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Men's Basketball

Morning After: Providence 74, Creighton 65

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[Box Score]

Key Stats:

Creighton’s three senior starters (Austin Chatman, Avery Dingman, Will Artino) combine to score zero points on 0-11 shooting. Artino, in particular, was ineffective — in only eight minutes of action he missed four point-blank shots, grabbed zero rebounds, and turned it over once. Chatman had four assists, just one in the second half, and was 0-6 from the floor and 0-3 from three-point range, including an airballed three that was a pretty good metaphor for how his season, and his team’s season, are going. Dingman, for his part, played solid, effective defense for 22 minutes and managed to grab four tough rebounds, though he missed the only shot he took.

Favorite Moment:

Before we go any further with this section, let me be abundantly clear that Creighton did not play well enough to win, nor did they play well enough to deserve to win, regardless of the officiating. And there were bad calls on both ends, benefitting both teams, as there always is.

WITH THAT SAID, man were there some calls in this game that only further highlighted the difference in speed, size, and athleticism between Providence and Creighton. When you’re bigger, faster, and stronger than your opponent, everything comes easier: scoring, defending, rebounding, getting away with fouls, etc. One play in particular incensed the crowd, and the bench.

Four minutes into the second half, Kris Dunn drove the lane and appeared to use his off-arm to clear space. It worked, he got to the rim, and he scored rather easily. The sellout crowd at CenturyLink Center went berserk, and so did Coach Greg McDermott. Seconds later when a foul was called on Geoff Groselle for an illegal screen (a proper call, incidentally), he’d seen enough. He lit up the officials, and was slapped with a “T” for his effort. Then he got his money’s worth by demonstrably explaining his beef with them during the ensuing media timeout. There was lots of arm-flailing, lots of pointing, lots of screaming.

It’s highly likely that Creighton wouldn’t have been able to guard Dunn effectively regardless, because he’s one the top point guards in the country and he was playing at the top of his game. But it was still frustrating.

The officials did call a significantly tighter game after McDermott’s outburst — they called 14 combined fouls pre-T, and 28 post-T in roughly the same number of minutes — though that wasn’t really to Creighton’s advantage either because Providence made 20-27 at the line in the second half.

All of this badgering of officials did lead to my favorite moment of the night, and probably my favorite fan moment of the entire season. During one of the second-half timeouts, an older gentleman with silver hair strutted out as the contestant in the putting contest. If you’ve never been to a game in person, they’ve done this contest for years; they set up a box with a gap in the bottom of it under one hoop, and you putt from half-court for a prize. The court breaks slightly left, and it throws a lot of contestants off when they try to compensate. This guy was cold-blooded though and sank the putt nearly dead-centered. But that’s not why I’m telling this story. As he walked off the court with the Creighton marketing folks, they had to walk past the officials who were standing and conversing on the end line of court. The fan had some choice words for the officials, and it was glorious. Who among us hasn’t wanted to speak their peace with an official during a game at some point in their life? And this guy actually did it! He got a standing ovation from the sections of the arena that were close to the “action” and saw it, and when he walked up the aisle back to his seat, people were stopping him to congratulate him and shake his hand. SO FUNNY.

Recap & Analysis:

What is there to say, really? By dropping their sixth straight game in the Big East and seventh straight overall, Creighton has now gone a full month without a win — the last ‘W’ came on December 19 against Texas Pan-Am and the next game is January 21 at Butler. It’s been 20 years since Creighton Basketball struggled like this, and there’s an awful lot of fanbases whose teams have been dominated by CU that are taking the opportunity to gloat about it, on Twitter and elsewhere. (Seriously, have you done a search for “Creighton” mentions on Twitter this morning? If not, here’s some free advice: don’t.)

It’s a recurring theme with this team, but they were once again smoked in the first four minutes. It was 12-2 Providence before the first media timeout; Creighton spent the next ten minutes fighting to dig out of that hole, cut the deficit to one, and then allowed PC to score five straight — a big-time shot from LaDontae Henton, and a three-pointer from Tyler Harris — rebuilding a 23-17 lead. With 3:01 to play, Creighton had scored the last five points to once again make it a one-point game, and then…

Well, and then the wheels came off. Jalen Lindsay hit a three. Carson Desrosiers made a bucket in the paint. Tyler Harris hit another three. LaDontae Henton hit a three. All totaled, Providence missed just one shot coming down the stretch. While this was going on, Creighton went 0-4 from the floor and made two free throws, while blowing defensive assignments and getting beat on the blocks for rebounds. It was a back-breaking 11-2 run to close the half, taking a one-point game and turning it into ten in less than three minutes.

The Bluejays made runs in the second half, but were never again as close, never again poised to take a lead with a defensive stop and a bucket. And Providence won by nine. For the umpteenth time (seriously, I can’t even keep track anymore), Creighton gave up a flurry of points in the game’s first minutes, then played essentially even the rest of the game but of course, lost by roughly the number of points they surrendered initially. Is there an answer to that? Probably not, sadly. Coach Mac has tried almost every starting lineup combination imaginable, and the problem persists.

Now things get really tough. Road games at Butler and Villanova. Home games with St. John’s and Georgetown. Two more road games at Xavier and St. John’s. That’s six games where the Jays will be underdogs, perhaps significantly so. They could — some would argue they will — be 0-12 in the league before the next winnable game pops up, a February 14 battle with Marquette.

It’s a depressing time to be a Bluejay, but if there’s anything to take solace in, it’s this: the team continues to battle, continues to play hard, and continues to hustle. That’s not easy to do when you haven’t won a game in a month. Things will get better with the influx of Big East-caliber transfer and freshmen talent arriving next year, especially if the culture persists despite the temporary losing. That’s the silver lining. It ain’t much, but it’s something.

Quotables:

“It’s such a possession game when you play Providence. Ed Cooley’s teams do a great job of not letting you get shots early in the shot clock, because he’s got some length and they protect the basket. They’re long enough to take away that early three. Now, they’ll push it in transition if it’s there, if there’s an opportunity, but if not, they’re going to grind it and prefer to shoot in the last ten seconds of the shot clock. They’re waiting for you to make a mistake. You have to defend for the whole 35 seconds, and it’s what kills you against teams like that. You defend for 32, 33, 34 seconds, and then I think four times when the ball was in the air the shot clock went off. That takes a lot of wind out of your sails.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“The start of the game was pretty simple. You dig yourself a hole against a possession-oriented team, it’s so hard to get back. It’s not like there’s going to be 75 possessions where you’ll have a lot of opportunities. The start of the game really killed us. I was proud that we fought back and that we had the ball back with a chance to take the lead with about five and half minutes left, but then they go on that mini-run at the end with back-to-back threes. We finally got the crowd back into the game, but then they took all the momentum into the locker room at halftime.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“The slow starts, it’s been a little bit of everything. Some nights, we turn it over four or five times on the first ten possessions. Tonight, that was not the case. Tonight, there was four offensive rebounds in the first nine possessions that they ended up scoring on. Three of them, I felt, were missed blockouts on our part. That can’t happen. And let’s be honest. Our offensive challenges magnify every other problem. We just can’t put that 12-0 run on you, because we don’t know where it’s coming from. James Milliken has been a little bit more consistent, and he’s a guy that has proven he can score in more than one way. He can get to the rim, he can get to the line, he can shoot the three, he can attack in transition. But on our roster right now, we don’t have a lot of other guys capable of doing that. We have to figure something out. I’ll probably go with something different again in the next game, from a starting-lineup standpoint, just to try and figure out what gives us the best chance to get off to a good start. Now, we started relatively well at Marquette early, and we started relatively well against Seton Hall. But tonight, on a night when you had a lot of energy in the building, you want to get that crowd into the game and make it tough on Providence and we never did that.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“Devin did some good things tonight. He’s had his share of inconsistencies this year as well, but we’re going to have to do something because we’ve got several guys that just aren’t playing up to what their potential is. And you can point to a lot of reasons for it, but the reality of it is, and I’m a big believer in this, you’re not going to gain confidence by resting. You gain confidence through repetition. You can rest in April, May, and the rest of your life if you want, but right now we’ve got to get to work. We’ve got to figure out these slumps that a few of our guys are in. It happens by studying the film, and being critical of yourself, and trying to fix some mistakes that happen throughout the game — some reads that you might miss offensively, some assignments that are blown. And then it’s about getting in the gym and figuring it out. And to this team’s credit, their attitude, their togetherness has been unbelievable. My staff has continued to prepare as hard for this game as we did for the Oklahoma game in terms of the scouting report and the preparation and attention to detail. None of that has changed. But there’s no question, this is a fragile group. That’s why it was important that we had a good crowd here tonight to show the guys that there’s a lot of people that are still on their side, that still believe in them. We’re going to prepare for Butler just like we’ve prepared for every other one. If we have to tweak some things in the starting lineup, and maybe bring a guy or two off the bench to see if that’ll jump start them, we will.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

“I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank our fans for their support of the Pink Out. It’s something that’s extremely important to Theresa and I, that we started when we came here, and it’s just been amazing to me how it’s caught on, how many people have jumped on board and supported this event and made it a ‘Can’t Miss’ game. I don’t like losing the Pink Out at all, but if one person does what they’re supposed to do and gets a check up when they forgot to or put it off, and something is caught early and it’s cured, then everything we’re doing is worth it. If it impacts one person’s life in a positive way, it’s worth it. I hope that people who see the pink t-shirt around town will say, you know what, I meant to do that and I need to do it. My wife is alive and doing well because it was caught early. Had it gone another three or four years, who knows what could have happened. We know the importance of early detection, and that’s really what this is about. Obviously, we want to raise funds, we want to put an end to this disease once and for all, because I didn’t like the way it impacted my family and I don’t like the way it impacts families all across the world. It’s an awful disease and we have to find a cure for it. This is a small way in which we can help as a community. I’m really proud of our fanbase and our campus community for how they’ve jumped on board.” -Coach Greg McDermott on 1620AM Postgame

And Now, Here’s What You Had to Say:

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