On the night Hudson Greer made his debut, it was Blake Harper who stole the show. The sophomore who won the 2025 MEAC Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year awards at Howard last year leads the Bluejays in points (13.0) and rebounds (7.5), and is second in assists. He’s also quickly becoming their leader and the player everyone else looks to for a bucket in a key spot.
North Dakota had started the game by making 5-of-9 from the field and built a 15-10 lead. Creighton had missed five of their first seven shots, with all of their attempts coming from behind the arc. And then Harper took the game into his own hands. First, he hit a three to cut the lead to 15-13, then rebounded a missed shot, brought the ball up court, and split a double-team on his way to the rim where he scored on a one-handed layup. On the next possession, Greer rebounded a UND miss and kicked it ahead to Harper who missed a three. But Jasen Green’s offensive board gave Harper a second chance, and he didn’t miss this one — his three from in front of the North Dakota bench gave CU a 18-15 lead, and gave Harper eight straight points.
And seconds later, Harper cleared the defensive glass after a miss and after a solid post entry pass to Greer, the freshman in his first game made a ridiculous read — throwing a bounce pass past two defenders along the baseline to a wide-open Green for a dunk.
Greer ➡️ Green 💪#GoJays ( 📺ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/UIK1aEHsjy
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
Baskets from Fedor Zugic and Josh Dix followed, and a 14-0 Bluejay run had flipped the game. CU never trailed again, and not only that, their lead was never less than seven points again.
“He played with a lot of confidence, a lot of swagger, got to the right spots and was active on the offensive glass again and got us some extra possessions,” Greg McDermott said. “He can score in a lot of different ways, and had three assists as well — a couple of those were at critical moments where he found a teammate for an easy basket.”
“It’s been just staying patient, knowing my time is going to come, and kind of listening to my coaches,” Harper added. “My coaches and teammates have really helped me throughout this transition, made it a lot easier. It’s a long season, and I’m going to keep doing that.”
Harper soon added another three as the Jays opened a 30-18 lead. At that point, he’d scored 13 of their 30 points.
Harper from deep AGAIN. #GoJays (📺ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/vKqqqrThGV
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
And after a fast break dunk by Kerem Konan, a steal-and-dunk by Owen Freeman, and a three by Ty Davis, Creighton led by 16 with 3:23 left in the first half. It looked like the expected rout was on. But that would be their high-water mark — North Dakota outscored Creighton 32-31 over the final 23:23 of the game.
KEREM KONAN 💥#GoJays (📺 ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/5Ac4KoRpLC
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
Steal ➡️ score #GoJays x @_OwenFreeman (📷ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/JHrkP5Nokr
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
“I mean, we didn’t really defend the first half,” McDermott said on his postgame radio interview. “We had a hard time finding a group that was clicking defensively the first half. I really challenged them at halftime defensively, and fortunately we defended the second half or we’d have been in trouble because we had a lot of open shots by the right guys that we missed. Sometimes you have to try to win in other ways and we were able to do that tonight.”
North Dakota spent the second half trapping and doubling defensively, leading to wide-open threes from everywhere — and the Jays missed them. They were 1-of-17 from three-point range in the second half and it allowed the Fighting Hawks to hang around. When a layup by UND cut the lead to 62-54 with 7:27 left, there was an unease in the arena as a potential upset was brewing.
But after calling timeout to reset, McDermott subbed Freeman into the game, and though his conditioning has been a question mark, he played every second down the stretch — and made his impact known. He scored five points in a 9-2 run that sealed the win, grabbing four rebounds (two of them offensive, both leading to second-chance baskets for himself) with a block and a steal.
AND OOOOONE 💪#GoJays x @_OwenFreeman (📺 ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/v6gw5AxlAw
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
“Fortunately, it’s not a beauty contest, because that wasn’t a work of art without a doubt,” McDermott said. “Defensively, I thought we were better the second half. I challenged the guys at halftime to have a little bit more teeth and grit on that end of the floor, and frankly, we did, because we shot it so poorly the second half from the 3-point line that our defense was what won the game for us.”
Inside the Box:
“I’m to the point where we’ve been at this since the end of September and I shouldn’t still have to ask guys to talk. I shouldn’t still have to ask guys to play hard,” Greg McDermott said on his postgame radio interview. “And if they can’t do it then we’re going to go with somebody else. It’s that simple.”
That quote does a lot of work in summing up where Creighton is on the morning of November 20. McDermott has had a long stretch of teams led by veteran players that bought in to CU’s style and culture right away; for whatever reason this group is not there yet, and after 40 practices, two exhibitions and four games, McDermott is over it.
His frustration seems to have come to a head on the trip back from Spokane last week. Feeling that they “lacked grit”, to use his words, he began to have second thoughts about the decision to redshirt Hudson Greer.
“I’ve said this many times, you want to know what’s going to happen when you put a player in the game. I’ve got too many guys right now where I’m not sure what’s going to happen,” McDermott said. “Hudson may make some mistakes, but there’s never going to be a lack of effort. He’s brought it every single day in practice. He’s got a little edge to him, maybe more of an edge than anybody on the team.”
Greer said the staff approached him the day after the loss to Gonzaga, and gauged his interest in changing the decision to redshirt.
“Following the Gonzaga game, I had a little bit of a hunch. We just didn’t have enough defense and rebounding to win that game. I feel like that was kind of a hole for us — and energy bringing. I feel like I bring that,” Greer said. “So coming off the plane, Mac approached me and was like, what do you think about playing? And we had conversations about it for a couple days and then I was thinking about suiting up for the (UMES game). Then I got a little ill, which was really annoying for me, but after getting healthy again and practicing with the guys, I told them yesterday, I was like, ‘Hey man, I want to play. I want to be a part of this thing.’”
Greer only scored one point, splitting a pair of free throws. But the areas McDermott highlighted as his strengths — which coincidentally are areas of need for the team — Greer was outstanding. He had seven rebounds, four assists and blocked a shot in 13 minutes, and brought an energy and enthusiasm that has often been lacking.
Those seven boards are the most by a Creighton freshman in their debut since Arthur Kaluma had eight in his debut in 2021. And the list of Creighton freshmen under Greg McDermott with seven rebounds and four assists in any game — not just their debut, but any game their freshman season — is pretty exclusive too.
- Doug McDermott
- Khyri Thomas (2x)
- Ronnie Harrell Jr.
- Justin Patton
- Ty-Shon Alexander
- Marcus Zegarowski
- Hudson Greer
“All my life I feel like I didn’t necessarily have the body to be a good defender. I feel like a lot of people would just look at me and be like, ‘Oh that’s a white boy, he’s not going to be able to stay in front of anyone,’ but I feel like I’ve really turned into a pretty good defender,” Greer said. “And now I have the body to make an impact and wreak havoc on that end of the court. A big goal of mine is to say I can guard any position, one through five. I can guard two through four, and I mean, if you want to put me on the one, I’m going to take the challenge. I feel like five might get a little tricky and Owen might not be too happy about that one, but I take accountability and take the challenge to improve defensively each and every day.”
Meanwhile, Blake Harper had 19 points, 12 rebounds (six offensive) and three assists in 26 minutes. You can see his confidence and leadership grow every night, and with two — maybe three, depending on a pending court case about granting five years of eligibility to all student athletes — years at CU if he wants them, Harper has the looks of a portal home run by the staff.
Blake is feeling it 🔥#GoJays (📺 ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/PJ3uVGFj6i
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
Good ball movement ➡️ great find by Harper#GoJays (📺 ESPN+) pic.twitter.com/hlIx1Gnm0A
— Creighton Men’s Basketball (@BluejayMBB) November 20, 2025
“Blake’s doing some good things, he’s learning on the fly,” McDermott said. “This defensive system that we require is a challenge for him, and he’s trying to get better and he’s learning and I think he is getting better. He’s got a good pace about his game, and you know, he makes good decisions with the basketball. He’s a very capable shooter as well and we saw that on display tonight.”
Nik Graves continued his offensive struggles, unfortunately. In scoring nine points, he shot 2-of-10 overall and 1-of-7 from three-point range — and 4-of-9 at the line. He’s now 2-of-18 from three for the season (11.1%). There’s a progression to the mean coming for Graves, considering he has three years of D1 experience where he’s proven himself a capable shooter. He was north of 32% from three all three years at Charlotte, including 60-of-181 (33.1%) a year ago, and is 91-of-286 (31.8%) for his career. Losing sleep over his shooting slump is probably unwarranted at this point.
His shot selection might deserve some scrutiny, though. He’s taken the same number of shots inside the arc as he has outside (18) — but he’s made 13-of-18 inside and 2-of-18 outside. That’s something to keep an eye on.
Josh Dix had his best game so far as a Bluejay, scoring 16 points. He’s still struggling to find his shot — he was 5-of-13 from the floor and 2-of-7 from three en route to those 16 points — but the rest of his game, especially defensively, has been as advertised. Given Graves’ struggles, McDermott was asked after the game if they’ve considered giving Dix time at the point guard spot, and he admitted they’ve worked on it.
“I think there’s certain situations where it could be good for us. You know, it’s certainly not his natural position, and the pace of the game slows down compared to Nick’s pace and Ty’s pace, that’s the one thing I don’t like,” he said. “But he certainly can defend any of those three spots. So that in itself is not a problem at all.”
Owen Freeman continues ramping up, and had 13 points, eight rebounds (five offensive), three steals and three blocks in 20 minutes. In McDermott’s 16 seasons, the only three players to have a 13/8/3/3 line are Ryan Kalkbrenner vs. Butler on 1/11/25, Baylor Scheierman vs. Butler on 12/22/22, and Freeman last night.
“Tonight was the best I’ve been able to continuously move up and down the floor. Just trusting in God’s plan that He has in store and that’s all I can really focus on. It’s not in my control,” Freeman said. “I felt like tonight I was kind of able to be myself there, especially in that second half. I’ve really been missing it.”
As for Fedor Zugic, the player most likely to see a decrease in playing time with Greer joining the active roster, he had four points and two boards in 14 minutes. McDermott said his lack of playing time is pretty simple.
“The guys in front of him, Blake’s played at a high level in practice. And Josh Dix has been our most consistent player,” McDermott said. “So, you know, Fedor had an opportunity all summer to be our most consistent player. He wasn’t. Josh was. So, that’s why Josh is in that position and if Fedor wants to play more, he’s gonna have to show me a little bit more in practice.”
On the injury front, Jackson McAndrew’s foot injury that caused him to miss the exhibition against Iowa State flared up on him during shoot around. He played eight minutes, all in the first half, going scoreless with one rebound. Whether he can play next week in Las Vegas, and if he can, how effective he is, will go a long way toward determining how successful the Jays can be in that tournament.
Overall, Creighton missed 37 shots and grabbed an offensive rebound on 21 of them. They’re currently 12th in D1 in offensive rebound percentage, after ranking 250 or worse in five of the last six seasons (with the one outlier being 2021-22, when they finished 165th). It’s not just a McDermott Era thing, either — the last time they finished in the Top 100 in offensive rebounding percentage was 1998-99, Dana Altman’s first NCAA Tournament team led by Rodney Buford. There’s a long way to go this season, but among the early storylines, that’s one that is both extremely positive and extremely surprising.