Two weeks ago in Omaha, Butler hung 99 points on a Creighton team whose defense ranks 29th in adjusted efficiency. The Bulldogs’ effective field goal percentage was 64.5% in that one, as they made shots from just about everywhere on the floor. These Jays take a lot of pride in their defense, and in preparing for the rematch, it was clear they took that result personally — and it showed in a dominant second half that led to a 22-point blowout of the Bulldogs.
Trailing 29-22 with 4:36 to play after a three from Butler’s backup big man Boden Kapke, shades of the game in Omaha where unheralded Bulldog shooters made inexplicable shots, the Jays had had enough. They ripped off a 12-4 run to take the lead in the final minute of the half, getting points from all four of their seniors in the process. Trey Alexander hit a jumper. Ryan Kalkbrenner scored at the rim. Steven Ashworth hit two midrange shots. And Baylor Scheierman’s drive to the rim, resulting in a contested layup with 52 seconds left, gave CU their first lead in over 13 minutes, 34-33.
Though it was short-lived, as Jalen Thomas answered with a bucket in the paint to give Butler a one-point halftime lead, Creighton had them where they wanted them. Their defense had held Butlerâs top three scorers, Pierre Brooks, Telfort and DJ Davis to seven points on 3-of-15 shooting. Once they stopped the other Bulldogs from scoring, Butler found it difficult to find success.
“We talked during a timeout before (that first half run), I said to the guys, you know, Jalen Thomas has made two threes and Posh Alexander just hit a step-back three,” Greg McDermott said on his postgame radio show. “That’s not what they want to do. So if we keep them offensively doing things that are out of system for them, and they don’t have the ball in the right guys’ hands, it’s gonna play to our advantage eventually.”
It continued after halftime, as Creighton scored 10 of the first 14 points to take a 44-39 lead after just three-and-a-half minutes. Spanning both halves, it was a 22-10 run lasting almost eight minutes that flipped a seven-point Butler lead into a five-point Bluejay advantage. Baylor Scheierman buried a pair of threes in the run, including this one where he came open courtesy of a ball screen from Kalkbrenner:
And this one from in front of the bench that came courtesy of an offensive rebound by Alexander, leading to a second-chance opportunity.
After the second triple, Scheierman blew a kiss in the direction of the Butler student section. On the postgame radio show, he set the record straight.
“No, no, that was for Draymond (Green). It wasn’t for the students. That was for him,” Scheierman said about the Golden State star who’s in Indianapolis for the NBA All-Star game this weekend, and apparently decided to take in some college hoops on his day off. “I saw him back there sitting in front of them. I told the guys at halftime if I made one in the second half I was going to give him a nice little look!”
A three-pointer from Kalkbrenner, one of three he made in the game, followed. Then Alexander came up with a steal and scored in transition, Francisco Farabello cleared the rebound on a missed shot and started a fastbreak that ended with Ashworth burying a transition three, and the Jays led by 10 with 12:43 to go. In 11 minutes of game clock, Creighton had outscored Butler 32-15, flipping a 29-22 Bulldog lead into a 54-44 Bluejay one.
“Yeah, well the message at halftime was pretty simple,” Scheierman said on the postgame radio show. “You know, it’s what we say every halftime. The first five minutes are super important to kind of navigate how the rest of the half is going to go. Obviously, we started off the game pretty rough, and so to start the second half like we did was huge for us.”
Creighton would end up scoring 34 of the first 50 points of the half to build a 68-51 lead, and most impressively, stepped on their throat when they had the chance and never let Butler mount any sort of momentum, much less get back into the game. The Bulldogs went scoreless over the final 5:59, one last message from a Bluejay defense determined to get revenge for giving up 99 points to them two weeks ago.
“Our effort defensively against a team that hung a hundred on us at home was outstanding,” McDermott said. “To hold them to 22 points on their court in the second half is a real credit to our guys, their attention to detail, and their conditioning.”
It was also a credit to a great tactical adjustment defensively, changing up their ball screen coverages to be more disruptive. Specifically: they had Kalkbrenner show on ball screens and string out the ball-handler rather than sit back in their usual drop coverage. The change confused Butler just enough to throw off their rhythm.
“I told the guys, let’s pay more attention to Posh (Alexander),” McDermott said of the Bulldogs’ point guard. “He was being aggressive and getting to that right hand too often. We knew we had to send him the other direction. So we trapped some ball screens, hard-hedged some others, and made his life difficult.”
The 79-57 win is the Jays’ third straight, and sets up a huge showdown with #1 UConn on Tuesday night — another chance to avenge a poor performance in an earlier meeting. But itâs a heck of a challenge as UConn is coming off an 81-53 pasting of #4 Marquette, and the nationâs best team has won 14 straight. That game tips at 7:30pm on FS1.
Inside the Box:
CU outscored Butler 45-22 in the second half and held the Bulldogs to just 31% shooting; it’s their lowest point total in a Big East game this year. The previous low was 62 in a loss to UConn back on February 6.
Speaking of 22, the margin of victory ties the largest for an opponent at Hinkle Fieldhouse over the last 30 years. They lost by 22 to UConn in December of 2022, and to find one bigger than that you have to go back to December of 1992 when North Carolina won by 47. Needless to say, itâs Creightonâs largest ever margin of victory in a win at Butler — but itâs also their first win in a day game at Hinkle since joining the Big East.
Baylor Scheierman had 27 points on 10-of-14 shooting, including 3-of-5 from deep, and 10 rebounds. Itâs his sixth consecutive double-double, continuing his streak of most consecutive double-doubles since Benoit Benjaminâs 28 in 1985. His defense on Jahmyl Telfort was outstanding, too; Telfort had 26 points in the first meeting and four on Saturday, making just 2-of-12 from the floor.
He had 53 points and 21 rebounds in two meetings vs Butler this year. The last Creighton player with a 50 & 20 over two league games vs the same foe in the same season was Doug McDermott in 2012-13. (Though  Doug did it twice that year, hanging 50/20 vs Evansville and 68/20 vs Missouri State.)
Six of Scheiermanâs made baskets were layups, as he continues to do things he wasnât capable of physically a year ago. There were questions in November about who the Jaysâ best player at driving to the rim would be this year without Ryan Nembhard and Arthur Kaluma; not many figured it would be Scheierman, but here we are.
âThey were really physical with Kalkbrenner on the inside and theyâll run some help there some, but Kalkbrennerâs a great screener — besides all the other things he does for us — and he set some incredible flare screens and pin downs for Baylor to get him loose,â McDermott said. âAnd Baylorâs continued to develop part of his game where heâs going to the basket and finishing at the rim to go with his elite ability to shoot the basketball.â
Trey Alexander did a little of everything, with 15 points, eight rebounds, five assists, and three steals while making 7-of-15 shots. Steven Ashworth did, too, with 12 points, eight assists and five boards. And Kalkbrenner scored 21 on 8-of-14 shooting, making three 3-pointers in the process — his most in one game since making four against Loyola Chicago back in November. Thatâs also the only other time this season heâs made more than one in a game.
As a team, the Jays had just eight turnovers — and four of those came in the first eight minutes of the game. Combined with eight steals of their own defensively, the Jays had a 22-2 edge in fastbreak points.
Highlights:
Press Conference:
