. Go through him. He doesn’t want to foul you, either. He wants to stay on the floor.’,” McDermott said. “He made two great plays driving the seam. He set his feet and made two tough shots. It really got us going.”
Ahead 63-58 with four minutes to go, Kalkbrenner blocked a jumper by Hopkins and the Friars’ Ed Croswell missed a putback badly in traffic. Sprinting down the floor, Kalkbrenner caught the ball and scored on an acrobatic shot at the rim to push the lead out to seven.
Creighton held them at arms-length from there, outscoring the Friars 17-11 to end the game. Providence never got closer than four in the final five minutes as Alexander was 6-for-6 at the line down the stretch and Kaluma’s lay-in with 55.7 left sealed the win.
They were able to withstand the Friars’ 25-9 second half run that tied the game because of one of the better halves of basketball they’ve played this season. With the score tied 21-apiece after a back-and-forth start, the game turned. Scheierman buried a three to give the Jays the lead 24-21, his fifth consecutive made shot without a miss. On the other end, Hopkins was whistled for an offensive foul and Ed Cooley compounded matters by getting called for a technical. His argument wasn’t necessarily tech-worthy, but he’d been out on the floor arguing calls for the better part of 20 minutes which made it more of a cumulative “get back in the coaching box” call.
The Jays made both free throws, drew Hopkins’ second foul on the next possession, and with the Friars’ star on the bench they ripped off a 13-4 run to turn a 26-21 lead into a 39-25 advantage. Scheierman scored 17 first half points, carrying the team against a defensive gameplan designed to run the Jays off the three-point line.
And he did it while feeling sick enough that he hadn’t slept in two days.
“I wasn’t sure I could get 31 minutes out of him. But he was great,” McDermott said. “He made some big threes and made some big plays in the lane. I thought his change of pace as came out of the ball screen is what allowed him to get to the rim and really make some nice plays.”
The Jays used switches to get him open looks from the perimeter to combat the Friars’ attempt to run them off the line, and by burying one shot after another he made that plan blow up in Providence’s face. Then they got the ball inside and nearly finished the deal before foul trouble of their own helped open the door for a Friar comeback.
By holding off the Friars and handing them their first loss in seven Big East games, they picked up a massive win — and set themselves up to make a run. They’re favored in each of their next six games on KenPom, and while obviously anything can happen in basketball, that’s an indication of how the schedule lightens up a bit after a brutal two months where their schedule strength has been tougher than anyone in America. Take care of business, and the game on February 11 against UConn will be enormous.
Inside the Box Score:
The Friars’ defensive plan worked to an extent, if not for Baylor Scheierman. He had 17 points in the first half, and even threw down a dunk early in the second half. You have to wonder how many points he might have scored had he not gotten into foul trouble.
“If teams are going to sit on top of Kalkbrenner and plug up the lane, then we’re going to have to make some threes. There’s not a lot of other options if the defense is going to pack the lane,” McDermott said on the postgame show. “Today they stretched out and ran our shooters off the line, and made the three-point looks tough.”
No one else besides Scheierman made a three; he was 3-of-6 and everyone else was 0-for-10.
On the glass, Providence was lethal — they rebounded 15 of their 40 missed shots and gave themselves 11 more attempts than the Jays had. A lot of the problems stemmed from Kalkbrenner leaving the rim to help on defense; Ed Croswell is a really, really good player on the backside of the play, and consistently was able to get a seal on the closest Bluejay to the play.
The flipside: Kalkbrenner’s rim protection kept Providence’s shooting percentage low, even on second chances. They turned those 15 offensive boards into just 18 points.
“A lot of times our crackdown ended up being a guard, and they couldn’t get Croswell out of there. A lot of the damage was done by him, and I was fearful of that going in,” McDermott said. “But it’s also part of the reason Devin Carter goes 4-for-14. He tried to attack Kalkbrenner and score on him at the rim, and that’s tough to do.”
But in the paint offensively, the Jays were dominant. Creighton outscored Providence 46-32 in the paint, and as a result of their aggression (and solid fundamental defense) they made more free throws (18) than Providence attempted (15).
“Games with Providence are always mud wrestling matches. They’re hard to officiate because there’s contact on virtually every play,” McDermott said. “I was worried when they raced out with four fouls on us and none on them, but I just kept telling the guys in huddles to show their hands. And we were talking to the officials during every break about who was initiating the contact. Fortunately it evened out in the end. I felt like the number of free throws attempted was going to dictate who would win, and that’s exactly what happened.”
Their ball security was also stellar, with nearly twice as many assists (13) as turnovers (7). Ryan Nembhard had a brutal game, scoring zero points on 0-for-7 shooting in 34 minutes with just three assists. But Trey Alexander picked him up, scoring 20 points with three assists, six rebounds and no turnovers in 38 minutes.
“Trey’s pace was really good coming out of ball screens. Carter is one of the better defenders in the league, and Trey, when he got him on his hip, made good plays,” McDermott noted. “And most importantly, while he didn’t shoot it great, R2 had three assists and just one turnover. Trey had three assists and no turnovers. Bello had two assists and no turnovers. That’s how you beat Providence. You can’t get in a situation where you’re turning it over a bunch.”
The trio of Ryan Kalkbrenner (21), Trey Alexander (20) and Baylor Scheierman (19) combined for 60 of CU’s 73 points. In the 19 minutes and 19 seconds that their starting five was on the floor, Creighton outscored Providence 40-21. It continued a trend where their starting five is borderline elite, but their bench is almost non-existent.
In 279:57 this season (of 720:00 possible) together, they starting five has outscored foes 567-451. In 155:47 vs. ranked teams (of 280:00 possible), the differential is 324-281.
With that said, they got meaningful contributions from two bench players in their first half run. Mason Miller scored on a reverse layup off the dribble and played passable defense on Hopkins; Francisco Farabello scored on a baseline cut to the rim, ripped away a steal and started a 2-on-1 fastbreak that led to a layup for Alexander, and defended the perimeter well. It’s the first time since Maui that you could reasonably say the Jays got any kind of spark from their bench.