To the victor go the spoils.
When Creighton beat Wichita State on Saturday, they not only won the regular season MVC title, they earned more favorable matchups in Arch Madness. Second seed Wichita State has to tangle with a bracket containing Illinois State, Northern Iowa, and Southern Illinois (or Missouri State). Yikes.
The Redbirds are as talented as any team in the league, save maybe for Creighton, and boast two all-conference players — one inside (Jackie Carmichael) and one outside (Tyler Brown). They bracketed a period of tremendous play (winning seven out of eight in the middle of the conference slate) with two periods of putrid play (losing six straight to open the league, losing four of five to close the league slate). Who’s to say they can’t start a new streak? They certainly have the talent to rattle off three straight wins in St. Louis if they get hot. I’d rather Wichita State run into that potential buzzsaw than the Jays, obviously.
Meanwhile, Northern Iowa is in the midst of a hot streak, they play a style that frustrates Creighton, and they beat the Jays three weeks ago. And the Salukis, though they finished in last place, won six of eight to close the season including a victory over Wichita State and might be the hottest team in the league.
On the other side, Creighton gets a bracket with Evansville, Indiana State, Bradley (or Drake). While those teams aren’t pushovers, I like the looks of that bracket a heckuva lot more than I like the side Wichita drew. I also like that it potentially sets up an identical path to the title as a year ago. Last season as the #2 seed, Creighton opened with the Bradley/Drake winner (Drake), then beat Evansville on Saturday, and bested Illinois State in the championship game.
The question at the moment, though, is which team would Creighton rather play Friday at noon — Bradley or Drake? The Jays swept Bradley, winning by 17 in Omaha and 18 in Peoria. In both games, they wore the Braves down and ran away from them in the second half; in the first meeting in Omaha, Bradley led 30-27 at the break, but the Jays outscored them 48-28 after halftime, while in Peoria, it was 32-28 Jays at halftime and the Jays outscored them 48-34 in the second half. That bodes well for the Jays, because if Bradley is their opponent, they’ll be playing a Braves squad who finished the first game just 16 hours earlier — considering the Jays wore them down on regular rest, you can imagine what might happen to a Braves team on short rest.
As for the Bulldogs, the two games earlier this season had almost nothing in common, and thus are harder to learn from. In the first meeting, Creighton shot 16-27 from three-point range, outrebounded Drake 40-22, and blew the pups out by 30, 91-61. A month later in Des Moines, everything went wrong — the Jays were outrebounded 39-31, they went 0-7 from three-point range in the first half and 5-21 for the game, and they lost 74-69.
Drake is a team whose offense is predicated on the jump shooting of Ben Simons, Richard Carter, Jeremy Jeffers and others — they’re not blessed with slashers who create their own shot, and they don’t have skilled big men who can dominate around the rim. Bradley, on the other hand, doesn’t have great shooters but does boast terrific guards who can grind the game into a slower, more manageable tempo for a team on short rest.
Here’s how the Jays fared, statistically, against the two teams:
Rebounding: +30 vs Bradley, +10 vs Drake
Points in the Paint: +14 vs Bradley, +18 vs Drake
Bench Points: +9 vs Bradley, -15 vs Drake
Second Chance Points: +24 vs Bradley, -2 vs Drake
Points Off Turnovers: -3 vs Bradley, +3 vs Drake
I think Bradley is the better matchup for a lot of reasons — Drake is horribly inconsistent, but their ceiling on their best night is higher than Bradley’s, in my opinion, and if they get hot, they have enough shooters to cause havoc on Creighton’s perimeter defense. Bradley’s lack of depth hurt them in both regular season games, and would only be exasperated in a game on 16 hours rest. It’s tough to say who’s the better draw.
In the end, I suppose it’s splitting hairs; Creighton will be favored to win by 8-10 points over either team, and is given a 87% chance of advancing by KenPom.com regardless of opponent. They’ll likely become the 37th straight top seed to advance to the semifinal of Arch Madness.
One Big Paragraph with Lots O’Dots™: Creighton is 8-1 in games all-time as the top seed, including titles in three of its four appearances in that spot. Creighton went 1-0 for the 1978 title, 3-0 in both 1989 and 1991 to win the crown, and were 1-1 in 2001 (losing to No. 5 Indiana State) … The No. 1 seed has won at least one game in all 36 previous MVC tournaments, reached the final in five of the previous six seasons and won the title in three of the previous five years … Creighton has won the MVC Tournament eight of the last 12 times it has won its first game in St. Louis … Creighton owns seven league tournament titles in the last 14 years. On a national basis, the only schools that can claim this are Duke (10), Gonzaga (10), Winthrop (9) and Creighton (7) … Creighton is the only Valley school that has not appeared in the play-in round since that format began in 1997 … Creighton has won its last 10 games at the MVC Tournament decided by four points or less … The last three times Creighton faced Drake in the MVC Tournament, the winner of that game won the tournament.
The RUN-DMD Show: Last year, Doug McDermott became the first sophomore in league history to be named Larry Bird MVC Player of the Year. This year, he became the eighth player in league history to repeat the award, joining an illustrious list that includes Junior Bridgeman, Larry Bird, Lewis Lloyd, Xavier McDaniel, Hersey Hawkins, Kyle Korver and Darren Brooks. McDermott’s honor gives Creighton seven MVC Player of the Year awards, one more than Bradley and Southern Illinois for most all-time.
The RUN-DMD Show, Part Deux: Doug needs 10 points to tie Rodney Buford atop the school’s all-time scoring list with 2,116, and 11 to become Creighton’s new leading scorer.
The Last Time They Played: On January 23, Drake upended Creighton 74-69 in Des Moines. The Bulldogs were led by Richard Carter, who tied a career-high with 20 points. After a closely contest first 10 minutes, DU took a 25-20 lead on consecutive three-pointers from the left corner by Carter. The Bulldogs closed the first half on a 12-0 run to go ahead 44-28 at the break, including three-pointers by Jeremy Jeffers and Chris Hines. The Jays rallied to take a second-half lead, but could not hold on.
Meanwhile, on February 27, the Jays toppled Bradley on the road 80-62 thanks to a 19-2 run midway through the second half. Doug McDermott scored Creighton’s first eight points and had 16 of the club’s 32 by halftime. He also drew eight Bradley fouls on the other end as CU reached the bonus at the 13:28 mark. McDermott finished with 32 points and 11 rebounds, while Will Artino sparked the team off the bench with 10 points and 6 boards.
The Series: Drake and Creighton have met 152 times, with Creighton winning 93 of them. In the MVC Tournament, the Jays hold a 4-2 edge.
The Jays hold a 46-41 lead in the series with Bradley, but in the MVC tourney, they’re just 3-5. The Braves are the only current member of the league that Creighton has a losing record to in the tournament.
Gratuitous Linkage: Ben Simons was the cornerstone of Mark Phelps first recruiting class at Drake, one that was highly rated and believed by many to be worthy of keeping the Bulldogs atop the MVC after winning the league in Keno Davis’ only year as head coach. He’s the “last man standing” out of that six-man group, as this excellent piece in the Des Moines Register features.
This Date in Creighton Hoops History: On March 8, 2003, second-seeded Creighton trailed tenth-seed Indiana State 34-29 at the half in a quarterfinal battle at Arch Madness. The Sycamores continued to lead until the 6:59 mark of the second half, when Creighton’s defense put the clamps on to turn a 52-51 deficit into a 57-52 lead by holding ISU without a field goal for the rest of the game.
Completely Random, Totally Rad Music Video of the Day: Let’s kick off Arch Madness right, with some good old fashioned rock and roll!
The Bottom Line: Creighton wins and advances to Saturday.
Jays 77, Bradley/Drake 69