After a nine-day layoff, Creighton returns to the court Tuesday night to play Arkansas Pine-Bluff, a team picked to finish third in the 10-team SWAC. Just 2-7 on the year, the Golden Lions have not yet played a home game — playing four neutral-court games and five true road games — and they won’t play a home game until January 18, when they host Southern in the fourth game of the conference schedule. Even by SWAC standards of extreme buy game scheduling, this is absurd. Among their losses are a 97-63 defeat at Oklahoma State, an 87-61 loss at SMU, and an 88-55 loss at Texas A&M, all teams in the top 100 according to KenPom, as well as a loss at Oregon State which resides just outside the top 100. As you’d expect with all the buy games, they’ve played the 15th toughest non-conference schedule in Division 1.
Currently ranked #328 out of 351 teams by KenPom, the Golden Lions have been outscored by an average of 20.4 points in their seven losses, with four losses of 26 points or more. Offensively, about a third of their shots (34.5%) come from behind the arc, they make about a third of them (33.6%), and about a third of their offense comes from made threes (30.0%). The trouble comes on every other shot they take; Pine-Bluff makes just 43.2% from the field overall, which means only 31 teams in America are worse at shooting the basketball than this team.
Part of the problem is they’re not blessed with an abundance of — or, honestly, even one or two — decent shooters. It also doesn’t help that they have an assist on just over half of their made baskets (56%), meaning not only do they struggle to create good looks for themselves, their teammates struggle to create shots for one another. They also turn it over a ton, averaging over 18 turnovers a game.
On defense, the Golden Lions play mostly zone, which is perhaps the one interesting wrinkle to this game as the Jays haven’t played against a ton of zone defenses so far this year, and have struggled when faced with it. Pine-Bluff has been able to use their zone to force an average of 18 turnovers a game — nearly one out of four possessions, which is excellent. In fact, it’s the 11th best percentage in Division 1, and considering their schedule, that’s a rather impressive stat.
Unfortunately for Pine-Bluff, unless they can force a turnover, they’re pretty much incapable of stopping anyone. Opponents shoot an average of 43% from three-point range and 60.2% overall against them — both of those numbers are in the bottom five of all D1 teams — which means every single team they play shoots like Creighton does on a good night, and of course, Creighton is one of the best offensive teams in the country. If every opponent turns into Creighton against Pine-Bluff’s defense, what will the genuine article do against this defense? Shoot 70% and score 110 points? Get free pizza in the first half? I mean, the possibilities are endless against a defense this bad.
Oh, but it gets worse! Even when opponents miss, which doesn’t happen often, they’re able to get an offensive rebound and a second chance 38% of the time. Overall, they get outrebounded by nearly eight boards a game. So to recap: they can’t shoot it very well, they don’t make good decisions with the basketball and aren’t skilled at passing, they can’t stop the other team from making shots, and they don’t get rebounds.
Individually, DaVon Haynes leads them in scoring, averaging 12.4 points and 7.6 rebounds a game. The 6’8″, 215 pound senior has taken 30 more shots than anyone else on the team, and is their primary option; he’s 39-78 in the paint on the year, making him their most efficient scorer by far. Second-leading scorer Tevin Hammond averages 11.5 points a game, but the 6’0″ junior makes just 35% of his shots (19-49 from two-point range, 16-51 from three-point range) and is turnover prone.
This is a bad basketball team, folks. If this game is more competitive than the scrimmage at Bluejay Madness, something will have gone horribly, horribly wrong.
About the Golden Lions: The Golden Lions topped Tuskegee and Morehouse in Atlanta to start the season, but have since lost road games at Oklahoma State, Air Force, SMU, Texas A&M, Sam Houston State, Oregon State and Hampton … DaVon Haynes and Daniel Broughton (7.6 ppg., 4.4 rpg.) were named to the Preseason All-SWAC team … Last Friday night, UAPB played a rescheduled game at Oregon State after the original game was postponed when inclement weather left the Golden Lions stranded in Dallas. The postponement left both teams with nearly two weeks in between games … In that game, Pine-Bluff trailed just 36-32 at the break, but gave up a 22-4 run out of the break as the Beavers blew the game open. Hayes registered 16 points on 7-of-11 shooting, while DeAndre McIntyre added 12 points and guard Tevin Hammond dished out 10 assists for the Golden Lions.
One Big Paragraph with Lots O’Dots™: Grant Gibbs needs three assists to move into fifth place in Creighton history in assists, passing Tyler McKinney’s 430 … Will Artino averaged 5.7 points and 3.0 rebounds in his seven starts, but has averaged 8.5 points and 4.5 rebounds per contest in two games off the bench, both wins. He had a season-best 13 points off the bench at Long Beach State on Dec. 3, then snared a season-high seven rebounds in 11 minutes vs. Nebraska … Ethan Wragge owns four straight games of 15 points or more and has twice tied a career-high with nine rebounds in his past three games … Through NCAA games of Dec. 8th, Creighton led the nation with 103 three-point baskets, and was second with 11.4 three-pointers per contest … Creighton has made 11 or more three-pointers in all but one game (7 vs. George Washington), including a season-high 14 at Long Beach State on Dec. 3rd.
The RUN-DMD Show: Doug McDermott owns 33 points or more in each of his last three home games, scoring 37 against UMKC (Nov. 11), 33 vs. Tulsa (Nov. 23) and 33 vs. Nebraska (Dec. 8). His 33 points were the most by a Bluejay against Nebraska since Duan Cole had 35 points on Dec. 7, 1991.
That’s pretty good, but this is nuts: in four home games so far this year, he’s played 124 minutes and scored 123 points (!).
And then there’s this: McDermott has scored 30 or more points in 18 career games. By comparison, all other Creighton players since 1991-92 have combined for 17 games of 30+ points, a span of 705 games played.
I mean, I don’t even know anymore.
Out of Context Ron Swanson Quote: “Just give me all the bacon and eggs you have. Wait…wait. I worry what you just heard was: Give me a lot of bacon and eggs. What I said was: Give me all the bacon and eggs you have. Do you understand?”
The Last Time They Played: On November 20, 2008, Creighton defeated Arkansas Pine-Bluff 82-50 in a game where CU tied a school record with 18 steals. Yes, 18. Both Booker Woodfox and P’Allen Stinnett struggled to score, combining to go 3-15 from the field, but Cavel Witter picked up the slack, going 5-7 overall and 3-5 from the line en route to 15 points, while contributing four steals. Amazingly, despite winning going away, the Jays were dominated on the glass, 40-30, with Kenny Lawson and Kenton Walker combining for just eight boards.
The Series: Creighton is 4-0 all-time against Arkansas-Pine Bluff, winning those games by an average score of 81.5-50.5. Creighton has scored 74 or more in each meeting, and allowed 58 or less points each time.
Greg McDermott has never faced Arkansas Pine-Bluff.
Gratuitous Linkage: FoxSports.com’s Reid Forgrave wrote a piece yesterday opining that the Big East is the deepest league in America, and had some nice things to say about the Bluejays.
This Date in Creighton Hoops History: On December 17, 1986, Creighton played a spirited game at #19 DePaul before losing 74-64. CU outplayed Joey Meyer’s nationally-ranked Blue Demons, who were coming off a victory over defending national champion Louisville — the Jays outrebounded them 35-32, shot a better percentage from the field, and came up with 17 steals — and led for a good chunk of the game. 20 Bluejay turnovers, six by Gary Swain (who had six in five games before this one), allowed DePaul to hang around and eventually pull away. Creighton senior Kenny Evans had a double-double, scoring 20 points with 13 rebounds, and after the game, told the media “We beat ourselves.”
Completely Random, Totally Rad Music Video of the Day: “Been Away Too Long” by Soundgarden, an apropos title for the Jays’ first game in nine days.
The Bottom Line: Creighton wins big, and gets ready for Cal on Sunday.
Jays 87, Pine-Bluff 56