In two meetings earlier this year, Creighton swept Marquette by seven total points. The Jays won in double overtime 75-69 in Milwaukee, and 83-82 in Omaha in a game that featured 17 ties and 16 lead changes. If a play or two went differently, Marquette could easily have swept the series instead. It was that close.
Five Thirty Eight published a piece this week attempting to prove or disprove the old adage that “it’s hard to beat a team three times.” Turns out, it actually is hard to do, especially when the first two games were as close as these were.
We found that teams with the slightest advantage — those that ended up with an edge in adjusted efficiency of less than 3 points per 100 possessions — won about 54.5 percent of all matchups, no matter when they happened during the season. In the first meeting between any two teams, regardless of whether they played again, the slightly better team won 54.7 percent of the time; when teams that played before met a second time, the better team’s chances went down just slightly, to 54.1 percent.
But when two evenly matched teams meet for a third time in the same season, their previous results matter. When the teams split their first two games, the better team won 57.3 percent of the time; when the better team lost the previous two meetings, that team avenged those defeats at a 56.7 percent clip. But when the better team won both previous matchups, the third was a true toss-up — the better teams won only about 49.3 percent of the time.
Of course, Creighton isn’t the same team they were in those two games. Ryan Nembhard had 11 points on 4-for-15 shooting, with six rebounds, two assists, and two steals in Milwaukee. He had 18 points on 6-for-11 shooting, with three rebounds, five assists, and a steal in Omaha.
Without the Big East Freshman of the Year, their offense has been noticeably worse — scoring 51, 64, and 60 points in three games looks rough on the surface, and even worse in advanced metrics, where they dropped by five points in adjusted offensive efficiency in just three games (from 104.0 to 99.6).
Defensively, they’ve actually gotten a bit better, with Trey Alexander — four inches taller and 25 pounds heavier than Nembhard — now guarding opposing guards. Their adjusted defensive efficiency has dropped by nearly a full point, which is great but not enough to make up for dropping five points offensively.
It’s tempting, then, to say the scales have tipped toward Marquette in the third matchup.
But three games is a small sample size, and two of those games had strange circumstances — not many teams were going to win, much less compete, in the crazed environment of the Dunkin’ Donuts Center against Providence on the night they won their first-ever Big East regular season title. And against Seton Hall, Alexander had the flu, receiving an IV in the locker room prior to tipoff and looking a step slow most of the afternoon.
On the other side, the Golden Eagles aren’t exactly playing all that well themselves, and they can’t even try to explain it away with injuries. They’re just plain inconsistent, failing to win two in a row since January and owning a 5-5 record over their last 10 games.
When they’re on, they’re capable of games like their 83-73 win over Villanova on February 2. When they’re not, they suffer losses like their 85-79 defeat at Butler or, worse, their 91-80 loss at DePaul.
Interestingly, Marquette’s First Team All-Big East forward Justin Lewis — who averaged 17.8 points and 8.0 rebounds per game — was stopped in his tracks by the Jays in both earlier matchups. In Milwaukee, he shot 4-of-18 from the floor and had nine points. In Omaha, he was 5-of-13 for 11 points. It was secondary players who had success. Oso Ighodaro scored a career-high 22 points in Milwaukee; Darryl Morsell had 23 in Omaha.
Meanwhile, Ryan Kalkbrenner feasted in both games. He had 20 points on 8-of-12 shooting, 12 rebounds (five offensive), four blocks and two steals in Milwaukee. He had 21 points on 8-of-9 shooting with seven boards, three blocks and two steals in Omaha. Marquette’s big men had zero answer for him, and it’s not clear that they will in the third game, either.
- Tip: Approx. 1:30pm
- Venue: Madison Square Garden, NYCNY
- TV: FS1
- Announcers: Tim Brando, Jim Jackson and 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
- Announcers: John Bishop and Ross Ferrarini
- Streaming on 1620TheZone.com and the 1620 The Zone mobile app
- Satellite Radio: XM 206; SiriusXM app 969
Forward Justin Lewis claimed the Big East Most Improved Player Award on Monday after making across-the-board strides in 2021-22. He was also named to the All-BIG EAST First Team on Sunday after concluding the regular season ranked among the conference leaders in six categories. He is third in the league in scoring at 17.1 points per game and fourth in rebounding (8.0 rpg.). In conference-only games, he scored 18.2 points per game.
Tyler Kolek tops the league in assists-per-game and is third in assist-to-turnover ratio (2.2). Kolek is dishing out a league-best 5.7 assists-per-game, which ranks 13th nationally. The George Mason transfer distributed a career-best 11 helpers in the win over Georgetown (2/16) and his 172 helpers this season put his total just outside the program’s top-10 single-season list.
In 30 games this season, Marquette has averaged 29.5 deflections per game (885 total) and met or surpassed its goal of 32 on 12 occasions (11-1 in those outings). Guard Tyler Kolek leads the way with 139 deflections and forward Kur Kuath (77-of-135 are blocked shots) is right behind with 135.
Creighton is 7-7 all-time entering its eighth appearance at the Big East Tournament, which includes trips to the finals in 2014, 2017 and 2021. They’re 1-0 in the opening round, 3-4 in the quarterfinals, 3-0 in the semifinals and 0-3 in championship games.
Five members of the Creighton men’s basketball team received recognition from the Big East Conference on Sunday, March 6. Ryan Hawkins was named to the All-Big East Second Team and Ryan Kalkbrenner was named All-Big East Honorable Mention. Additionally, the Bluejay trio of Ryan Nembhard, Trey Alexander and Arthur Kaluma were named to the Big East’s All-Freshman Team. WBR covered those award winners in detail yesterday.
Two incredible notes here: Creighton and Marquette have met 94 times over the last 99 years, but never on a neutral floor until today. And Marquette is the only active Big East team that Creighton has never tipped off against at the Big East Tournament.
Marquette leads the series with Creighton by a 56-38 margin. Creighton leads the series 10-8 since the teams became BIG EAST rivals, and has won six of the past seven matchups. CU is attempting to beat the Eagles in a fourth straight match-up for the first time since a five-game streak from 1932-36.
Creighton’s won two MVC tourney titles on March 10. In 2003, they blew out Southern Illinois 80-56, and in 2013, they beat Wichita State 68-65. The latter of those resulted in a second-straight Arch Madness title, and a fitting capstone to the Bluejays historic run of excellence in that tourney. Ott’s recap following the game is really terrific and I highly recommend taking a couple of minutes to go read it.
The Bottom Line:
Given how Marquette’s last six weeks have gone, if they win it is likely to be fairly decisive — by 10 points or more. If it’s close, Creighton has the edge. They’re 7-2 in games decided by five points or less, with two of those wins coming without Ryan Nembhard — 81-78 in the game at St. John’s where he was lost for the season, and 64-62 last week against UConn. Going back further, Creighton has won 13 of its last 15 conference tournament games decided by four points or less.
If Wednesday’s Opening Round of the Big East Tournament is any indication, it’ll be close.
Creighton 68, Marquette 65