UConn men’s basketball took care of business and easily disposed of Creighton Saturday night in Omaha. In a normally raucous environment at the CHI Center in Omaha, Nebraska, the Huskies (21-1, 11-0 Big
East) put together arguably their most complete game of the season and handed the Bluejays their biggest home loss since joining the Big East with an 85-58 victory.
After missing the Providence game earlier this week with a concussion, Braylon Mullins returned to action and immediately made his presence felt, hitting a deep three for the Huskies’ first bucket of the game. Solo Ball tacked on two more 3-pointers, and then Mullins hit again from deep, giving UConn a 12-8 lead after starting the game with four made threes.
Creighton (12-10, 6-5 Big East) did eventually fight back, and led by one after a three from Isaac Traudt, but Jaylin Stewart answered with a tough bucket on the other end on the next possession to put a halt to the Bluejays’ only lead of the game. Creighton did, to their credit, hang around for most of the first half, but UConn began to pull away after Tarris Reed Jr. slammed home a miss from Alex Karaban to go up 33-27 with just over two minutes left in the first half.
From there on out, it was all UConn. Ball hit another three, and while Creighton hit a pair of free throws, Silas Demary Jr. finished the half with five-straight points. By the time both teams headed to the locker room, the Huskies had a 41-30 lead.
Creighton scored first to start the second half, but Mullins connected from three again and a layup from Karaban stretched the lead to 14 — at that point, the largest lead of the night. For a UConn team that has allegedly lacked a “killer instinct” and let teams hang around more than they maybe should, the Huskies turned up the intensity and ran the Bluejays out of their own building.
Led by Karaban, UConn ripped off a 10-0 kill shot, and by the time Karaban capped off the run with a putback off his own miss, the Huskies led 62-40. UConn’s defensive pressure bothered Creighton all night, and the Bluejays failed to mount a counterattack, going scoreless from the field for nearly seven minutes in the second half. By the time Jasen Green scored with 7:39 left to play, Creighton fans had already filed out en masse as the Huskies led 69-45.
The Huskies stretched the lead to as much as 30 in the second half after another three from Mullins before cruising to the 27-point victory. The win is just UConn’s second-ever at the CHI Center and was the Bluejays’ biggest home loss since joining the Big East.
Mullins led UConn with 16 points, shooting 4-8 from three. Karaban (15 points), Demary Jr. (15) and Solo Ball (11), joined him in double figures. The Huskies were lights-out on offense all night, shooting 54.1 percent from the floor and 51.1 percent (16-31) from three. After some struggles during conference play offensively this season, Saturday night’s performance bumped UConn’s offensive efficiency from 42nd to 31st nationally in KenPom.
Defensively, the Huskies were just as good. Creighton did not make a 3-pointer in the second half on 11 attempts and shot just under 41 percent from the field. Nik Graves led all scorers with 17 points, and Blake Harper was the only other Bluejay in double figures with 11.
UConn imposed its will on the boards, outrebounding the Bluejays 37-24, and outhustled them with 23 second-chance points to Creighton’s eight. Greg McDermott’s Creighton squad is not nearly as talented as the Bluejays’ squads of previous years, but UConn put together its most complete performance in recent memory for a convincing win on the road in a place that has tormented the program in the past.
Up next, the Huskies head back to Hartford to take on Xavier at PeoplesBank Arena. Tip off is set for 7:00 p.m. and Peacock/NBC Sports will broadcast the game.
