All the bad habits Creighton men’s basketball showed in the first two wins carried over to Tuesday night as the Jays fell at Kansas State, 89-82.
A 20-5 run turned a 55-all tie into a healthy Kansas State lead, one the Wildcats managed to hold onto despite a fierce Bluejay rally at Bramlage Coliseum.
“Congrats to Kansas State,” Coach Alan Huss said. “They were the hungrier team tonight for certain. They executed at a really high level. I think there’s an incredible lesson for our team to learn from this as a collective unit. [The Wildcats] were humbled a week or so ago against a really good South Dakota State team where they weren’t ready to play, and they’ve clearly gotten better. Our guys were humbled tonight in a similar fashion.”
After trailing by as much as 15, Creighton found itself down by just four with three minutes to play. However, a 7-0 Wildcat run aided by a couple of layups rimming out, a turnover, a rushed shot attempt and a couple bad fouls from the Jays allowed Kansas State to stretch it back out and secure the victory.
“That’s just a lack of trust in process right now, and it’s something that if we don’t get it fixed quickly, it’s going to spiral out of control,” Huss said. “We’ve got to do a better job there as a collective unit of staying on script when we face some adversity.”
Three Jays scored in double figures and Creighton knocked down 13 3-pointers, but it wasn’t enough to overcome a Kansas State team that shot 56.6% from the field.
Jasen Green played 22 minutes after sitting out the win over Le Moyne on Thursday, but it’s clear he’s still working his way back to 100%, and Jackson McAndrew played just 10 minutes. The junior forward left the game in the first half with an apparent leg injury suffered when hitting the deck in a loose ball scrum, started the second half then checked out for good after less than three minutes.
Here are three takeaways from the loss.
Defensive Mistakes Galore
Creighton’s defense has been very boom-or-bust this season, on Tuesday the bust outweighed the boom.
The Bluejays forced 22 turnovers and converted them into 30 points on the other end. Half those turnovers came via steals, allowing the Jays to earn a 19-5 edge in fast-break points.
However, if the Wildcats managed to hang onto the ball long enough to get a shot up, it usually went in.
“They were the better team, they were the more connected team, they continuously made us pay with easy baskets at the rim, with elite pace to their cutting game,” Huss said. “Our defense was just completely feast or famine tonight. We turned them over or they got the shot they wanted. That can’t be the way we’re built.”
Heading into the game, I highlighted Kansas State senior guards Brandon Rechsteiner and Jaden Schutt and their 3-point prowess. The two had combined to connect on 15 of their 38 3-point attempts in the Wildcats’ first two games, with Rechsteiner averaging 21.0 points to lead the way. On Tuesday, the duo got loose for 19 attempts from beyond the arc, making 10 of them and pouring in a combined 40 points overall.
Time and time again, Rechsteiner and Schutt found openings to fire away, whether it be an overaggressive fly-by closeout allowing the shooter to reset and launch, miscommunication on flare screens or the defender flat-out just getting lost. Kansas State went 14-for-30 (46.7%) overall from deep to outpace what the Let it Fly Jays managed.
However, it was the 13-for-18 mark at the rim that had Huss most frustrated. Far too often, Creighton gave up back-cuts by playing too aggressively to the top side or failing to properly handle off-ball interchanges, and their rotations against drives weren’t on time or failed to happen at all.
“You make a choice, ultimately, whether you’re going to protect the rim or protect the 3-point line,” Huss said. “At some level, fundamentally, you have to make that choice. We really want to protect the rim first, and we didn’t protect the rim tonight. The answer is double down, protect the rim, and when they bang us with a few 3s early, not lose our minds, not go crazy, stay poised, stay below them, not give up the back-cuts, don’t let them score at the rim.”
While Huss was more focused on the poor rim protection in the moment after the game, the film should review far too many quality 3-point looks for one of the most trigger-happy teams in the country as well. Creighton didn’t take away either one on Tuesday, and that’s a recipe for disaster moving forward.
The good news is many of the mistakes that happened in Manhattan are fixable. The bad is the staff doesn’t have much time to correct those issues before the schedule ramps up even further.
Little Guy, Big Spark
Earlier in the day, news broke that Creighton point guard Brody Robinson had received a temporary restraining order granting him the ability to play up until his scheduled hearing on Nov. 20.
After failing in other attempts, the Oakland transfer’s attorney filed suit in Douglas County on Monday, and receiving the go-ahead to play Tuesday night was the best-case scenario.
Creighton Bluejay Brody Robinson (4) sits during media day on Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026, in Omaha, Nebraska. Photo by Brandon Tiedemann.
During Kansas State’s go-ahead run, with the Jays trailing 65-57, Huss broke the glass — and Robinson spearheaded a comeback.
“He was going in for emergencies only tonight and we were in an emergency situation,” Huss said on 1620 the Zone. “I just thought we needed a spark. Even though he hasn’t really been a part of what we do from an offensive standpoint with our top lineup, it’s pretty clear he’s one of our better players. He’s definitely one of our more seasoned players. He has been in these environments and was unfazed by it. I just thought he gave us the spark we needed at that time.”
Robinson first found Wes Enis for a 3-pointer to end a 9-0 spurt for the Wildcats, then he drove inside and kicked it to Hudson Greer in the corner for another 3. He followed that with a transition layup for his first Creighton points then knocked down a trey of his own on the next possession. Two free throws apiece from Enis and Robinson cut the deficit to three with just over six minutes to play.
The comeback stalled out at that point, but Robinson finished with 10 points, two assists and two steals, shooting 2-of-5 from the field, 1-of-3 from 3 and 5-of-6 from the line while playing the last 11 minutes of the game.
“I just knew that if my name did get called, I was going to bring everything I had … I just tried to play to my best ability and give us much as I can toward winning,” Robinson told 1620.
Creighton has two more games before Nov. 20, which means Robinson should be eligible to play against Iowa on Sunday and Bethune-Cookman next Wednesday.
Big Game for BJ Davis
Perhaps the biggest bright spot from the game was the play of BJ Davis, who finished with 25 points on 9-of-20 from the field (6-of-14 from 3) and 1-of-1 from the foul line, three assists and three steals in 34 minutes. A couple of those misses came late with the Jays in desperation mode, down double figures in the final two minutes.
He set the tone early, opening Creighton’s scoring with a and-one at the rim then following with a trailer 3 from just beyond the halfcourt logo. Five of his nine buckets were unassisted as well as Davis went to work creating his own shot and hitting some tough ones off the dribble.
Two of his steals directly put points on the board as well as he hit teammates running ahead for easy finishes each time.
Kansas State’s decisive run began after Davis took a seat with his third foul, and by the time he returned to the floor two minutes later, Kansas State had already built some momentum.
Davis was good in his first two games as a Bluejay, totaling 22 points on 50% shooting, eight assists and zero turnovers while wreaking havoc on defense against Kansas State and Le Moyne, but Tuesday proved he can take over a game with his scoring as well, something the Jays will need at points this season.
