No. 17 Creighton men’s basketball bounced back from a two-game losing skid to score a big road win on Saturday, and sophomore Mason Miller was a big part of it.
On a day when the Bluejays struggled from the 3-point line, Miller went 3-for-3 for nine points in 20 minutes. Before Saturday, the 6-foot-9 forward hadn’t scored in three consecutive games, misfiring on all five 3-pointers he attempted. After the game, Coach Greg McDermott revealed that he had been dealing with a shoulder injury.
“It definitely feels a little bit better,” Miller said before practice on Monday. “I’m still doing stuff with it, trying to get a better. I’ve just had to kind of work on my shoulder a little bit, kind of strain to the outside rotator cuff, but it’s feeling a lot better now … It’s more of just a confidence thing; I kind of came into the game not worrying about my shoulder as much, just knowing that it’s still my jump shot, I can still do what I want to do.”
Miller said he sustained the injury two or three weeks ago. McDermott said he noticed that the rotation and arc on Miller’s shot were off and that the injury prevented Miller from getting extra reps in outside of practice to work out the problems. But as his shoulder improved, he’s been able to work through the issues, and it showed on Saturday.
Redshirt freshman Jasen Green has made an impact in his own way these past two games after earning his way into the rotation behind Miller at the four, grabbing three offensive rebounds (converting two of them into put-backs) and drawing two fouls in eight minutes on the court against Providence and Xavier.
“They did a great job,” McDermott said. “I felt like Mason was close to being back to his old form after tweaking his shoulder. I felt it the practice before Providence and then it carried over from that. It just looked like his stroke was back to where it was before. Jasen just keeps getting better. He’s doing some really good things in practice and as a result, he’s earned some time.”
Minutes at the four opened up for Green when McDermott decided after the Butler game to slide Isaac Traudt to the five ahead of Fredrick King, providing a different look behind Ryan Kalkbrenner. Traudt has played five minutes to Green’s eight in the last two games as McDermott has experimented with ways to get his veterans a breather here and there.
“It’s a lot of matchup-based things with Mason, with Isaac, with Jasen, with our decision to go to [Francisco Farabello] and play a smaller lineup,” McDermott said. “It’s kind of dictated by what the other team is doing and what we think is the best defensive matchup for us. So those guys all know that they have to stay ready and if their number is called we expect them to be ready to go.”
Tuesday could provide another opportunity for the likes of Green and Traudt to see the court as Georgetown (8-15, 1-11 Big East) visits CHI Health Center Omaha for the program’s annual Fan Appreciation Night.
The Hoyas have lost eight straight since their lone conference win over DePaul, but their last three road games (at Xavier, Providence and Seton Hall) have all been single-digit losses.
“We talked to the team yesterday about they led Xavier for the entire game and lost at the very end, and we know how good Xavier is,” McDermott said. “The Seton Hall game was, I think, a three-point game with four minutes to go; it could have been anybody’s game. Coach [Ed] Cooley does a heck of a job. He puts them in positions to get shots and they have a lot of shot-makers; it’s not they have anybody you can sag off of.
“[Jayden] Epps didn’t play the first time we played; he’s the leading scorer in the conference and he’s playing at a high level. [Dontrez] Styles has been their leading scorer over the last five games; he’s playing at a high level. [Ismael] Massoud can step out there and shoot it. [Supreme] Cook’s as good an offensive rebounder as there is the country. So we have to get stops, we have to get out in transition, we’ve got to locate their shooters. But I hope our guys mature enough to understand that we better respect this opponent because they’ll come in here with nothing to lose and give us a game.”
Epps, a 6-foot-2 transfer from Illinois, did not play in the first meeting with Creighton, a 77-60 Bluejay victory on Jan. 3. He’s averaging 17.6 points and 4.4 assists. Styles, a 6-foot-6 transfer from North Carolina, is second on the team at 13.5 points and 5.9 rebounds per game. He’s coming off back-to-back 20-point outings and is shooting 36.8% from 3 on the season. Cook, a 6-foot-9 transfer from Fairfield, is putting up 11.3 points and 8.0 rebounds including 3.9 on the offensive end.
Tipoff on Tuesday is set for 7:30 p.m. CT on FS1 with Nebraska natives Kevin Kugler and Nick Bahe on the call.
