Creighton has gone .500 or better in league play 22 of the past 23 seasons. Xavier has been .500 or better for 36 consecutive years, the longest active streak in the country. Through multiple leagues and multiple coaches, Creighton and Xavier have been consistent winners for nearly — or more than, in Xavier’s case — a quarter of a century. Both teams are in serious jeopardy of enduring losing conference records this year, though. The Bluejays are 3-5 after losing five of the last seven games. The Musketeers are 3-6 after losing four straight and six of their last eight. In just about any other season, this game in this timeslot (noon on Super Bowl Sunday) would have been a showcase for the Big East. Instead it’s been shuttled off to regional FSN, where it will air live across less than half of the country.
The Jays enter the game on the heels of their worst performance of the season, a 83-67 loss to St. John’s that wasn’t nearly as close as that score sounds, and it sounds pretty bad. It was a boat-racing that sent 90% of the crowd scurrying for the exits long before the game ended, and gave us one of the most depressing under-four timeouts in the history of the arena. It’s up there with the 67-40 loss to Georgetown in 2015, their 10th loss in 11 games that season and the ugliest home loss in an ugly season, which sent the crowd home early to save their eyes from enduring the rest of the massacre. CU went 17 minutes without a field goal in that game, missing 23 consecutive shots to find themselves on the wrong end of a 31-6 run to the Hoyas. The postgame quotes sound eerily similar — they prepared well, they seemed focused, none of the coaches saw it coming.
That one was bad, but because of the reality of how bad that 2014-15 team was, it didn’t hurt as much as it might have. You only have to go back a couple of seasons from there to find such a game: the 89-68 loss to Wichita State in 2012, on national TV back when that was a novelty, and a loss that cost the Jays a chance for a regular season championship. You probably remember that one as the game where Greg and Doug McDermott got into a heated exchange in the second half in full view of ESPN’s cameras. That’s how raw the emotions were that afternoon. And yet the worst was yet to come: So many Jays fans headed for the exits long before the final horn that the first few rows wound up occupied by obnoxious Shocker fans. That team had expectations, would ultimately wind up winning a game in the NCAA Tourney, and got punked at home by the hated Shox. Ott summed it up perfectly afterward — it wasn’t maddening. It was disappointing.
Wednesday night’s loss finds itself in the middle of those two on the “disappointment” scale. It’s the champion on the “maddening” scale.
This team might not have realistic NCAA Tourney goals this year, but seems to be in a similar place to the 2015-16 group who won enough games to stay on the periphery of the bubble all season. They’re a year away from being Big Dance worthy, yet capable of an NIT berth this year. But because — like that 2015-16 team — they’re hanging around on the edges of the bubble, every loss stings a little harder. And losses where the team doesn’t give themselves a chance to win because they aren’t locked in, aren’t focused, and get punked on their home floor — those sting even harder.
The similar thread running through all three of those losses is that Creighton wasn’t competitive and the outcome was clear for most of the second half. They’re the three worst home losses of the Greg McDermott Era, the only three times where the atmosphere after the final media timeout resembled a funeral instead of a basketball game. That’s the company Wednesday night’s loss finds itself in.
It’s not a good place to be.
Xavier finds themselves in the same boat, a proud program doing some soul-searching during a rare down season. Banners on the Parkway felt the need to tweet the following in response to a volcanic eruption of fan frustration that resulted in Musketeer fans turning on each other:
They then summed up what’s going on in the minds of the Xavier fanbase, one year removed from earning a #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament but struggling in the first year of a new coaches’ regime and without the veteran stars of last year’s team:
“Scroll through Twitter and you’ll find a host of reasons why this is. The genius certain he can read the mind of a 21 year old based on a facial expression he sees on television is sure the team doesn’t want it enough. Others look at a team stripped of its best talent and restocked with two freshman that have amounted to nothing and three grad transfers and see underachieving that must be the fault of the coach. And then there’s the large group of people who pronounces anyone who has anything negative to say not a true fan.”
Sound familiar?
For what it’s worth, first-year head coach Travis Steele seems to be every bit as frustrated as Musketeer fans following a midweek loss at Georgetown where his team looked lost. They surrendered 52 second-half points to the Hoyas thanks to eight made 3-pointers, failed to get stops because of miscommunication or poor fundamentals, turned it over because of lackadaisical or foolish passes, and were quote “selfish” offensively, according to their coach.
“I challenged our guys,” Steele told the media after Thursday’s loss at Georgetown. “What are you willing to sacrifice for the greater good of the team? Because it’s bigger than you. Whether you’re having a bad game, or miss a shot, maybe you’re wide open and a guy missed you, maybe you thought you got fouled and it wasn’t called, it doesn’t matter, you gotta go on the next play.”
Sunday afternoon, then, is less a battle for a win (though it definitely is that, don’t get me wrong) than it is a battle for pride. These are programs who have enjoyed sustained success, find themselves in a transition year, and are coming off of losses that question their very makeup.
It will be a fascinating game to watch unfold.
- Tip: 12:01pm
- Venue: CHI Health Center Omaha
- TV: FSN
- Announcers: Wayne Randazzo and Dickey Simpkins
- Live on: Fox Sports Midwest, Fox Sports Arizona, Fox Sports Detroit, Fox Sports North, Fox Sports Ohio, Fox Sports South (AL, MS, TN), Fox Sports Southwest (AR Plus & Non Grizzlies), Fox Sports Sun, Fox Sports West, Fox Sports Wisconsin, AT&T SportsNet (Rocky Mountain Region), MASN2 and YurView New England
- Tape delayed on various FSN stations around the country
- Complete clearances here
- In Omaha: Cox channel 47 (SD), 1047 (HD); CenturyLink Prism 748 (SD), 1748 (HD); DirecTV channel 671; Dish Network channel 418
- Outside Omaha: Varies depending on region.
- Streaming on FoxSportsGO, with region restrictions
- Radio: 1620AM
- Announcers: John Bishop and Taylor Stormberg
- Streaming on 1620TheZone.com and the 1620 The Zone mobile app
- For Cord Cutters:
- Xavier has five players averaging in double figures in scoring: Sophomores Paul Scruggs and Naji Marshall, juniors Quentin Goodin and Tyrique Jones, and graduate transfer Zach Hankins.
- Paul Scruggs leads the team in scoring (13.4 ppg.), free-throw percentage (.815) and 3-point field goal percentage (second in the Big East at .467). He’s emerged as a star, and if Xavier returns to the heights they’re used to, it will probably be Scruggs who leads them there. One of only two players
who has started all 22 games this season, he leads the team with 17 double-figure scoring games, including three straight games and eight of the last nine games. Perhaps his biggest performance so far came in a win over Butler, where Scruggs hit a career-high five 3-pointers, scoring 23 points (one shy of his career high) to go with eight rebounds and six assists. - Quentin Goodin, who leads the team in assists (third in Big East at 4.8 apg.), has 389 career assists and is just one assist shy of the top 10 on XU’s all time career assist leader list. Goodin averages 12.1 points and 2.7 rebounds per game. A year ago against Creighton, he didn’t do much in Cincinnati scoring two points on 1-of-6 shooting. But he scored 17 points in Omaha (4-of-7 on two-pointers, 2-of-5 on threes) with three rebounds and two assists.
- Naji Marshall, who had a team-high 16 points at Georgetown Thursday night, is second on the team in scoring (17th in the Big East at 13.3 ppg.), rebounding (seventh in the Big East at 7.0 rpg.) and assists (tied for 13th in the league at 3.3 apg.). Marshall is also tied for the league lead in defensive rebounding at 6.1 rpg. Marshall has scored in double figures in 15 games this season. Last year, he scored 14 combined points in two games versus the Bluejays, making 6-of-14 shots.
- Tyrique Jones, who had a career-high 21 points with 11 rebounds vs. Marquette last weekend, leads the team in rebounding (and is tied for fourth in the Big East at 7.4 rpg.) and offensive rebounding (first in the Big East and 19th in the nation at 3.4 rpg.).
- 6’11”, 245-pound graduate transfer Zach Hankins leads the conference in field goal percentage (.708) and is second in the Big East in blocks (1.5 bpg.). You never quite know what you’re getting with a grad transfer from a lower level, even one as accomplished as Hankins — he was the DII National Player of the year at Ferris State — and fortunately for the Musketeers, he’s been a difference maker. In his only season in Cincinnati, he’s averaging 10.2 points and 4.9 boards a game while giving them a rim protector inside.
- Creighton’s history on Super Bowl Sunday is mixed. They fell to Southern Illinois (79-77) in 2002 on Super Bowl Sunday when the St. Louis Rams and New England Patriots met. The Bluejays rallied to beat TCU (89-79) in 2003 when the Tampa Bay crushed Oakland, topped Evansville (74-70) in 2004 when New England defeated Carolina. In CU’s most recent game on Super Bowl Sunday, Creighton outlasted Missouri State (75-51) on the same day that Pittsburgh defeated Arizona. Off the floor, Mitch Ballock committed to Creighton on Super Bowl Sunday in 2016, a day that saw the Denver Broncos defeat the Carolina Panthers in Super Bowl L.
- Creighton is 7-8 in games with a game-winning go-ahead score in the final 10 seconds at CHI Health Center Omaha, which opened in the fall of 2003. Two of Xavier’s last four trips (2015 and 2018) to Omaha have been one point Musketeer wins thanks to free throws in the final 6.3 seconds.
- Ty-Shon Alexander has made a three-point basket in all 21 games he’s played this season, stretching his streak dating to last year to 25 games in a row. Alexander’s streak is tied for the fourth-longest in Creighton history, and just six behind the school record set by Booker Woodfox in 2008-09. Each of the three streaks longer than his came in a season that the player was named Conference Player of the Year (Korver in 2002 and 2003, Woodfox in 2009).
- It’s worth noting that Kyle Korver’s second-place streak of 28 games with a trey was snapped when he did not attempt a field goal in 24 minutes of play during an 83-56 win over UNI (and head coach Greg McDermott) on Feb. 9, 2002. Korver then drained a triple in 27 more games in a row, a stretch from Feb. 13, 2002 to Jan. 20, 2003 before it was snapped against Evansville (and head coach Steve Merfeld).
Xavier owns a 15-12 lead in the series with Creighton, and are 5-4 in Omaha. Nineteen of the 27 all-time meetings have been within five points in the final minute, including five of the last six.
A year ago, Xavier won both meetings — a 92-70 win in Cincinnati when the Jays had the misfortune of catching the eventual Big East champs after their only two-game losing streak of the season, and a 72-71 win in Omaha thanks to a disputed foul call on the game’s final play. If you can stomach it, here’s the WBR Highlight Reel. For the controversial final moments, we’ve included both FOX’s call and the Bluejay Radio Network call. That means you get both Tim Brando’s “Wow” and John Bishop’s repetitive-yet-amazing “THAT IS NOT A FOUL!”, Len Elmore’s “Are you kidding me?” and Brody Deren’s “Oh my goodness!”…
Creighton’s last game on February 3 was a 84-71 win over Evansville on February 3, 2010. A lot of good stuff happened in that game, but I remember it more because — in WBR’s first year — that was a banner game for WBR. Patrick Marshall competed (but not very well) in the putting contest. And a video debuted on the jumbotron featuring one of the site’s owners, known as “Dance Cam Guy”, dancing under a spotlight in the Old Gym. I unearthed the video so we can enjoy it again, 10 years to the day.
Oh boy.
Now I just want to listen to the Sugarhill Gang rapping “Apache.” Thanks, DCG.
The Bottom Line:
Creighton is a seven-point favorite on KenPom, with a 73% chance of winning. I think his metrics are correct, and the Bluejays will rebound from Wednesday’s loss.
Bluejays 78, Musketeers 72