Creighton Fends off Marquette, Wins Again at Home
In the Big East ranked matchup of the day in Ohama, the number twelve Creighton Bluejays defeated the Marquette Golden Eagles by a score of 89-75 to secure their sixth victory in the past seven games. Marquette was missing their best player in guard Tyler Kolek and arguably their second-best player in Oso Ighodaro, but in the realm of seeding heading towards the tournament, there are no excuses for a top-five team. They were able to stay in the game for all of the first half and much of the second half before Creighton pulled away with three minutes remaining. Marquette stuck with a tight seven-man rotation due to their absences, while the Bluejays essentially went with a seven-man rotation of their own, with the exception of two minutes played by freshman Issac Traudt.
The Bluejays got tremendous production from their trio of excellent players in Baylor Scheierman, Ryan Kalkbrenner, and Trey Alexander. Scheierman recorded a monster double-double, with 26 points on 6-12 from the three-point line and 16 rebounds. Kalkbrenner had 19 points, six rebounds, and a blistering five blocks, while Alexander chipped in 18 points and 11 assists for his own double-double. All three players were on the floor for at least 37 minutes. For Marquette, junior guard Kam Jones continued his heater, leading the team with 23 points. Forward David Joplin poured in 21 points of his own, and guard Stevie Mitchell had 15 to pick up some of the scoring that was missed in this contest.
Creighton picks up a huge win against a top-five opponent and further strengthens their resume heading into the Big East tournament, where they will likely be the two seed. Their next matchup doesn’t come until a week from today when they will travel to Philadelphia to face the Villanova Wildcats, who are currently in the tournament bubble. Marquette is still firmly a top-two seed in the NCAA tournament barring a few more straight losses, and they will hope to get healthy for the home stretch. They have another brutal matchup coming up on Wednesday at home against the number three and defending champion UConn Huskies.
