Villanova has won five of the last seven Big East Tournaments, and they played in the title game in one of the two they didn’t win. This has been their tourney to lose for the better part of a decade, in other words, and Wednesday night’s opening round win over Georgetown reinforced that idea. Their 80-48 win saw them get a season-best 15 three pointers from eight different players, and featured a giant performance from Big East Freshman of the Year Cam Whitmore — he had 19 points and 10 rebounds, making 3-of-5 from three-point range.
They’ve won seven of their last nine games, finally healthy and peaking at the right time. Trouble is, it’s happened too late to get them into the NCAA Tournament as an at-large — they’re 17-15 with a KenPom ranking of 54 and a NET of 72. So to avoid missing the tourney for the first time since 2012, they need to win four games in four days in NYC. There’s a desperation to their play that makes them especially dangerous.
The Jays and ‘Cats split two meetings in February, both when Villanova was at full strength. Both games were among the slowest CU played all year — a 63-possession grinder in Omaha and a 62-possession rematch in Philadelphia were only eclipsed by the 60-possession rock fight with UConn on February 11.
That’s the style of game we’re likely to see again. Ratcheting up the tempo is tough against a team who turns it over as little as Villanova does — just 15.8% of their possessions end in a turnover, 38th best in the country. They had 18 total turnovers in the first two games. There just aren’t many opportunities to run in the open floor against them; in Omaha neither team had a single point in transition, a great illustration of just how slow the pace was.
CU can absolutely win that type of game with their defense; they played five games of 63 possessions or fewer this season (the three above plus the Texas Tech game in Maui and the Seton Hall game in Newark) and won four. But how can they get this one?
“At Villanova we didn’t get any stops, and when you don’t get stops you can’t get out in transition,” Greg McDermott said this week. “That allowed them to set up their three-quarter court pressure and really take us out of our rhythm offensively. I mean that all starts with getting stops. Without a good defense you can’t be a good transition offensive team. It’s going to be important that we run together some stops and we control the defensive glass. If we can do that it allows us to get out and do what we do.”
Figuring out a plan for Eric Dixon is at the top of the scouting report. The 6’8″ big man torched the Jays’ drop coverage, scoring 31 points in Philly two weeks ago on the strength of 6-of-8 shooting from long range. In two games against CU, he has 51 points, and his lone made three-pointer in Omaha briefly gave them the lead in the final minute. Knowing how McDermott typically plays the percentages, it’s likely that they believe Dixon won’t shoot that well again. And it’s not really that much of a gamble — while he shot 38% from three-point range this year, he only made more than one 3-pointer eight times, and half of those came in non-conference play.
But there’s a difference between being OK with someone taking a shot, and daring them to take it so completely that you leave them wide open. That’s where the Jays must improve tonight. On Dixon’s first three attempts, Ryan Kalkbrenner was nearly under the rim when he launched them — and after he sank those shots, his confidence was such that nothing the Jays did disrupted his rhythm. I’d bet on Dixon not being able to repeat his six 3-pointer, 31-point performance. But for them to win that bet, they can’t give him the sort of wide-open shots you’d typically only see in shootaround.
That’s easier said than done. When Kalkbrenner started paying more respect to Dixon’s shot when he roamed out to the perimeter, it took him away from the rim — and then the Jays guards were abused on the pick-and-roll by Justin Moore and on back-cuts by Cam Whitmore. The myriad of easy layups the Wildcats got were the direct result of Kalkbrenner being pulled away from the rim, and their guards being unable to stop the ball-handler from getting downhill off the dribble. And when they adjusted back to keep him near the rim, the Wildcats burned them on kick-outs to their other shooters. It was a poor performance by the Bluejay guards that ultimately doomed them in that game. Their energy and effort must be better — like it was in the first meeting — for the Jays to win.
Offensively, the Jays are hoping the shift to postseason play gets Baylor Scheierman back on track. Since making 5-of-10 from three-point range on February 8 at Seton Hall he has made just 12-of-45 (26%) in his last seven games. Prior to that stretch, he had been 62-of-157 (39.5%). Scheierman has come up huge in other ways, grabbing 10 rebounds (four offensive) with four assists and three steals against DePaul in the regular season finale, and over the seven games where his shot has been off, he’s averaging 8.2 rebounds per game.
Ryan Nembhard scored 20 points with 11 rebounds and three assists, making 3-of-5 from outside the arc and 5-of-9 inside of it in that game. He’s excited to play in his first Big East Tournament after missing last year’s tourney due to a season-ending injury — and has plenty of motivation after being left off the all-conference teams after getting preseason recognition. He was third in the Big East with 4.9 assists per game and third in assist-to-turnover ratio. He’s ready to go.
“Big stage, bright lights. One of the greatest arenas in the world,” Nembhard said of Madison Square Garden. “If you’re not excited in a building like that, I don’t know, there’s probably something wrong with you.”
“It sucked that I couldn’t get a chance to play in it last year,” he continued, “but I’m super excited for postseason play, whether it’s March Madness or this tournament. This is the time of year you want to play your best basketball so I’m looking forward to it.”
- Tip: 8:30pm (approx.)
- Venue: Madison Square Garden, New York City, NY
- TV: FS1
- Announcers: Gus Johnson, Bill Raftery
- Sideline reporter: Kristina Pink
- 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
- Cable Cutters: Available on all major streaming platforms
- Streaming on the Fox Sports app and website
- Radio: 1620AM, 101.9FM
- Announcers: John Bishop and Taylor Stormberg
- Streaming on 1620TheZone.com and the 1620 The Zone mobile app
- Simulcast on SiriusXM
- Live Stats
- The Villanova bench outscored Georgetown’s 25-6 in the opening round, with no starter logging more than 28 minutes thanks to the game being out of hand early.
- The Wildcats drained a season-high 15 3-pointers, one more than they dropped in at Saint Joseph’s back on Dec. 17 in Philadelphia. There were 35 attempts, giving them a conversion rate of .429.
- Creighton is 9-8 all-time as it enters its ninth appearance at the Big East Tournament, which includes trips to the finals in 2014, 2017, 2021 and 2022. That doesn’t include the 2020 trip that was halted at halftime of the quarterfinal round game vs. St. John’s at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Greg McDermott owns 16 wins in conference tournaments at CU (9 in the Big East Tournament, 7 in the MVC Tournament). With a 9-8 record, McDermott’s .529 win percentage at the Big East Tournament leads all current Big East coaches and his nine wins are tied for the most among current Big East coaches with Ed Cooley, who is 9-9.
- Creighton has won 13 of its last 15 conference tournament games decided by four points or less.
Villanova leads the all-time series with Creighton, 18-7, and has won both meetings in the Big East Tournament (winning the title over the Jays in 2017 and 2022). Six of the last eight meetings have been decided by double-figures, with CU winning four of those games.
Creighton is 9-0 all-time on March 9th, including a 3-0 record under Greg McDermott. CU’s last March 9 game saw Mitch Ballock make a league-record 11 three-pointers in a 91-78 Senior Day win over DePaul in 2019.
Creighton’s lone Big East Tournament game on March 9th came in 2017, when CU beat Providence in the quarterfinals. And in 1974, Creighton defeated Texas in the NCAA Tournament, 77-61, to reach the Sweet 16.
The Bottom Line:
ESPN’s BPI gives Creighton a 75.0% chance of victory, while KenPom predicts a five-point Bluejay win (71-66) with 68% odds of winning. Vegas pegs the Jays as five-point favorites, as well.
I think the Jays find a way to stop Dixon from torching them again, and win a back-and-forth battle that will be lower scoring than the metrics think.
Creighton 68, Villanova 63