[dropcap]Creighton[/dropcap] will try to make it two straight when they host #21 Georgetown on Saturday afternoon, a team coming off a home loss to Xavier that seems surprising on the surface, but maybe shouldn’t be. The Hoyas were coming off an emotional blowout win over #4 Villanova, and an overtime win over Marquette, so a bit of a letdown was natural.
This will be the fourth ranked team that Creighton has played in January, more than any other month in program history. What’s more, combined with the January 10 game vs. #19 Seton Hall, it will mark the first time since January of 1979 that Creighton has hosted two top-25 foes in the same month. Meanwhile, Wichita State and Northern Iowa play on Saturday and it’s the first time two rated Missouri Valley teams will square off against one another since 1982. If that isn’t a stark comparison between CU’s old home and it’s new one, nothing is.
Georgetown is led by junior guard D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera, who averages 15.2 points per game to rank fifth in the Big East. He is also tied for eighth in the Big East in assists (3.5 per game) and second in the league in free throw percentage, connecting on 85.3% of his shots (87-of-102). He was held in check by the Bluejays in the teams’ first meeting, which should give Creighton pause — the Hoyas won handily despite Smith-Rivera scoring five points.
Senior center Josh Smith is second on the team in scoring at 12.5 points per game, and leads the team with 6.8 rebounds. Smith also leads the Big East in field goal percentage, connecting on 64.8 percent of his shots from the floor (92-of-142). He’s in better physical shape than he was a year ago, but still struggles with stamina and has a tendency to pick up cheap fouls when he’s tiring — something we saw first hand as he played just 20 minutes in the first meeting because he was in foul trouble most of the game. He managed to score 16 points on 5-6 shooting (and 6-8 from the free throw line) despite playing just 20 minutes because Creighton had difficulty guarding him; it will be interesting to see how they try to slow him down on Saturday.
Three other seniors are significant contributors. Senior guard Jabril Trawick is fourth on team in scoring (7.9 ppg), second in assists (2.2 apg) and fourth in rebounding (3.9 rpg). He had 12 points in the Hoyas’ first game against Creighton on 4-5 shooting from the field. Senior forward Mikael Hopkins scores just 4.6 points per game, but is second on the team with 5.5 rebounds and leads the team with 2.0 blocked shots per game, which ranks third in the league. And senior guard Aaron Bowen is fifth on the team in scoring with 6.5 points per game.
Their freshmen have contributed substantially to the Hoyas success so far, combining to average nearly 24 points (one-third of the team’s total) and nine rebounds a game. L.J. Peak, a forward who has started all but one game this year, leads the pack at 9.1 points a game, and also contributes 2.4 rebounds and 1.3 assists. He had a big game against Creighton earlier this month, scoring 14 points on 5-7 shooting.
The highest ranked freshman recruit, Isaac Copeland, had struggled over the first three months of the season and barely played in the first game vs Creighton. That will be a different story tomorrow; he’s the current Big East Rookie of the Week after averaging 17.0 points, 6.0 rebounds and 2.0 assists while shooting 63.2% from the floor (12-of-19) and 81.8% from the free throw line (9-of-11) during wins over Butler and Villanova last week.
It will be interesting to see if Creighton opts to go with a starting lineup of the five seniors on Saturday, as they did Wednesday against St. John’s. That lineup got the team off to a better start, at least in the first half, but the first game with Georgetown was one of the only games in January where a slow start wasn’t a problem. Creighton led for a good portion of the first half, and were up 29-24 with three minutes to go. But they didn’t finish well, 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.
They match-up fairly well with the Hoyas, but if Georgetown comes with their “A” game, they’re awfully tough to beat. Ask Villanova about that. Any chances of catching a break with an unfocused Hoya team probably went out the window with Xavier’s victory over them earlier this week, sadly. For CU to pull the upset, they need G’Town to show up with something less than their best game, and they need to shoot (and defend) like they did on Wednesday. Don’t count it out.
Quick Notes on the Hoyas:
- The Hoyas, who re-entered the national rankings this week, appearing at No. 21 in the Associated Press Top 25 poll and No. 22 in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches’ poll, are coming off a 66-53 loss at home to Xavier on Tuesday.
- The Hoyas are rated No. 18 in the country in the latest RPI Ratings, with a strength of schedule tabbed No. 3 nationally.
- Georgetown’s freshmen have combined to average 23.9 points, 9.2 rebounds, 3.7 assists and 2.2 steals per game. They have accounted for 36.9 percent of the team’s minutes played (1512 of 4100) and for 33.1 percent of the team’s scoring (478 of 1442 points).
Bluejay Bytes:
- The Bluejays make 75.1% from the charity stripe to lead the Big East. That ranks 14th-best nationally, and is on pace to be Creighton’s fifth-best mark in a single-season since the category was kept in records that date to 1951-52.
- Toby Hegner’s 21 points on Wednesday were the most by a Creighton freshman since Doug McDermott had 21 vs. Oregon on March 28, 2011, and the most by a freshman reserve since Ethan Wragge had 21 points vs. Xavier on November 27, 2009. The scoring binge of 21 points came in his first game as a reserve after he had started the first 21 games of his Creighton career.
- Creighton wore their gray alternate uniforms on Wednesday vs. St. John’s for the second time this season, (and the first time since a November 28 loss to Ole Miss). Creighton wore alternate gray uniforms nine times last year, winning its first seven times before falling vs. Providence in the Big East Tournament title tilt and in the NCAA Tournament vs. Baylor. Even more impressively, Creighton never trailed at any point in the five of the first seven games in gray, and in the other two, were behind for all of 18 seconds against Villanova, and for 97 seconds vs. Providence.
The Series:
Creighton is 2-2 all-time against Georgetown, and has lost two straight in the series. Greg McDermott is 1-3 against Georgetown and coach John Thompson III, however, losing 54-49 in the 2006 NCAA Tournament while coaching at Northern Iowa.
The Last Time They Played:
On January 3, Creighton fell 76-61 to the Hoyas in D.C. Two Georgetown freshman led the way, as L.J. Peak had 14 points and Tre Campbell had a career-high 13 points, while Josh Smith added 16 despite being in foul trouble most of the afternoon.
Gratuitous Linkage:
The Washington Post’s Gene Wang writes about Isaac Copeland, the latest G’Town freshman to enter the spotlight, following a week where he made the game-winner against Butler and scored 17 points in an upset of #4 Villanova.
What the Other Side is Saying:
“The coaches will coach and the players will play, but this one just may come down to how hard the bloggers blog. Are you up to the challenge? Final score: Hoyas 72 – Bluejays 64.”
-Casual Hoya, “From the Other Side“
This Date in Creighton Hoops History:
On January 31, 1977, Creighton defeated DePaul 84-75 in Chicago, paced by 21 points from John C. Johnson and 20 from Rick Apke. Dave Corzine, who’d go on to play for a decade in the NBA, had a double-double for the Blue Demons with 19 points and 17 rebounds — though he needed an unfathomable 28 shots to get those 19 points as Apke’s man-to-man defense hassled him into 9-28 shooting from the field.
Tied at 39 at the half, Coach Tom Apke got the Bluejays going in the locker room. “I chewed ’em out and screamed at ’em, and got them ready to come out on fire,” he told the media after the game. They traded baskets with DePaul to open the second, and with a 54-53 lead, Coach Apke slowed things down. “I was concerned that our guys were so doggoned hot with emotion, and figured the slow-down would settle down our tempo,” he noted afterward.
The Jays pulled away late, ending the game on a 12-4 run to pick up their fifteenth win of the year.
Completely Random, Totally Rad Music Video of the Day:
The Bottom Line:
Creighton picks up pizza for the second straight game, and their second straight win at home before heading out on the road.
Bluejays 75, Hoyas 72