Creighton’s first exhibition game gave them a lot to work on. The Bluejays had 19 turnovers which Iowa State converted into 24 points. They gave up an offensive rebound on 43% of the Cyclones’ missed shots (16 of 37), and ISU turned those into 19 second chance points. That’s a 43-13 advantage in extra-possession points, and it’s not very often you will overcome a 30-point deficit there to win a game. They did because they shot 48.3% from three (14-of-29) and 51.0% overall (26-of-51).
Their opponent in the second exhibition, Minnesota, presents a different set of challenges than Iowa State did. The Gophers defeated Nebraska-Omaha 72-52 in Minneapolis last week, with 36 of their 57 shots coming from behind the perimeter. That’s nothing new, as Niko Medved’s Gophers were a prolific three-point shooting team a year ago and his Colorado State teams were known for it. On the flip side, they were out-rebounded 39-35 and gave up 15 offensive rebounds.
It’s hard to know how much of that was a product of the Mavs’ shooting the ball extraordinarily poorly versus Minnesota simply getting beat on the glass; the Mavs were 1-of-15 from three-point range in the first half and 5-of-28 for the game. With the Gophers’ size they figure to be a better rebounding team that that, and how they fare against the Jays’ frontcourt is likely one of the biggest things Niko Medved and the Minnesota coaching staff are looking for in this game.
7’2’, 275-pound center Malick Kordel scored 13 points off the bench with four rebounds, three assists, and a blocked shot in his debut after transferring from Michigan. He’s in a sixth-man role at least for the moment; 6’9” junior Grayson Grove started 12 games a year ago and is penciled in again, though Kordel played more minutes and was far more productive despite technically being the backup.
Jaylen Crocker-Johnson (13.4 points, 6.8 rebounds per game), Isaac Asuma (10.9 points, 4.0 rebounds, 3.7 assists), and Bobby Durkin (10.2 points, 3.2 rebounds, 2.9 assists) are all back from last year’s team, giving them a solid core to build around.
For the Jays, one of the questions is whether Fred King will make his exhibition debut or not. The fifth-year boomerang transfer is currently eligible after the latest court ruling, but did not dress for last Sunday’s game.
“Fred’s done a nice job of getting his body in shape. He showed up about 30 pounds overweight, and he’s lost about half that back,” Alan Huss said after Sunday’s win. “I think he’s worked pretty hard at it, which I’m really proud of him for that, especially given the uncertainty of what he’s been dealing with from an eligibility standpoint. The next step is getting him some reps with the first team. He’s been on the scout team, and that’s just a different feel. So it’ll be nice to kind of move him over and get him some first team reps here in the coming weeks.”
Oswin Erhunmwunse looked a lot like the player he was at Providence, both for good (six points, five rebounds, solid rim protection defensively) and bad (four fouls in just 21 minutes). They’ll take that every day of the week after their struggles a year ago, certainly, but getting a bit more from him in the paint would be a plus.
Another question is what freshman point guard Katrelle Harmon has in store for an encore. He scored 16 points on 5-of-5 shooting, all in the paint, with six assists, three turnovers, three rebounds, two steals, and two blocks in 27 minutes off the bench. And he was a key playmaker as they held off a late Iowa State rally.
Speaking of the backcourt, part of the reason Harmon played so much in the second half was because both BJ Davis and Wes Enis fouled out. Their perimeter defense suffered without them; in particular after Davis fouled out, they had a hard time staying in front of Cyclone guards. Against a Minnesota team that will take a lot more threes than ISU did, it will provide a great test not only for Davis and Enis to defend without fouling out, but for the players behind them in the rotation.
Ten Bluejays played at least nine minutes against Iowa State, and that was by design even if the foul trouble was not (Davis and Enis fouled out, Erhunmwunse had four).
“I think they’ve all earned the opportunity to get out there and have a crack,” Huss said on Sunday. “We’ll play some guys closer to thirty minutes but we want to play nine, ten guys. We’ve got a couple of big time battles to figure out here as we move forward. I don’t know exactly how it’s gonna play out. I think that’s the beauty of the next two weeks, trying to figure those out.”
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Tip: 7:30pm
Venue: CHI Health Center Omaha
TV: YouTube
Announcers: Simulcast of the Bluejay Radio Network broadcast
Radio: 1620AM
Announcers: John Bishop and Jeff Vanderloo
Streaming on 1620TheZone.com and the 1620 The Zone mobile app
Live Stats:
Follow along on Stat Broadcast
Minnesota played 15 guys in their exhibition win over Omaha, as Malick Kordel led Minnesota with 13 points, while Bobby Durkin had 11 and Jaylen Crocker-Johnson had 10 points. Kyan Evans produced eight points, four rebounds, seven assists and four steals.
The 2025-26 Golden Gopher squad made a school record 278 three-pointers, breaking the previous record of 272 set in the 2013-14 season. Bobby Durkin led with 80, followed by Cade Tyson with 71, Isaac Asuma with 58, and Jaylen Crocker-Johnson with 42. Durkin, Asuma and Crocker-Johnson are back for 2026-27, so they expect to be just as lethal from long-range.
In his second year as head coach, Niko Medved previously was at Colorado State where his Rams’ teams defeated Creighton twice (95-81 in 2021, 69-48 in 2023).
Freshman Katrelle Harmon didn’t look like a true freshman in his exhibition debut on Sunday at Iowa State. He led CU with 16 points and six assists while also sharing the team-lead with two blocked shots and two steals. The only time last year the same Bluejay led CU in points, assists, blocks and steals of a game that counted was Dec. 30 against Butler, when Jasen Green did it. In Creighton’s last 30 seasons, no Bluejay player has had at least 16 points, six assists, three rebounds, two steals and two blocked shots in a game that counted.
On Sunday at Iowa State, Creighton was whistled for 24 personal fouls, and senior guards Wes Enis and BJ Davis both fouled out. Creighton hasn’t had multiple players foul out of the same game that counted since Feb. 3, 2021 (Marcus Zegarowski and Damien Jefferson vs. Georgetown). Creighton last had 24 fouls in a game that counted on Dec. 20, 2020 in an overtime win at UConn, and last had 24 or more fouls in regulation on March 9, 2017 vs. Providence in a Big East Tournament quarterfinal victory.
Creighton is 58-6 since 1981 in fall exhibition games thanks to 26 straight victories. The only team since 1994 to beat Creighton in an exhibition setting has been Global Sports, which eventually merged and changed their name to EA Sports and had three victories.
Among the teams that Creighton has defeated in recent exhibitions include No 18 Iowa State this year, No. 16 Iowa State last year and No. 14 Purdue in 2024.
Despite their relative proximity, Creighton and Minnesota have not played in 30 years. It’s kind of funny that they haven’t run into each other in a holiday tournament or a postseason tourney somewhere along the line; they’ve played eight of the 11 “historical” Big Ten teams multiple times since the last time they saw the Golden Gophers.
The last time they met was in the 1996 San Juan Shootout. #24 Minnesota beat the Jays 64-63, as the Gophers’ Eric Harris made a game-winning basket with five seconds left to avoid the upset. Creighton rallied from a 14-point deficit in the second half led by Randall Crutcher, who scored 14 of his 19 points after halftime. Trailing 50-39, Crutcher scored five straight to narrow the gap, and then Edward St. Fleur and Chris Chestnut hit back-to-back threes in a span of 14 seconds to tie the game.
The Jays eventually led by as many as four, 62-58, after Crutcher completed a three-point play with 2:21 to go. But they only scored one more point the rest of the way, and when St. Fleur’s desperation shot at the buzzer missed, Minnesota escaped with the one-point win.
That Gophers team was spectacular, though the NCAA record books would have you believe it never happened. They finished 31-4 and 16-2 in the Big Ten, earning a #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament and advancing to the Final Four. An academic fraud scandal later forced them to vacate all of it. That team didn’t just win, they blew out just about everyone they played; their three regular season losses came by a combined 10 points, and their 31 wins came by an average of 17.1 points. One of the toughest games they got the entire year came from Dana Altman’s Bluejays.