On Senior Night, a white-out, the Creighton Bluejays (21-9, 14-5) host the Butler Bulldogs (13-17, 6-13) for Creighton’s final home game of the season. Creighton is playing for seeding both in the NCAA Tournament and Big East Tournament, and a loss here is detrimental to Creighton’s seeding in both tournaments. For third-year Butler Head Coach Thad Matta, winning this game helps Butler to get momentum into the Big East Tournament. Creighton, meanwhile, looks not to stub their toe on a Butler team that gave the Bluejays fits in Indianapolis.

First Matchup

With around 11 minutes left in the first meeting, Creighton and Butler were in a pretty tight contest. It was within a two-point game after Butler’s graduate center Andre Screen converted an and-one at the 10:50 mark in the second half. Over the next four-and-a-half minutes, Creighton managed to extend the lead from two to 12, and while Butler’s late game fouling would help the Bulldogs bring it within four, the Creighton Bluejays still left Indianapolis with an 80-76 victory.

Senior center Ryan Kalkbrenner paced Creighton with 26 points, nine rebounds and six blocks. Senior guard Steven Ashworth also broke the 20-point barrier with 22 points and nine assists. Butler was led with a 21-point performance from redshirt senior forward Patrick McCaffery, 14 points from senior forward Pierre Brooks and double-figure points off the bench for both sophomore forward/center Boden Kapke and sophomore guard Finley Bizjack.

Butler Personnel

Butler’s scoring effort is led by someone who scored just nine points in the first contest: graduate forward Jahmyl Telfort. Telfort averages 16.1 points per game and 3.4 assists per game, both marks that lead Butler, but his recent performance is worthy of extra notice. Telfort, since the Creighton game, has had just one single-digit scoring outing (Jan. 31 at Georgetown), is shooting better than he has been over this season and is scoring more than his season average. He got the assignment of Creighton sophomore forward Jasen Green in the first meeting, and with how well Green’s been playing defensively, this assignment is likely to continue.

Brooks is the second leading scorer, but only by about a half-point. Brooks is averaging 15.6 points per game and is second on the team in total rebounding at 4.9 per game. Brooks, alongside Telfort, are the only two Bulldogs to have 1,000 minutes played this season, over 300 shot attempts and are two parts of a trio of players to start every game this season.

The other part of that trio is McCaffery. He will likely surpass 1,000 minutes played this game Saturday but does more for Butler than just take minutes. He is second on the team in three-point shooting percentage among players with at least 50 attempts, shooting 40.1% from distance. The Iowa transfer also averages 11.0 points per game, which makes him a valuable stretch four for the Bulldogs to use. He and Brooks lead the team in three-point attempts this season and will likely continue to shoot from distance with Creighton’s Kalkbrenner in the paint.

Bizjack is the leader in three-point shooting percentage with at least 50 attempts for Butler and has emerged as the consistent fourth starter for the Bulldogs. He has started in every game since Jan. 21, averaging a whopping 14.5 points per game while shooting 47.5% from the field and 47.1% from three since becoming a starter. Butler is 5-7 in this stretch. Very quickly Bizjack has jumped up the rotation and the lineup as a consistent threat who needs constant attention from defenses, even if his season-long scoring average of 9.7 points per game doesn’t appear to be the most intimidating for opponent defenses.

Kapke and Screen provide different looks at the center position for Butler, that being when the Bulldogs don’t go with McCaffery at center. Kapke is a willing three-point shooter with 11 starts, going for 3.6 points and 2.5 rebounds on 39.4% shooting from the field and 28.0% from three. However, Kapke is not the rim-protector that Screen is. Screen is averaging 8.2 points, a team-leading 6.1 rebounds and a team-leading 1.4 blocks per game. Either of these potential starters will present different issues for Creighton.

Junior guard Kolby King, likely off the bench, will present more spacing troubles for Creighton. He is shooting 38.2% from three and scoring 5.3 points per game over 18.5 minutes per game. Junior guard Landon Moore is also likely coming off the bench and will be one of the few other players that Butler will play. Moore averages 16.3 minutes per game and plays like a driving guard, making just three three-pointers this season. He is averaging 2.9 points and 1.7 rebounds per game.

Butler Last Game

Butler last played on Wednesday at Hinkle against Xavier in a losing effort, 91-78. The Musketeers–as Creighton knows–has been dismantling teams, and Butler was no different. Telfort had 20, Bizjack continued his great recent performance with 19, Brooks had 15 and McCaffery finished with 11. Screen got his first start against Xavier since the first game against Creighton and finished with eight points and five rebounds. Kapke had started most of the games between that Jan. 11 game against Creighton and this last game against Xavier. It will be interesting to see which of these two bigs starts against Creighton on Saturday.

Creighton Last Game

Creighton’s last game was a rebound from a loss–also to Xavier–in Newark against Seton Hall, resulting in a win 79-61. This was a game Creighton was supposed to win and handled business in, but Seton Hall was providing some fits for part of the game. Notably, Creighton gave up 15 turnovers and allowed 16 offensive rebounds. But a career-high in points from freshman forward Jackson McAndrew, good bench performance from junior center Fredrick King and quality (but expected) performances from Kalkbrenner and Ashworth helped Creighton to the 18-point win.

Big East Check-In

Creighton controls their own destiny for the two seed in the Big East Tournament. All Creighton needs to do is win against Butler to clinch sole possession of second place. In some cases, a loss can still get them a two seed, but it would require Creighton to either tie with one of UConn or Marquette in the standings. Tying with both of these schools engages a different tiebreaker that would place Creighton below UConn and give the Bluejays the three seed, however Creighton cannot go lower than third.

UConn plays against Seton Hall and Marquette plays against St. John’s, both games at home for our focus teams. If Creighton were to lose their senior night game, the Jays need at least one of UConn or Marquette to lose their respective game. Creighton wins these individual tiebreakers because of the split regular season record and their win against St. John’s in Omaha, the only team in this group to beat St. John’s. If three teams are involved, despite going 2-2 against UConn and Marquette, the Huskies swept Marquette and have a 3-1 record against the group as a result. The sweep of Marquette means that UConn would have the best record against the group, the St. John’s tiebreaker becomes irrelevant, and the Huskies take the two seed.

The choice between the two seed or the three seed allows Creighton to pick its poison. If Creighton gets the two seed, they’d likely play Georgetown as the locked-in seven seed and face off against graduate guard/forward Micah Peavy. Peavy has 40 points and 20 rebounds in two games against Creighton, not to mention his 12 assists and 11 steals. He has the capacity to wreak havoc on the Creighton offense. Granted, Seton Hall or DePaul (both fighting for the 10 seed) could also win that first round game, so nothing is for sure in this hypothetical.

Meanwhile, Villanova is locked into the six seed with no game on Saturday. While it isn’t a guarantee that Villanova wins against the worse option of Seton Hall or DePaul, tempting fate with graduate forward Eric Dixon isn’t ideal either. Creighton’s likely matchup as the three seed would be this Dixon-led Wildcats team. Dixon has scored more points against the Bluejays while Creighton has been in the Big East than any Big East player has scored in this timeframe, with 200 points on 47.3% shooting from three over 10 games.

We will know more about the seeding implications by tipoff, but Creighton really should be looking to prepare a dogfight in the quarterfinals of the Big East Tournament no matter their seed. 

Creighton Notes

• King’s performance at Seton Hall is encouraging for the upcoming Big East Tournament. He finished with 12 points on 4-5 shooting, one block and one rebound. Creighton has Kalkbrenner, who obviously deserves to play, but getting King going now helps to make him a viable option to keep Kalkbrenner fresh if Creighton were to advance in the Big East Tournament. Same thing goes for freshman guard Ty Davis to help Ashworth, but King’s performance at Seton Hall reminds Creighton fans that he is capable of a big offensive output when given time.

Things to Watch

1. Screen or Kapke being the starter for Butler helps to show their hand a bit in this game. Screen starting means that Matta wants to focus on rim protection and trying to oppose Kalkbrenner. Kapke starting means that Matta wants to pull Kalkbrenner out of the paint, which might result in some trouble for Creighton if Kapke converts. In their first matchup, Kapke hit three three-pointers and finished with 13 points. It’ll be up to Matta to determine if Butler is better off with rim protection or three-point shooting.
2. Worry about McCaffery potentially playing a small-ball five for Butler. Three-point shooting at the center position hurts Creighton’s ability to play defense with Kalkbrenner in the paint. No matter who starts between Screen or Kapke, McCaffery as a small-ball, five-out center is a big threat to Creighton.
3. For the fans, enjoy seeing Kalkbrenner, Ashworth, senior guard/forward Jamiya Neal and senior guard Sami Osmani for the final time in Omaha. All four men have been impactful to Creighton’s recent successes. All four men deserve their share of cheers on Saturday.