The Big East standings are a jumble heading into the regular season’s final day, with 32 possible seeding combos depending on who wins and who loses. Everyone else in the league will have finished their game by the time Creighton and DePaul take the court, so by tip time, the Jays will know what their ceiling is with a win — and what their floor is with a loss.
We don’t have that luxury at this point, of course. But thanks to this rad flowchart from the World-Herald’s Jon Nyatawa we can figure out where the Jays would be seeded, and who they would play, based on various scenarios:
Those scenarios assume a Bluejay win, and while they’re favored across the board, DePaul is a much improved team over recent years and is playing perhaps its best basketball of the season. They’ve won two straight, hanging 92 points on St. John’s (winning 92-83) and 101 on Georgetown (in a 101-69 pasting). And as a result, they’ve won seven Big East games in a season for the first time in more than a decade.
Their offensive explosion the last two games has largely been a result of Max Strus getting red hot. He had 43 points Sunday against the Johnnies and then followed it up with 30 points vs the Hoyas, making 14-of-25 from three-point range (56%) in the two wins. That’s the story of Strus’ career — he’s a volume shooter who scores a ton of points, takes a lot of shots to get there, and is more susceptible to wild swings between hot and ice cold than most shooters. Unfortunately for CU, he’s on the high side of the bell curve at the moment.
But DePaul’s improvement has also been a result of being really, really good on the glass. Through 17 conference games, DePaul has been the best offensive rebounding team in the Big East — they’ve grabbed an offensive board on an absurd 31.8% of their missed shots. They had 11 offensive rebounds in the first game against CU, right in line with that percentage (11 rebounds on 33 missed shots). Likewise, they’re second-best in defensive rebounding in league games, grabbing a board on 73.7% of opponent’s misses — taking away transition opportunities.
In the first meeting, DePaul’s one-two punch inside was limited by foul trouble, and they still managed to clean up on the glass. Femi Olujobi (13.5 points, 5.3 rebounds per game) and Paul Reed (11.6 points, 8.1 rebounds) played just 16 and 19 minutes, respectively. Olujobi had 10 points and one board; Reed had two points and seven boards with four turnovers. Unheralded Flynn Cameron picked up the slack somewhat, scoring 11 points (3-of-3 on threes) with four rebounds (two offensive). Olujobi and Reed were bothered by Creighton’s defensive plan to double-team every touch in the post, so it will be interesting to see what CU’s plan is in the rematch — and how they adjust if DePaul starts hitting the jump shots they missed in Chicago.
While DePaul (on paper) has an advantage inside, they’re a dream matchup for the Jays behind the perimeter. The Blue Demons have allowed the second-most three-point attempts in the Big East (42.9% of opponents shots have been threes, which is ABSURD), and their opponents are making 35.9% of them — second-best in the league, and 263rd in D1. It’s a big reason why their defense gives up an effective field goal percentage of 53.7%, dead last in the Big East. There’s going to be good shots available behind the arc tonight for Creighton. They were just 9-of-26 behind the arc two weeks ago against DePaul, though, and just 15-of-58 (25.9%) over the last two games.
Threatening to overshadow everything is, unfortunately, the continued college basketball corruption scandal and Creighton’s alleged involvement. Things were ratcheted up significantly late Thursday when Yahoo Sports cited a federal indictment linking CU assistant Preston Murphy to a $6,000 payout/bribe from an agent. Late Friday, Murphy was placed on administrative leave and he will not be on the bench for Saturday’s game (and presumably the postseason, starting this week in NYC).
There’s no good time for this news to drop — it’s a massive embarrassment to me as an alum and a donor to have Creighton’s name associated with this — but on the eve of the season’s final regular season game is really bad timing. Coming a few days before the team heads to the country’s largest media market for the Big East Tournament, where a hoard of reporters will want to get a comment from Greg McDermott about it, could make for some interesting media sessions this week. Mostly, though, 24 hours before Senior Night for two players that deserve their time in the spotlight is unfortunate. It threatens to rob them of their moment, so for the sake of those seniors — and for the entire roster, who’ve worked their butts off to put themselves in a position to grab an NCAA Tournament berth — I hope the timing of this latest news is not a distraction that takes their eyes off that goal. Because as we wrote in the Primer before Wednesday’s game, any loss to any team and Creighton’s NCAA hopes are over. Whatever indiscretions Murphy or others are allegedly guilty of, try not to lose sight of the fact that this is the final (scheduled) home game for a pair of Bluejays who haven’t spent a long time on the Hilltop, but who have made invaluable contributions to the program. Kaleb Joseph and Connor Cashaw epitomize Creighton basketball — good kids who worked hard to improve and by the end of their careers here, became important parts to a winning team.
“I hope everyone will stay and listen to what Connor and Kaleb have to say after the game,” Greg McDermott said in his postgame radio interview after Wednesday night’s win. “Those two guys deserve a lot of credit for why we’re still where we are. When you go through a tough stretch like we did with those four losses, it would be easy for two seniors to say ‘I would be doing this if I were on the floor’ or ‘I should be out there doing that instead of that young guy.’ But instead, they’ve chosen to take the high road. They’ve helped mentor those young guys. They’ve made sure the locker room is a positive place. And they’re contributing in a big way to us winning basketball games.”
You can bet those two seniors are the ones rallying this team during this moment, and it’s because of them that I’d be absolutely shocked if Creighton doesn’t win tonight.
- Tip: 7:00pm
- Venue: CHI Health Center Omaha
- TV: FS1
- Announcers: Dave O’Brien and Doug Gottlieb
- In Omaha: Cox channel 78 (SD), 1078 (HD); CenturyLink Prism channel 620 (SD), 1620 (HD)
- Outside Omaha: FS1 Channel Finder
- Satellite: DirecTV channel 219, Dish Network channel 150
- Streaming on FoxSportsGO
- Radio: 1620AM
- Announcers: John Bishop and Taylor Stormberg
- Streaming on 1620TheZone.com and the 1620 The Zone mobile app
- For Cord Cutters:
- One of the oldest records in the DePaul record book is George Mikan’s 53 points in a NIT game against Rhode Island on March 21, 1945. The closest any player has gotten to that mark was Stanley Brundy and Mark Aguirre with 47-point efforts once each in their careers. Earlier this week Max Strus matched Mikan’s 53-point output in a 40-minute span, but it was over two games against St. John’s and Georgetown. Strus scored 36 in the second half against the Red Storm on Sunday before following that with 17 points in the first half against Georgetown on Wednesday.
- In scoring 101 points against Georgetown this week, DePaul scored their most points in a Big East game since March 2, 2006 when they hung 108 on Syracuse. Devin Gage dished out a career-high 10 assists, Femi Olujobi reached double figures for the 21st time this season, and Paul Reed recorded his sixth double-double of the season.
- Reed’s length at the ‘4’ makes him a tough matchup for Creighton, and could limit their use of the four-guard lineup. The sophomore is averaging nearly a double-double in conference games this year — 13.8 points and a league-best 8.8 rebounds per game while shooting .545 (91-167) from the field, .563 (9-16) from three-point range and .935 (43-46) from the free throw line in 28.1 minutes per game.
- Creighton forced Marquette into 22 turnovers last Sunday while picking up 15 steals. That’s the most by a Creighton foe in a conference game since Southern Illinois had 23 on Feb. 10, 2008. And with 13 steals against Providence on Wednesday, they have now had 13+ steals in consecutive games for the first time since November of 2007. Creighton has not had 10+ steals in three straight games since Nov. 24-Dec. 1, 2007, and hasn’t had 13+ steals in three consecutive contests since Dec. 18-27, 1991.
- Creighton is 21-2 in the last 23 years in its final home game of the regular-season, losing only in 2002 to Drake (when it had no seniors), and in 2015 in the final seconds to Xavier. Each of the last 19 Creighton teams to win on Senior Day would go on to reach the postseason.
- With a win, Creighton can assure itself a top-five seed in the Big East tourney and also assure itself of a .500 league record or better for the 23rd time in the last 24 seasons. They would also win three consecutive regular-season games in the same month of March for the first time since 1931-32
Creighton has won 14 of the last 15 meetings with DePaul to take an 19-16 lead in the all-time series. Last year’s sweep marked the first time since the 1976-77 campaign (when CU led 4-3) that the Bluejays have taken the lead in the series.
Twelve of the last 13 meetings in the series have been decided by double-figures, with the exception being the first match-up last season at Wintrust Arena that went down to the final seconds before CU prevailed, 76-75, on a late three-pointer by Bluejay star Marcus Foster.
On the latest edition of the Scriptown Brewing Bluejays Bytes Podcast, we have an exclusive interview with Creighton’s Kaleb Joseph. We talk to him about his upbringing, his passion for basketball, influential people he’s met through the sport, his time at Syracuse and Creighton, and how he’s dealt with the highs and lows along the way. A good listen for the days leading up to Senior Night.
On March 9, 2013, Creighton steamrolled the Indiana State Sycamores in their last-ever MVC Semifinal game, 64-43. Ott’s recap from St. Louis fills in the blanks:
“I’ve been to 15 consecutive Arch Madness weekends, and only once before Saturday do I remember as dominant a half of basketball played by Creighton during that stretch than the one the Bluejays pulled off in the MVC Tournament semifinals against Indiana State. It was nearly 10 years ago to the day, when Creighton shot 49% from the field and held Southern Illinois to 16% shooting during the first half of the 2003 MVC Tournament championship game. The score after 20 minutes was 42-16 Bluejays, but somehow it didn’t even seem that close. CU would cruise to an 80-56 win in the title game.
Fast-forward a decade, to yesterday afternoon. Coming off a double-digit win over Drake in the quarterfinals, a win that was hardly a walk in the park, Creighton jumped out to a 14-2 lead over the Sycamores during the game’s first 5 minutes. But instead of seeing the Trees mount a push of their own, similar to what Illinois State would do after getting down big against Wichita State in Saturday’s second semifinal, Jake Odum and ISU-Blue couldn’t make shots or get stops. And the Bluejays’ vaunted offense started to snowball.
Just before the under-4:00 media timeout, an Austin Chatman jump shot gave Creighton a 28-point margin, 39-11. The game was over, the remaining 24 minutes merely a chance for Doug McDermott to pad his already impressive stat line and for his father, head coach Greg McDermott, to get some of the Bluejay “Bench Mob” players a few minutes here and there.
By the time the first half closed, the Jays were up 41-18. McDermott and the entire Sycamores squad were tied at the break with 18 points apiece. McDermott made all five of his three-point attempts in the first 20 minutes and only missed one field goal, en route to a ridiculous 18 points and 5 boards in 16 minutes of play. The Jays shot nearly 62% from the field in the first half, including 73% from three-point range (8-11). Meanwhile, Indiana State shot 25% from the floor and didn’t make a three in 7 attempts.
After the break, the Bluejays pulled back on the reigns a bit. Coach Mac could rest folks as he saw fit. Starters McDermott (35 minutes), Chatman (34 minutes), and Grant Gibbs (39 minutes) all played nearly all the game Friday against Drake. So it was advantageous that the Bluejays could put the Sycamore away early and save some wear and tear on the regulars. McDermott played 27 minutes against ISU, Chatman logged 29 minutes, and Gibbs played 28 — his lowest total since January 30.
The Sycamores outscored the Jays 25-23 in the second half. But not one of the thousands of white-and-blue-clad Creighton fans at the Scottrade Center seemed to care. Thoughts were floating to making celebratory plans for Saturday night and, for some people, changing travel plans for Sunday. Some folks stuck around to watch Wichita State beat Illinois State, but most Jays fans headed to the hotel lobbies and Sundeckers and other watering holes, content to drink away their last night of Arch Madness in St. Louis.”
This popped up on the YouTube homepage under “suggested videos” this morning while I was searching for workout music; I don’t know what it means, if anything, but I like it.
The Bottom Line:
Creighton takes advantage of DePaul’s porous perimeter defense and wins to set up a potential win-and-in scenario Thursday in NYC.
Bluejays 83, Blue Demons 76