Creighton men’s basketball found a way to escape with an overtime win over Georgetown Tuesday night, despite allowing the Hoyas to score on 16 straight possessions and shoot 56.9% from the field.
While needing overtime at home to beat team with only one win in conference play isn’t necessarily encouraging, the way the Bluejays finished both regulation and overtime showed resiliency by a team needing to rack up as many wins as possible to keep its NCAA Tournament hopes alive.
“You need momentum, and you need wins,” Coach Greg McDermott said after the game. “I think everybody in this league understands that Georgetown’s way more talented than their record, and I think our fans saw that tonight, and certainly we saw it on film. So this is a really good win for us. It’s been a tough stretch; this is a lot of games in a short amount of time, especially when you could argue one of our most important players is not even close to healthy. We’re having to manage that in practice as well, so it’s been a challenge, but I’m really proud that the guys were able to find it within themselves to figure this one out.”
The Bluejays saw a significant drop in their adjusted defensive efficiency rating on KenPom after the game, down to 69th — right in the middle of the Big East. That kind of effort won’t get it done on the road Friday as Creighton travels to face a high-scoring Providence team.
“We’ve got to get better defensively as there’s more film on us,” McDermott said. “We have some weaknesses, especially when Jasen [Green] is not 100%, but we’re going to have to clean that up. Tonight, we outscored somebody, and sometimes you have to do that.”
The poor defensive showing was a combination of the Hoyas hitting shots they haven’t made consistently for much of the season and defensive breakdowns on Creighton’s part. The Friars (8-9, 1-5 Big East) won’t need an outlier shooting performance to give the Bluejays problems as they rank 36th in the country in adjusted offensive efficiency while playing at the 16th-fastest tempo in the country, resulting in a Big East-leading 88.7 points per game.
The Friars are shooting 56.9% inside the arc (53rd), 35.4% from 3 (99th) and 77.4% from the free-throw line (26th) while only turning the ball over on 15.4% of their possessions (73rd).
Providence features the Big East’s leading scorer in Vanderbilt transfer Jason Edwards, a 6-foot-1 guard averaging 17.2 points and 3.3 assists while shooting 35.3% from 3. However, he missed Providence’s last game, an 88-82 loss to Villanova Tuesday, because of a flare-up of plantar fasciitis.
Fellow senior Jaylin Sellers, a 6-foot-5 UCF transfer, isn’t far behind at 15.9 points per game on a 55.1 effective field goal percentage (including 40.9% from 3 on 5.2 attempts per game). Freshman Stefan Vaaks, a 6-foot-7 wing from Estonia, is averaging 14.2 points and 3.0 assists while shooting 34.8% on a team-leading 7.8 3-point attempts per game. Another freshman, 6-foot-6 Jamier Jones, is also a double-digit scorer at 11.7 points per game on 68.3% shooting (a remarkable 70.8% inside the arc and 8-of-15 from 3).
A trio of returners in senior guard Corey Floyd Jr. (9.0 points per game, 39% from 3), sophomore wing Ryan Mela (7.9 points and 4.8 rebounds per game) and sophomore big man Oswin Erhunmwunse (7.3 points, 7.0 rebounds and 2.6 blocks per game) round out the group of Friars playing at least 20 minutes per game.
While the Friars are 17th in scoring, they’re also 354th (out of 365 Division-I teams) in points allowed at 85.1 per game. Providence doesn’t force turnovers (320th) and doesn’t rebound well on either end (212th in offensive rebounding rate and 230th in offensive rebounding rate allowed). The Friars have defended the interior well with Erhumwunse providing rim protection (47.3% 2-point percentage allowed, 44th), but teams have shot 37.8% from 3 against them this season (340th). Providence also hasn’t forced teams to beat them one-on-one this season as its opponents have assisted on 57.4% of their field goals (82nd-highest), which aligns with the way Creighton wants to play.
After Tuesday’s game went late into the night following an 8 p.m. tipoff, McDermott chalked Wednesday up as a mental day, planning to hit the practice court again Thursday before the team departs — making for another short prep.
“Providence is a team like Georgetown — very talented, lost some close games, great win at St. John’s,” McDermott said. “We saw a desperate Georgetown team tonight, and we’ll see a desperate Providence team on Friday.”
Tipoff at Amica Mutual Pavillion Friday is set for 5:30 p.m. CT on FS1 with Alex Faust and Emeka Okafor on the call.
