Tuesday started a crucial early-conference season stretch where Creighton plays four of the top six teams in the Big East in the span of 12 days. They won the first game, 89-85 over Butler, and next up is a team who presents some of the same stylistic challenges: Seton Hall.
The Pirates enter the game at 12-2, and are one of the biggest surprises of the season so far. Picked dead last in the Big East preseason poll by the league’s coaches, it was hard to argue with that assessment at the time. They were 7-25 a year ago and 2-18 in the Big East, winning just twice after December 4 with both wins coming in overtime. And this year’s roster was completely remade with 10 transfers, making them hard to gauge.
But it turns out Shaheen Halloway emphasized finding players who fit the way he wants to play — tough, physical and relentless — over anything else, to great success. Their defense is terrific, stifling opponents on the perimeter and making it very difficult to score at the rim. Seton Hall’s adjusted defensive efficiency is 95.3, 14th best in D1 and 12.9 points less per 100 possessions than the average D1 team. Opponents also have a 46.1% effective field goal percentage (34th) against them.
“They’re a very physical basketball team,” Greg McDermott said on Friday. “They have a lot of interchangeable pieces defensively that can do a lot of damage. The big thing is we’ve got to take care of the basketball so we can get into our offense. We have to take care of the ball. We have to get decent looks at the basket. Live ball turnovers are going to be such a key statistic in this game.”
While their perimeter defense is OK, holding teams to 32.9% shooting (147th), they’re elite inside the arc.
Their opponents are shooting only 43.8% on two-pointers, the 15th best mark in the county. That’s largely because they literally block one out of every five shots; you read that correctly, Seton Hall has blocked 20.1% of their opponent’s shots. It’s the best mark in the nation by far, as the next closest team is nearly two full percentage points behind them (Georgia, at 18.2%).
“When you get in the paint, they really bring a lot of help,” McDermott noted. “Often times their blocked shots end up being the first pass of the transition going the other way. So we’ve got to be smart when we get the basketball in the paint.”
They’ve also stolen the ball on 15.3% of opponents’ possessions, the 3rd highest rate in the country, and turned opponents over on 23.1% of their possessions (9th best).
Their defense is, quite simply, a menace.
Offense is another story. The aggressiveness of their guards often leads to sloppy, disjointed possessions. They’re prone to both long scoring droughts and foul trouble that forces them into strange lineup combos. And their best shot is often off of an offensive rebound — like Kevin Willard’s best Seton Hall teams, they’ll take bad shots that carom wildly off the rim, assuming correctly that they can grab the lion’s share of the rebounds and score on enough putbacks to win.
A.J. Staton-McCray (13.1 ppg.), Tajuan Simpkins (11.3 ppg.) and Adam “Budd” Clark (9.9 ppg., 5.4 apg.) lead a talented class of newcomers.
Their primary playmaker on both ends is the 5’10 Clark, who transferred from Merrimack after two seasons where he excelled, including averaging 19.5 points a year ago in earning first team All-MEAC honors. They won 21 and 18 games in those two seasons, but missed the postseason because that’s life at that level when you exit the conference tourney early. He’s settled in after an adjustment period; Clark is averaging a team-best 5.4 assists per game, and has at least six assists in six of his last eight games after doing so just once over his first six games.
In their last game, he had 13 points, six assists and three steals against Marquette. He’s fearless driving to the rim and disrupting passing lanes, but he can be turnover prone.
A.J. Staton-McCray, a 6’4” sixth-year senior who played four years for Samford and one for Miami, leads them in scoring at 13.1 points per game. One of their few reliable floor spacers, Staton-McCray can get hot quickly and is essential to keep defenses honest so Clark has driving lanes.
His name might sound familiar because in the 2024 NCAA Tournament against Kansas, with 19 seconds left and Samford trailing 90-89, he made a clean chasedown block that was controversially ruled a foul. KU made two free throws and escaped the upset.
Samford’s A.J. Staton-McCray gets a clean block on Kansas’ Nick Timberlake — but is whistled for a foul.
Timberlake went on to make both free throws. Kansas gets a huge break. pic.twitter.com/Me5i8SzgP8
— The Comeback (@thecomeback) March 22, 2024
Their elite rim protection is led by Najal Hines (29) and Stephon Payne III (23), who have combined for 52 blocked shots. The 6’9” Payne is a beast in the paint, and is coming off a 14 point, 22 rebound performance against Marquette on Tuesday. It was the first 20-rebound performance by
a Pirate since Angel Delgado’s 23-rebound showing against Kansas in the 2018 NCAA Tournament, and the most by any Big East player since Providence’s Bryce Hopkins grabbed 22 boards against Marquette in. For the season, he’s averaging 7.9 points, 7.9 rebounds and 1.4 blocks per game.
Meanwhile, 6’10” freshman Najai Hines from Plainfield, NJ stayed in-state and became the third-highest ranked recruit in Seton Hall history (#71 in the 247 Composite rankings). His 2.5 blocks per game sits 17th in the nation, though to be fair, 13 of his 29 swats came in the first week of the season against Saint Peter’s (6) and Monmouth (7).
Clark and the guards like to press opponents up high, looking to speed them up and force live-ball turnovers. And if you do beat their perimeter defense, finishing over Payne and Hines is difficult, so opponents often settle for low-percentage jump shots.
Elon transfer Tajuan Simpkins is their sixth man, and averages 11.3 points per game while shooting a team-high 41.5% from three point range. He scored 22 in their 72-67 win over Providence, including what became the game-winning shot, a three with just over a minute left.
Senior transfer Elijah Fisher is back for Round 2 in the Big East after playing for DePaul two years ago. Fisher was second on the Blue Demons with 10.2 ppg and shot an efficient 52 percent from the floor that season. He scored 19 points against the Jays in two meetings, making 9-of-13 inside the arc. At 6’6” he uses his athleticism to attack the rim and defend multiple positions; along with Clark, he gives the Pirates two aggressive downhill drivers who force defenses to collapse, opening up kick-outs or dump-offs to their big men.
And 6’3” Mike Williams, a transfer from LSU, is their glue guy. He averages 8.9 points, 2.8 rebounds, and 1.9 assists per game, and gives them toughness and versatility defensively on the perimeter.
Tip: 11:00am Omaha time
Venue: Prudential Center, Newark, NJ
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Stephon Payne racked up the accolades last week after his 18-point, 16-rebound performance at Providence on Dec. 19. Payne brought home Big East Player of the Week honors and was also named one of the USBWA National Players of the Week.
Seton Hall has nine players averaging at least 11 minutes per game. Of those nine players, seven of them are averaging at least seven points per game. The Pirates have had six different players lead the team in scoring in a game.
Believe it or not, none of Creighton’s 14 games this season have had a second half lead change. Tuesday’s 89-85 win over Butler was Creighton’s first game this season decided by five points or less.
According to research by Rob Anderson, there have been eight Creighton players since 1999-2000 with 18+ three-pointers in any 4-game stretch. The first seven are exactly who you think they are:
– Kyle Korver
– Doug McDermott
– Booker Woodfox
– Mitch Ballock
– Ethan Wragge
– Ryan Hawkins
– Baylor Scheierman
The eighth? Austin Swartz.
Issac Traudt has averaged 13.8 PPG for Creighton over the past five games. And while he’s been great from outside, it’s two-pointers where he’s made the biggest jump.
First 9 games: 1-5 from 2FG.
Last 5 games: 8-11 from 2FG.
Seton Hall and Creighton have split 32 all-time meetings, but Creighton has won ten of the last 12 meetings, including the past six. Creighton is 8-10 all-time at Seton Hall and 7-5 since joining the Big East.
On January 4, 2017 the Bluejays lived above the rim, literally, in a 85-72 win at St. John’s. Led by freshman phenom Justin Patton, the Jays had more dunks than made three-pointers. We wrote the next day:
“In front of NBA scouts, Patton had another monster game, scoring a career-high 25 points on 11-14 shooting, with nine rebounds, four assists, a block, and a steal in 30 minutes. Five of his 11 made baskets came on dunks, flying over, around, and occasionally straight past the smaller Red Storm frontcourt. It seems like his arsenal of weapons grows every game — from fadeaway jumpers, to up-and-under layups using the rim to shield the ball from a defender, to effortless dunks, to three-pointers…he has so many ways to score, it’s ridiculous.
Case in point: how many seven-footers have you seen that have the hand-eye coordination to catch a ball while moving toward the basket, and then have multiple ways to finish depending on how the rim is defended?
KenPom predicts a three-point Seton Hall win with 60% probability; ESPN’s BPI gives the Pirates 52.8% odds of winning. For the Jays to prevail, they’ll need to replicate their success from three against Butler and keep second-chance points close again — offensive rebounds are less costly if your opponent doesn’t score on them, after all.
This one feels like a game the Jays will keep close but fall down the stretch.
Seton Hall 74, Creighton 67