Moments That Popped: Creighton 76, No. 1 Kansas 63

Omaha, Nebraska — The No. 1 team in college basketball fell with a thud on Wednesday night at CHI Health Center, 76-63 to Creighton in a game that Kansas never led.

This one had all of the ingredients of these types of losses. Sluggish energy. Hot shooting by the opponent. A KU run. A counterpunch by Creighton that kept the visitors at bay. An over-rated chant late in the game and a court-storming at the final buzzer.

All teams have off nights, and the Jayhawks certainly had one on Wednesday, shooting just 35.7% from the floor and losing by double-digits despite winning the turnover margin by a whopping 10.

The Jayhawks fell behind by 10 after a red-hot start by the Bluejays and yet only trailed by 10 at halftime. It wasn’t necessarily that they played real well to keep it there, but they did enough so it didn’t get any worse.

That set the stage for a strong start to the second half, but that, too, was short-lived and KU never recovered when the Bluejays responded to the Kansas run.

KU coach Bill Self said after the game that he was disappointed that KU had a chance in that stretch to put some real game pressure on Creighton but could not do it.

Kansas had the Creighton lead down to 5 with 11:02 to play, but the Bluejays never led by fewer than 7 the rest of the way, spending most of the final 10 minutes back up by double digits.

Next up, KU (7-1) will head into enemy territory this weekend, with a 12 p.m. tipoff against Border War rival Missouri on Sunday in Columbia.

The Jayhawks are 3-0 against the Tigers since the century-old rivalry was renewed during the 2021-22 season. KU has two wins in Lawrence and one at Mizzou Arena so far in the recent series.

This will be the final on-campus contest in the initial 6-game series, with the final two games slated to be played at T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, Missouri.

Here’s a look back at some of Wednesday’s action against Creighton.

LIKES

• Second-half start – After slogging through quicksand throughout the first half, the Jayhawks started the second half with a little juice and it immediately paid dividends. In just over a minute of the game time after the second half began, KU ripped off a 7-0 run to cut a 10-point Creighton lead to three (41-38) and turn this into a ballgame again. By far the best part about the run was that it was sparked by KU’s three top returners — Dajuan Harris Jr. scored five points and forced a steal; Hunter Dickinson picked up a tip-in off of an AJ Storr miss (another aggressive play by Storr to get to the rim) and KJ Adams made the play on the steal and the assist to Harris for the sixth and seventh points in the run. Timeout Creighton. Game on, Kansas. He also scored with his left hand on the bucket that turned it into a 9-0 KU run and trimmed the Creighton lead to one.

• Limiting turnovers – Kansas had just 1 in the first 13+ minutes of the game, 2 for the entire first half and only coughed it up 5 total times in the game. That gave Kansas a chance because any more and Creighton might’ve run away with this one much earlier. But it’s worth noting that KU’s number of possessions was down in that first half, with most of its trips ending in one-shot-and-out opportunities as the Jayhawks shot just 37% for the half – 13 of 35 overall and 5 of 14 from 3-point range.

• Zach Clemence sparks KU – He doesn’t get much run, but he played 7 minutes in this game in the second half and made those minutes count. The KU big man was aggressive on offense, both for himself and in creating for others — especially in transition — and battled on defense and on the glass. He finished with 4 points, 1 rebound and 2 steals in 7:25 of action and was the only Jayhawk to finish the night with a positive plus/minus number: +6.

DISLIKES

• Dickinson limited big time – The KU big man struggled to become a factor most of the night, getting just 2 shots in the game’s first 13:14 and finishing with just 4 for the night. A big part of the reason for that was the way Creighton sagged off of KU’s perimeter players, packed the paint and did not give him much room to operate on the rare times he did touch the ball down low. On those occasions, Creighton big man Ryan Kalbrenner got the better of him with his length and strength. Two of Dickinson’s misses came from behind the 3-point line and he only got to the foul line twice, as well. Teams are going to employ this strategy against the Jayhawks moving forward and Self and company were probably already working on a way to counter in the bus on the drive home.

• Storr pulled early – Creighton picked up back-to-back layups on its first two possessions and it didn’t take KU coach Bill Self even a full second to go to his bench after the second one. Both layups victimized KU starter AJ Storr and Self immediately went to freshman guard Rakease Passmore to check in for him after the sluggish start on defense. The first was an easy layup right by Storr at the rim. And the second was off of a nice feed through the lane from the wing Storr did manage to get an offensive rebound and tip-in for two points after the two defensive miscues. But that wasn’t enough for Self to change his mind.

• 3-point D – Creighton drained 5-of-8 from downtown early in the game, reminding anyone who had forgotten that this is what they do. The Bluejays drilled a couple big ones in first few minutes, including one on a second-chance opportunity and that helped the home team build a big lead early. For the night, CU finished with 12 makes on 29 attempts (41.4%). That’s three more makes than they averaged so far this season, but it should be looked at as one of those fluky games where some random team caught lightning in a bottle and made a bunch of 3s against the Jayhawks. Creighton plays this way. They shoot a lot of 3s and have guys who are not afraid to jack them up. They hit some big ones in this one and some timely ones that not only broke KU’s back but also brought the crowd into it in a big way.

• No Rylan Griffen – Kansas was shorthanded in this one, missing sixth man Rylan Griffen because of an illness. Griffen did not make the trip, and, on a night when Kansas struggled to make shots, his absence was noticed in a big way. Self said after the game that he hoped Griffen would be able to practice later this week and be ready to return for Sunday’s game at Mizzou.

WHAT THE?

• 7-point swing – There was a pretty big moment early in the second half that turned into a 7-point swing that went against the Jayhawks. After Creighton guard Pop Isaacs hit a 3-pointer to push the Bluejays’ lead to 46-40, KU guard Zeke Mayo missed a shot in the paint on the next possession, inspiring a bit of outrage from the Kansas bench. Self and company thought Mayo got hit on the arm on the shot, which, if called, would’ve give Mayo a chance at 2 free throws. Instead, play continued, Isaacs hit another 3-pointer and then Self called timeout with 15:58 to play. During the timeout, while discussing the Mayo play with the officials, Self was hit with a technical foul, giving Creighton a pair of free throws after the timeout. Steven Ashworth hit both charity shots and a 46-40 Creighton lead quickly ballooned to 51-40. It was a frustrating night in the foul department for the Jayhawks, who were whistled for 17 fouls compared to just 7 called against the Bluejays – 7-3 in the first half and 10-4 in the second half.

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