In the days leading up to the start of practice for the 2012-13 season, White & Blue Review will look back on the top five games, performances and moments of last season, as voted on by the editors of WBR. Today is the second in that series.
Doug McDermott scored the most points in school history as a freshman, and began his sophomore season with eight straight games of 20 or more points. It was his ninth game, though, where his All-American campaign really began to take hold.
On the road against old Valley foe Tulsa, McDermott unleashed a game of nearly unprecedented offensive efficiency, scoring in nearly every feasible manner while making twice as many shots as he missed. After going 16-23 from the floor en route to 35 points, Tulsa’s head coach uttered one of the most flattering post-game quotes I’ve ever heard:
“I thought the guy single-handedly broke the spirit of my team. In particular, my three seniors and sophomore post players. He was terrific…My goodness, it really surprised us how good McDermott was, particularly in the post against size, how good his strength is, how good his stamina is, how good his feet are, and how good of hands he has.”
It was a night where he took some incredibly tough shots and made almost all of them, whether it was spinning to his left, spinning to his right, taking a hook shot, fading away for a jumper, or hitting a three with a hand in his face. The latter was perhaps the most remarkable: with the shot clock nearing double-zeros, he threw up a turnaround three from NBA range with a defender draped all over him and drained it. It was that kind of night.
Otter tried to sum up the performance the next day.
“Echenique scored the first 9 points of the second stanza, extending the Jays’ lead from 42-34 to 51-34. His last hoop came on a flush via a great feed from Gibbs. After that burst of offense, the big man could kick back and relax and join his teammates and the Tulsa players as they took in the greatness of Doug McDermott.
Seemingly as soon as Echenique’s scoring spurt ended, McDermott resumed dominating the Golden Hurricane. He scored 16 points in the final 14 minutes of the game, including hitting the only two 3-pointers he attempted all night. He made twice as many shots (16) as he missed (7), scoring 35 points (career high) and adding 7 rebounds while thoroughly thrashing Tulsa’s defense. As Patrick pointed out immediately following the game, the McDermott Fan Club continues to grow. Meanwhile, as the country’s casual college hoops fans begin to find out about him, Creighton fans are running out of superlatives to describe McDermott’s game.
Oh, and he’s a sophomore.”
Meanwhile, Patrick Marshall, as always, was incredibly prescient in his analysis.
“People are coming out of the woodwork now to sing the praises of Doug McDermott, but Creighton has a lot of weapons in their arsenal. In all the games I have watched this season, I have rarely seen McDermott force a shot. While there will be some that will start comparing him to last season’s media darling Jimmer Fredette, his game comes completely within the offense and not on one-on-one plays. Others may see this differently, but Fredette was forced to make plays because he didn’t have the solid core of teammates that would be able to make plays. I am tending to believe at this point that Creighton has a few more weapons and other options with Young, Echenique, Gibbs and the rest of the crew.”
In making 16 of 23 shots, McDermott had one of the most efficient high-scoring games imaginable. Amazingly, just one month later, McDermott was somehow even better as he made 18 of 23 shots and scored 44 points in a win at Bradley.
Doug’s performance at Tulsa broke the will of the Golden Hurricane players according to their coach, but against Bradley he extended his powers to the P.A. announcer, who glumly said after one second half basket, “Doug McDermott, two more points.” His 18 field goals were one away from the all-time school record, and his 44 points were the most by a Bluejay since Benoit Benjamin scored 45 in a January, 1985 game. At several points during a second half where he scored 31 points, the television crew of Travis Justice and Nick Bahe were so amazed that they were reduced to incredulous giggling. Who could blame them? As he did in the game against Tulsa, Doug McDermott was playing on a different level than everyone else on the court. Bradley threw every defensive strategy known to man at him in an attempt to at least slow him down, to no avail, as Otter talked about after the game.
“Poor Bradley really had no chance. Pop in a tape of the game, sit back, and watch McDermott score with almost any possible low post move. Then track him as he picks and pops on the perimeter, knocking down three of the five 3-pointers he attempted. The Bradley highlight reel will surely draw a lot of viewers because it could serve as Exhibit A as to why McDermott posts the kinds of numbers he does.
The Braves tried to play him one-on-one, they tried to double-team him. It didn’t matter. McDermott either went around, over, or even through the defense en route to the hoop. Meanwhile other guys, namely Gregory Echenique (12 points, 12 rebounds) and Jahenns Manigat (13 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists), were thriving thanks to heightened attention Bradley paid to McDermott. Little good it did, right?”
To date, it’s Doug McDermott’s best individual game as a Bluejay (which is really saying something), and one of the best individual performances in the last 50 years of CU hoops. For that, his outrageous efforts at Tulsa and Bradley rank as the #4 moment of the 2011-12 season.
