True story: about five minutes into Thursday nights' game, three guys decked out in full Husker regalia came in and sat in the seats right in front of me. I'm talkin' bib overalls, backwards ball caps with the "N" for "nolledge", the whole two yards. Well, that's not entirely fair. One of them was wearing a Yankee cap.
Anyway, they were cheering for Savannah State, and being pretty obnoxious about it. These were the type of guys who when they yelled, it carried...and every single time the whistle blew in favor of Creighton, they were all over the refs. It was quite a display.
During the under-four timeout, I finally had to ask them what was up. Their answer was an all-time classic. "Well, Creighton beat us, but they still suck!"
Dumbfounded, I had no response. Luckily, I didn't need one, as his buddy provided a better response than I could have ever mustered. "That's right, you suck Creighton! Ha ha ha ha ha!" And then he spilled about 18 ounces of fresh beer all over not only himself but one of his fellow d-bags.
How hilarious is that? You bet.
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Thursday's game against Savannah State seemed, on the surface, to be a classic trap game. Sandwiched between the Nebraska rivalry game and a tough two-game road trip to Drexel and Xavier, its exactly the kind of game it would be easy to overlook. Of course, to be a trap game, Savannah State would actually have to be, um, GOOD.
One of my co-workers emailed me at halftime to say, "This is like watching paint dry. I've never seen a worse basketball team in my life, and I'm at least 73% sure my son's high school team could beat them."
Yes, I checked my email at halftime. Behold the beauty of the iPod Touch (or as I call it, the iPhone without the phone) and free Qwest Center Wi-Fi. Might be the only thing free in the entire arena except for the restrooms. On second thought, I shouldn't give them any ideas...
While his claim likening the game to watching paint dry was hyperbole, and his braggadocio about a high school team being better was dubious, it wasn't that far off from being plausibly true. The Tigers were not good.
The Jays had a 22-4 lead just six minutes in; they had an amazing 18 steals (also a school record); and they got 60 points from their bench. But my favorite stat of the night, dedicated to the d-bags in bib overalls who sat in front of us at the game: Creighton led 47-28 at the half, meaning for as bad as Savannah State was, they were 8 points better than Nebraska.
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Creighton's execution has certainly been better; it looked like they just weren't up for the game. Frankly, I can't blame them; ask yourself if you'd be excited to play Savannah State, and if you answer anything but "not so much, chief", you're lying. And your conscience won't appreciate it if you lie.
On this night, the offense looked discombobulated, they gave up some easy looks of defense, they turned it over way too much, they missed way too many easy shots, and they still jumped out to a 20-4 lead just five minutes into the game. So make no mistake, they did what they had to do, they got the win, and they were able to get solid minutes for the end of the bench. Dustin "The Nickel" Sitzmann saw the court in the first half for cripes sake!
Frankly, their play over the first four games has warped my expectations for this teams' ceiling. Coming into the season, with the number of new players, I figured there would be bumps in the road and stretches where they would struggle to find consistency. And after they've shown so many flashes of awesomeness, its easy to forget that this group is still made up almost entirely of newcomers.
The offense struggles at times to be in the right places. The defenders have lapses where they stand straight up and down, and wind up reaching instead of moving their feet with the offensive player they're guarding. And yet they've won four games by an average of nearly 20 points. The things I mention two paragraphs above are things I assumed would happen; the fact that I'm already complaining about them just four games in speaks to my opinion of where this team can get to by March.
Incidentally, I hear P'Allen Stinnett posterized a defender with a mammoth dunk, AGAIN. Ho hum.
Of course, I'm joking. His alley-oop was astonishing if for no other reason than the sheer distance he got off the ground. I've seen the footage the CU Video Team shot, and his feet have to be 35, 40 inches off the ground, minimum.
As that play developed, I noticed him loping just in front of the bench, along the baseline. Savannah had no defenders between him and the basket, and I barely had time to process my perception before he streaked down the baseline, jumped over a defender in the paint and slammed home a dunk. Amazing stuff. And just think, he's only a freshman, and he's only played four games. The Valley ought to be afraid. Very afraid.
My Heee-Haw Player of the Game Award goes to P'Allen. He didn't get the coveted 20 ounces of generic Mountain Dew awarded to him for his stellar effort against DePaul, so on a night when there was no clear-cut star, his 13 points on 5-9 shooting, four rebounds, three assists and one monster dunk give him the edge. Congrats on the first of what I hope is many Heee-Haw awards in his career!
You bet.
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