Creighton University
Kentucky
Kentucky Ends Men's Basketball Season, 65-63
3/23/2009 10:30:00 PM | Men's Basketball
OMAHA, Neb. -- Kentucky All-American Jodie Meeks converted a three-point play with 10.6 seconds left to lead the Wildcats to a 65-63 victory over host Creighton in second-round action of the NIT on Monday night before 16,984 fans at Qwest Center Omaha.
Kentucky (22-13) advances to the quarterfinals and will play at Notre Dame at 6 pm (Central) on Wednesday. Creighton ends its season with a 27-8 mark, its second-most wins ever.
Creighton led most of the game against the winningest college basketball team in history (1,988 wins), but could not finish off the Wildcats, who are making their first NIT appearance since 1979. In fact, UK played with the lead for a total of 4:28 in the game, just 1:40 in the first half and 2:48 in the second half.
The Jays appeared to be in control when Kenny Lawson Jr.'s three-point play off a feed from P'Allen Stinnett lifted CU to a 63-60 lead with 1:26 to play. UK answered with a lay-up by Meeks with 1:09 to play.
The teams would trade turnovers before Justin Carter was fouled by Meeks with 36 seconds to play. Carter, a 68.6 percent shooter at the line, would miss both attempts, giving UK the ball for a last shot trailing by just one.
After a timeout, the Wildcats would inbound the ball to Meeks. As a ball screen was set to Meeks' right, he drove left past Stinnett toward the hoop. He would drain the basket with 10.6 seconds left while being fouled, then convert the free throw to give UK its only two-point lead of the evening.
The Jays pushed the ball into the front court, where it called two timeouts with seven seconds left. CU would work the ball in to freshman Antoine Young. Young drove left and found MVC Player of the Year Booker Woodfox in the corner. Woodfox's potential game-winning three-pointer rimmed out, and Meeks grabbed the rebound as time expired.
Creighton was led by 18 points from Woodfox, while Stinnett had 15 points and Lawson 12. Carter hauled in a career-high 15 rebounds to go with eight points, including a pair of three-pointers. CU finished 22-of-59 from the field (37.3 percent) and made 8-of-19 three-point tries (42.1 percent). CU made 11-of-19 free throws for the game, but just 2-of-7 in the final 3:30. Rebounds were even, 36-36.
Kentucky was paced by 16 points from Meeks, well below his season average of 24.0 ppg. Meeks would score UK's final five points, and had all but three of his points after intermission. Patrick Patterson shook off two early fouls to finish with 12 points and seven rebounds, snapping his streak of four consecutive double-doubles. Perry Stevenson nearly produced a double-double with 13 points and nine rebounds as well. UK shot 45.1 percent from the floor (23-51) and was 4-of-8 (50 percent) from downtown. The Wildcats were also 15-of-19 at the line, including 10-of-10 in the second stanza.
NOTES: The sellout crowd of 16,984 was easily the largest in the NIT this season and made Creighton the first team in MVC history to surpass 300,000 home fans in a season ...CU also averaged an MVC-record 15,930 fans per contest, which is expected to rank 12th nationally ...Justin Carter's 15 rebounds were the most by a Bluejay since Ben Walker had 15 at Baylor on Dec. 4, 1999 ...Booker Woodfox's 18 points gave him 297 at home this year, a Qwest Center Omaha single-season record ...Booker Woodfox finished third in CU single-season history and second in the country this season by shooting 47.6 percent from downtown (91-191). Woodfox trailed only Eastern Kentucky's Mike Rose (99-206; 48.1 percent) this season ...Josh Dotzler had two steals, moving him into second place in CU career history (196) and tied for fourth in single-season history (70) ...Year-end team leaders included Booker Woodfox in scoring (15.8 ppg.), Justin Carter in rebounding (5.5 rpg.), Josh Dotzler in assists per game (3.5 apg.) and Kenny Lawson Jr. in blocked shots per game (1.6 bpg) ...Creighton's 35th game was a school-record for one season ...Creighton is now 84-16 in games at Qwest Center Omaha ...Booker Woodfox closes his career having made a three-pointer in a CU-record 31 straight games ...Creighton had not hosted an SEC team since 1940, when Kentucky was also the opponent ...Creighton has played six games decided by two points or less in the past six postseasons, going 2-4 ...Creighton dropped to 20-4 when leading at halftime and had its seven-game home winning streak snapped ...An updated box score was recalculated on Tuesday morning and redistributed, replacing Monday's original final stats.
