Despite seeing senior guards Nik Graves (15 points) and Josh Dix (14 points) and sophomore guard Austin Swartz (12 points) in double figures, the Creighton men’s basketball team couldn’t take down the No.3 team in the Big East, falling to Villanova 80-69.
Back at CHI Health Center on Feb. 14, poor shooting, unforced turnovers and defensive woes proved the perfect storm of factors, beginning right from the opening whistle.
Three minutes passed before either team broke the 0-0 score showing on the board. Villanova finally got the ball rolling on a mistake from Creighton, as sophomore guard Blake Harper turned the ball over and allowed the Wildcats to execute a fastbreak layup.
A missed jumper from Dix, off-target three from Graves and missed layup from junior forward Jasen Green defined the next minute and a half of play before Creighton evened the score at 2-2 on a put-back layup from Green. It wasn’t that all Creighton’s shots were poor ones, it was that they weren’t falling at a time when the Bluejays needed the points to get them rolling.
“I thought we were getting really good looks. Isaac [Traudt] had a bunch of good open looks at the beginning of the game that just didn’t go in. I think if we make those shots, then it’s a different game, but I feel like, obviously, they’re a pretty good defensive team,” Green said.
Traudt had four early 3-point tries that bounced around the rim but didn’t hit home, which seemed to be a norm in the opening minutes for the rest of the Bluejay squad as well.
The cold stretch turned into a two-minute scoring drought before a triple from Swartz, assisted by Traudt, nearly evened the score at 9-7 in favor of Villanova with 13:22 remaining.
That was the last time that the Bluejays scored for over four minutes.
The four-minute drought was part of a larger 16-3 run for Villanova, which extended the lead from 11-7 at 12:24 remaining in the half, to 25-10 with 7:20 left in the half.
“To start the game defensively, I thought we did some really good things for the first 15 or 16 possessions,” head coach Greg McDermott said. “Unfortunately we were pretty inept offensively at the same time, and then they went on [a 16-3 run]. Those kinds of runs have been our problem all season long.”
Green watched the sequence spiral from there — the kind of stretch McDermott had warned about.
“Coach said in the locker room earlier, ‘If one person breaks down, then it’s kind of hard for us to keep our defensive integrity going,’” Green said. “And there [were] just a couple possessions in a row where that unfortunately happened, and they were able to get a pretty big lead on us and we were kind of fighting back for the rest of the time. It’s just kind of tough when we have defensive breakdowns multiple possessions in a row … it’s kind of hard to battle back from that.”
Defensive breakdowns served as a major contributor to the widening gap, but when those mistakes became amplified by turnovers, Villanova’s advantage only increased. Creighton turned the ball over four times in six minutes — bleeding into the 16-3 Wildcat run.
“Some of our turnovers, especially the first half, they were turnovers that were going to lead to baskets, and obviously live ball turnovers kill you too and we had a few of those, but the second chance points we lose by eight, the points off turnovers you lose by nine,” McDermott said, referring the Villanova’s 15-6 advantage in points off turnovers and 15-7 edge in second chance points. “It’s hard to win and especially when you execute a play to perfection — you’ve got a lob, you’ve got a dunk or a layup — and you throw it away. Those are hard.”
With 5:23 left before the break, Creighton sat at a 28-17 deficit, lessening the gap from as many as 15 two minutes prior to just 11, thanks in part to two shots in the paint from Dix.
But just as it looked like the Bluejays were making strides toward a single-digit deficit, Villanova’s offense lit up again, scoring on five of the next seven possessions to end the half. Creighton trailed 41-27 at halftime.
“I was hoping we could cut into [the deficit] there [before the half] … we just couldn’t sustain anything,” McDermott said. “Our biggest scoring run was five points tonight which is … not good enough, especially on your home floor. You’ve got to be able to sustain some things offensively and then sustain some things defensively, and we just weren’t able to do that this afternoon.”
Over the first 20 minutes, 30 of Villanova’s 41 first-half points came in the paint, while Creighton managed just 12. Swartz (10 points) and Dix (7 points) spearheaded Creighton’s offense in the first half.
To begin the second half, Creighton employed elements of zone defense at various points, a last-ditch effort to stifle Villanova’s dominance in the paint, but to no avail.
“We’ve defended the 3-point line against them better than anybody in the conference … and we’ve kept them in check for the most part there, but gave up, once again, way too much in the paint,” McDermott said. “We tried some zone stuff to start the second half a little bit and they made a three on both of them and it’s just one of those things: when things aren’t going your way and you switch to zone, they hit back-to-back 3s, that’s kind of a sign of things to come.”
The 3s McDermott referenced came five minutes into the half, pushing the Wildcats’ lead to 55–44 and halting Creighton’s push to make it a single-digit game. The Bluejays had trimmed the deficit to seven — at 47–40 and again at 49–42 — but Villanova’s timely shooting quickly restored control.
By the end of the 40 minutes, Creighton’s short bursts of scoring couldn’t offset Villanova’s lead, and the Bluejays took their 13th loss of the season, 80-69.
Still, there were individual efforts that stood out. Green recorded a season-high and team-high 11 rebounds, helping lead the Bluejays to 41 rebounds and a slight 13-12 advantage on the offensive glass.
A large part of Green’s efficiency on the glass compared to previous contests stemmed from the presence of Karem Konan and Owen Freeman alongside him at various points in the game. With another true five on the floor, Green was able to slide to the forward spot rather than absorb the full responsibility of guarding the post.
“I had a lot more rebounds this game which was really good. I was able to kind of find the ball a lot easier without having to block out the five-man as much,” Green said. “Those two are just really big bodies that are able to affect shots, they’re able to help on drives a little bit as well. I feel like the biggest thing for me is being able to get more rebounds defensively.”
The extra possessions helped, but converting them proved to be a harder challenge, as Creighton combined for 41.5% from the field but just 29.5% from the 3-point-line over 40 minutes. Meanwhile, Villanova’s sustained 46.2% from the field and 28.6% from 3 were enough to propel them to their 20th victory this season.
Now, the margin for error — if possible — gets even smaller, as the Bluejays turn their attention to UConn, then St. John’s tomorrow.
Ahead of these mentally challenging matchups, McDermott’s guiding principle has become balancing accountability with compassion as his team, given the emotional turmoil of Dix’s mother’s passing.
“We’re not at a position emotionally where I could yell and scream at them right now. They don’t need that with what they’ve been through this last week. You’re trying to teach basketball, you’re trying to help them get better, but you also have to understand they’re kids and they’ve been through something they’ve never been through before,” McDermott said. “I don’t want to crush them emotionally because their emotions have been tested this week, so they also need a steady hand as well. We have a responsibility to get better, we have a responsibility to play better, and we’re going to do everything we can to make that happen, but it’s also a slippery slope because they’re young people that have experienced something that’s really hard for them.”
Even amid the emotional weight of the week, the Bluejays haven’t lost sight of their goals.
“I think we still have a lot of basketball to play. We still have a goal, at the end of the day, to make the tournament and make a run, so at the end of the day we’ve got to stack days,” Graves said. “We’re just taking days one at a time, trying to get better each and every day and just fix all these lapses we’re having.”
The Bluejays are away, facing No. 1 Connecticut this evening. Tipoff is at 6 p.m., streaming on TNT with radio play-by-play airing on 1620 The Zone.
