Key Stats:
It wasn’t Creighton’s best performance — they had more turnovers than assists for the first time in three games in the Caymans (16 to 13), they shot “only” 38.5% from three-point range (10-of-26) including a pretty bad 4-of-12 in the second half, and were outrebounded 31-27.
None of it mattered because sophomore Ty-Shon Alexander scored a career-high 36 points, lighting up Clemson from everywhere on the floor — he drove to the rim off the dribble, he nailed mid-range pull-up jumpers, he hit three-pointers, and he was a perfect 11-of-11 from the free throw line. They had no answer for him all night, as 19 of his points came in the first half and 17 came in the second. It’s the most points scored by a Bluejay since Doug McDermott hung 45 on Providence on Senior Night 2014 (Marcus Foster had 35, though, two years ago vs Georgetown). Speaking of McDermott, Alexander’s perfect 11-for-11 free throw shooting line makes him just the 15th Bluejay to be perfect from the line in a game with more 11 or more attempts. The last time it happened? McDermott against UAPB in December of 2013; he’s the only player to accomplish the feat more than once, as he was perfect three separate times.
Over three games in the Caymans, Creighton shot 45% from three-point range (36-of-80) and held their three opponents to 24.5% (13-of-53). CU also had 58 assists on their 98 made baskets, and opponents had 27 assists on their 87 baskets.
Freshmen and sophomores averaged 72.7 points per game for Creighton in the three games. That group was responsible for 79.6% of the scoring, 74.2% of the rebounds, and 70.7% of the assists. Alexander was brilliant, obviously, but so was Mitch Ballock — he finished the Cayman Islands Classic with 16 assists, 6 steals, and just 3 turnovers while making 45.0 percent from beyond the arc on 20 attempts in the three games. Damien Jefferson averaged 13.7 points and 5.0 rebounds over the three games on 18-of-24 shooting from the field. And they got big contributions from Jacob Epperson, Samson Froling, and Marcus Zegarowski too. The future is bright, and it might be here quicker than we thought.
Press Conference:
Highlights (Courtesy of Stadium):
Recap:
From the outset of the title game of the Cayman Islands Classic, it was clear Ty-Shon Alexander was locked in and ready. Barely a minute in, he stepped into a passing lane to intercept a pass, raced down court, and laid in an easy bucket to start the game’s scoring.
“I got a layup to start and then I worked on my outside game,” Alexander said on a post-game radio interview on 1620AM. “When that started happening, I started making a lot more shots. Then I just knew, it was on.”
It was on, indeed.
A pair of threes by Alexander helped build a 20-12 lead less than eight minutes into the game. All 20 of those points came from the Bluejays’ underclassmen — Damien Jefferson scoring on a putback after fighting for a tough offensive board, Samson Froling scoring on a nice move under the hoop, and Marcus Zegarowski on both a drive to the rim and a three-pointer. Add in the 11 points Alexander had already, and the Jays had built an early lead on the #16 team in the country.
They’d lead for all but 47 seconds, eventually by as many as 13 points, answering Clemson runs time after time with clutch plays. After the Tigers cut the lead to 26-24, Alexander scored six straight — drawing a foul on a three-point shot and making all three free throws, then draining a three-pointer off of a curl a couple of possessions later.
In building a 45-35 lead at the half, Creighton had made nearly 60% from the floor, outrebounded Clemson 18-11, and outscored them 18-3 from behind the arc. Much as they’d done the night before against Georgia State, their ability to rebound let them floor the gas pedal and score before their opponent could set up defensively. Georgia State’s matchup zone wasn’t much of a factor because often Creighton was taking a shot before they could get all five players back on defense. Likewise, Clemson’s aggressive man-to-man defense was sliced apart for the same reason.
“In the first three games at home, in some ways I felt like we tried to do too much on our own. Not in a selfish way, just in a ‘go make a play to try to help my team’ way,” Greg McDermott said on his postgame radio interview. “We trusted each other and trusted the ball movement more this week. We got out of the gates in transition more. Let’s be honest, scoring 87 points on Clemson is like scoring 120 on anybody else. Georgia had 49 on them yesterday. It’s hard to score against those guys.”
The Bluejay bigs weren’t spectacular, but did a good job defensively and made enough plays offensively to keep Clemson’s defense honest. Martin Krampelj, who’s clearly not yet 100% recovered from his ACL surgery, was more active in this game than previous games this season, and threw down an alley-oop in the first half:
And another dunk in the second that gave the Jays their largest lead of the night, 50-37:
“I told Martin, you’re letting the fact that some things aren’t yet right with your game affect your entire game,” McDermott said of his big man. “Tonight I thought, regardless of what happened, we had his spirit. His communication was excellent. He was pointing to guys. He was repeating what I’d said in the huddle after they’d left. Those are the things we need from him right now, and the rest of it’s going to come.”
As for Jacob Epperson, he had this acrobatic…dunk? Tip-in? One-handed off-balance sorta-alley-oop? Whatever you call it, it was a rather astonishing move for a seven-footer:
Despite all of that, Clemson wasn’t going away. They’d scored on four of their last six possessions to cut the Bluejay lead to 66-59, and for one of the rare times all night, had forced Creighton to use up most of the shot clock before attempting a shot. They needed a bucket as the clock neared zero. Two weeks ago before the season tipped, we weren’t sure who that player would be — who was the guy that you could rely on to get you a bucket at the end of the shot clock, or at the end of a game? Two weeks later we know the answer to that question.
Ty-Shon Alexander is that guy.
Late in the clock, he created space between himself and the defender with a step-fake. Then he rose up and buried a three from 25-feet out to push the lead back out to 10, and implored the crowd — 75% Creighton fans, perhaps more — to make noise.
“Ty-Shon is blessed with the ability to make some tough shots,” McDermott said in his radio interview. “He’s also blessed with a lot of confidence, but that confidence comes from the work he put in last spring and over the summer. Once Khyri made the decision to go to the NBA and Marcus was gone to graduation, he recognized that we were going to need a little bit more from him. To his credit, man, he’s improved in every facet of the game.”
His scoring gets the attention — and rightfully so when you hang 36 points on a top-ten defensive team — but his overall game has improved alongside his scoring, too, from his passing to his defense.
Still, Clemson refused to go quietly, and in the final minute they pulled within a single possession. Three missed free throws opened the door, and then a bad turnover in the backcourt was nearly disastrous:
But Davion Mintz redeemed his two earlier missed free throws by sinking a pair of them on the next possession, and then sealed the win with a breakaway dunk.
A week ago after the loss to Ohio State, McDermott took a little heat on social media and the Bluejay Underground after saying he was measuring progress with this young team on more than just wins and losses. He clarified a bit, and then doubled down on that after this win.
“We’ve got our offensive mojo going, and that’s a step in the right direction. Now our job as a coaching staff is not to get tricked by the victories. Just like the Ohio State game in defeat, we still have to look at this and find where we can improve. We have to look beyond the win to evaluate the areas of improvement, just like we had to look beyond the loss last week. We have to figure out what the glaring weaknesses are that other teams will see on film, what they’ll do to exploit them, and then figure out a way to adjust to that. That’s the challenge now.”
Following the win, the team was greeted by the hundreds if not thousands of fans who had travelled to the Caymans to cheer them on. Their support did not go unnoticed.
https://twitter.com/JohnBishop71/status/1065450283566809088
The Bluejay players then invited all the kids in Creighton jerseys and shirts to join them for a photo with the trophy, which was a pretty cool scene.
It’s something McDermott commented on time after time all week. Monday night after the win against Boise State, he told the radio crew that “This crowd is unbelievable. We’re out of the country, and this isn’t an inexpensive place to travel to and stay.”
Wednesday night, he reiterated that point. “This following with us is phenomenal. We had five, six, seven times more people than anyone else here. It just amazes me. It’s what makes Creighton a special place. They had a blast this week, and they made a difference in our games. It’s fun having them around.”