In his first season as a Bluejay, Steven Ashworth was Creighton’s fourth option, playing alongside two dynamic playmakers in Baylor Scheierman and Trey Alexander and the ever-efficient Ryan Kalkbrenner in the middle. Throughout his career, the Utah State transfer has been the definition of a combo-guard, leveraging his shooting ability to be a threat both on and off the ball.
This season, Creighton’s needed much, much more from him. Even before losing Pop Isaacs for the season, Ashworth shouldered a heavy load of ball-handling and playmaking, and that’s been even more true in the last three games without Isaacs. Even so, he’s risen to the occasion.
Ashworth is averaging 17.0 points (tied for fourth in the Big East) and 6.4 assists (tied for second) while shooting 40% from 3 on 8.3 attempts per game (sixth in percentage, first in attempts).
In each of his first four seasons, spot-up has been Ashworth’s most common play type, according to Synergy Sports. That’s changed this year, with pick-and-roll ball-handler rising to the top at 32% of his scoring possessions. Add in his passing possession and pick-and-rolls make up 51.4% of his total possessions — for a good reason. Ashworth has emerged as one of the best pick-and-roll playmakers in the country.
Ashworth-initiated pick-and-rolls have produced 1.185 points per possessions (PPP), ranked in the 92nd percentile. That’s good for sixth nationally among players who have logged at least 100 such possessions, and third among all high-major players.
Let’s dive into the tape to see what’s made him so effective so far this season.
We’ll start with his scoring. He’s producing 1.048 PPP (88th percentile efficiency on 80th percentile volume) while shooting 44.7% overall (44.8% from 3). Ashworth was one of the best pull-up 3-point snipers in the country at Utah State, shooting 46.9% (23-of-49) from deep out of pick-and-rolls in his final season as an Aggie. That didn’t translate to his first season in the Big East, however, as he went 14-for-47 (29.8%) on those shots for Creighton.
This season, the touch is back, and perhaps year two has brought more comfort, confidence and understanding of where his windows will be. Through his first 12 games, he’s 13-of-29 — one make shy of his 35-game total from a year ago.
If his defender goes under the screen, he’s letting it fly. If the screener’s defender hangs back, he’s firing away (even if his defender fights over the top and is on his tail). There’s often not a lot of time or space for him to get off a clean look, but he’s confident launching even with defenders in his space. The threat of his shot puts so much stress on the defense.
Ashworth is hunting that 3 whenever he can, but he’s capable of scoring inside the arc as well. Through 12 games, he’s already attempted 14 layups or floaters around the rim, making seven of them (including an and-one). Last year, he went 9-for-15 all season. Ashworth wasn’t blessed with great positional size or athleticism, and that makes finishing around the rim challenging for him. Even so, he’s upped his layup/floater rate from 15.9% of his field goal attempts last season to 21.5% this year while maintaining a similar level of efficiency.
One thing worth noting is that Ashworth was an elite mid-range shooter out of pick-and-rolls last year, often hunting for that pull-up when coming off screens. He went 11-for-18 on those shots. Through 12 games this year, he’s just 1-for-4. Whether that’s a conscious player choice, a coaching directive or simply a result of how teams are defending him, that could be something Ashworth taps back into during Big East play.
As good as Ashworth has been as a pick-and-roll scorer, he’s been even better as a passer. The two-man game with Ashworth and Kalkbrenner has been one of Creighton’s best options this year, but the heady point guard has done a good job feeding Fredrick King as well.
Creighton hasn’t had much pick-and-pop success, though Ashworth has found Kalkbrenner once after drawing two as well as Jackson McAndrew once on a ghost screen (first two clips below). The rest are all rolls. He does a good job keeping his eyes up and his dribble alive against hedges, manipulating the defense until the passing window opens. He’s grown into a terrific lob passer, with Kalkbrenner and King both benefitting.
If teams gum up the paint to take away the roll, as they often have this season, that creates openings elsewhere, and Ashworth has routinely made the right pass. He does a good job of reading shooters lifting into passing lanes or hitting the short roll when teams blitz him. He’s also done a good job creating hockey assists by getting the ball to the open man who then makes the extra pass against rotation to get an even better look.
With a roster bereft of dynamic ball-handling, particularly after Isaacs’ surgery, Ashworth has carried a heavy load this season for Creighton in terms of on-ball responsibilities while continuing to be the off-ball threat he’s shown to be throughout his career. Teams know that and often try to get as physical as possible at the point of attack with him, but even so he’s managed to grow into one of the best pick-and-roll threats in college basketball.
Creighton has asked more of Jamiya Neal on the ball since Isaacs’ injury, and once Fedor Žugić gets up to speed he can help alleviate some of that pressure as both a floor-spacer and secondary ball-handler. However, Ashworth will continue to be the one that makes this offense go. Creighton features one of the best pick-and-roll attacks in the country, and the fifth-year senior is the biggest reason why.
