Creighton University
6-2
Tulsa
4-3
Men's Basketball Drops Road Opener at Tulsa
12/3/2014 7:48:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Tulsa improved to 4-3 with its seventh straight home win, while Creighton dropped to 6-2 with the loss.
Creighton led most of the first half, including a lead as large as 18-12, before Tulsa clamped down on the defensive end to take a 33-25 lead into the half. Woodard led the charge, scoring nine points during a half-ending 11-0 run including a three-pointer just before the intermission buzzer. Creighton never led again.
CU got within one at 39-38 but would miss a tying free throw, only to see the hosts take off once again. The Golden Hurricane erupted for an 13-2 run, including a four-point play by Woodard, as TU took its largest lead of the game to that point at 54-41 on a hoop by Brandon Swannegan.
Creighton got within eight points at 54-46 with 9:25 to play, but got no closer. Tulsa put the nail in the coffin late when it grabbed multiple offensive rebounds and culminated the possession with a three-point play by Marquel Curtis to give TU a 68-54 lead. Curtis later had a three-pointer with 3:10 left, giving him a season-high 17 points and the Golden Hurricane a 15-point advantage.
Austin Chatman tied his career-high with 19 points while also leading CU with seven rebounds and six assists. Toby Hegner added 14 points for Creighton, including 11 after halftime. The Bluejays shot 38 percent in the game and also had 13 turnovers that led to 20 Tulsa points.
In addition to 23 from Woodard and 17 from Curtis, Shaquille Harrison also had 17 points. The Golden Hurricane shot 48.1 percent from the field and were 18-of-33 at the line. TU also won the rebound battle 36-34 and had a season-low seven turnovers.
Creighton will play its fourth straight game away from home on Sunday when it makes its first trip to play at Pinnacle Bank Arena in Lincoln, Neb. Opening tip against Nebraska is set for 6:06 pm.
TULSA-CREIGHTON POST-GAME QUOTES
TULSA HEAD COACH FRANK HAITH QUOTES
Opening statement…
“Obviously it was a great win for us, our guys played extremely hard. On the defensive end, we were outstanding. I look at [Isaiah] Zierden's line, he was their leading scorer, he comes off the bench and was definitely a focus of ours. We did a tremendous job on him. The way our guys held their composure in the second half was great, because we knew Creighton was going to come back. They made some shots, they cut it to one and then we came back and started getting stops and started to execute there at the end of the second half. Really proud of our guys and it was a great team effort.”
On the spurt right before the half…
“The first part of the game I think we were both really tense and the defense was carrying both teams a little bit. We had some shots that just weren't going in, and we missed some free throws. But once we got a couple of those shots – and obviously James' shot there at the end of the half was a momentum play for us. I want to hang our hats on our defense. I thought our defense kept us around before we started shooting the ball. We did a really good job on a team that's really good offensively.”
On the play of Brandon Swannegan…
“He played great. He fought and he helped our offense by sprinting into ball screens. We are a ball screen team. When you walk up there it's not as good, but when you sprint and you have good movement – we play a lot like Creighton does, they set good ball screens – and he was able to score around the basket. Also his defense. His early help on defense – obviously he had a couple of blocks. Look at him, TK gave us great minutes. We got good production off of our bench, not by the standpoint of putting up a lot of points, but we got good production from those guys.”
On the importance of bouncing back after Wichita State…
“Obviously we had a great opportunity tonight. We had a great opportunity the other night against Wichita State, and a great opportunity against Oklahoma State. All three of those teams we just played in a row are all going to have a chance to play in the NCAA Tournament. It was really important for us to have an opportunity to play on our home court against a team like Creighton, to come out and play well. It all started with the effort, I thought we played with great toughness, and great passion, and great desire. The effort game is important to us, to win that battle night in and night out. I thought we did a good job with that tonight.”
On having a different guys stepping up in crunch time…
“For us, we're not a great shooting team, we shot 37% from three, we'll take that every night – seven threes. Paint points are really important for us. We had 34 points in the paint -- but that doesn't happen with the anxiousness of our team from a paint-point standpoint – that takes time understanding that. We had great ball movement and player movement, moving that ball from side-to-side. Now you have a chance to attack close outs and get in the paint. I thought our guys were really good at that tonight in terms of just being patient and attacking their closeouts.”
TULSA PLAYER QUOTES
TULSA JUNIOR GUARD JAMES WOODARD
On the energy of the game being contagious…
“It was very contagious. Getting stops and then coming down and contributing from that stop is very big for us. It gives everybody a rhythm and gives us a lot of energy. Obviously, we were on our home court, and our fans gave us great energy. I think that all contributed to the win.”
On his spurt of scoring right before halftime…
“I think that was key for us, going into the half with a lot of momentum and staying on top of them, making sure they don't get any runs or spurts. Because they can get hot in a quick second just like they did in Oklahoma. It was key for us, but we had great ball movement from Marquel [Curtis], Rashad Ray and [Shaquille Harrison] and I think that's what got me some open shots. I think we just need to stay with the momentum.”
On if he knew he was close to the 1,000-point mark…
“I wasn't really paying attention to it. I was just going out there and playing.”
TULSA JUNIOR GUARD MARQUEL CURTIS
On the energy of the game being contagious…
“Watching Brandon [Swannegan] and Rashad Ray have so much energy all the time, even in practice, we really feed off of that. And like Juice said, the crowd tonight was really good so we had a lot of energy for this game.”
On if this is the most comfortable he's felt so far…
“It really started at Wichita [State] when I hit a couple of shots early. I was just talking to Coach Haith about this – in shoot-arounds and practice my shot has felt really good so he is always encouraging me to be confident and take the open shot and make plays for everybody else and tonight I really felt like I did that.”
CREIGHTON HEAD COACH GREG MCDERMOTT QUOTES
Opening Statement…
“I thought Tulsa was good tonight. They certainly exposed us off the dribble. Their ability to get into the paint off the dribble racked up a bunch of fouls on our front line guys. I think that nine of our eleven fouls in the first half were on our four front line guys. We have got to be able to get out there and do our job without committing so many foolish fouls. I thought we made some mental mistakes the first half. A couple times we over-helped on Woodard and gave him a good look at a three. The play at the end of the half is inexcusable, even if he is five or six feet behind the line, someone else needs to shoot that shot in that situation. Now we make a run in the second half and instead of getting it back to even, maybe we are up eight or nine points and now it's a different game. Tulsa was really good I was impressed with their team. Obviously Woodard I think is a terrific player and Curtis was making shots, but we have been a team all year that has not fouled much and we had a hard time guarding them without putting them on the line.”
On the strategy after the first half…
“We went to zone some there and we gave up one, and then we decided to go zone that last possession and really had it where we wanted, we just were not quite aggressive enough on Woodard. He is a heck of a player, I saw him a lot in high school and I have always been impressed with his game. He was certainly good tonight.”
On trying to catch up…
“We got down one or two at one point in the first half, and then Zach gets his fourth foul right away and he had been doing some good things. So we just need to figure out a way to be a little more consistent. Obviously, this is (outside of Austin) the first true road game for a lot of these guys in the role that they are in, and there is going to be a learning curve. I understand that, but I think we are a much better team than we played as tonight, and we are going to have to be Sunday when we go to Nebraska.”
On the inability to make shots…
“Well certainly there is a concern when our shooting percentages are where they are at. What we have to evaluate is, are they good shots? If we are taking shots that I feel are good shots and we are missing them, that is just going to happen once in awhile. I think we have to eliminate some of the quick shots and some of the forced shots in the paint. And we need to pick apart the opportunities we had to make a read to get us a good shot where the read wasn't made. That is where we are still a work in progress offensively. We have the ability to get downhill with Austin and Devon in particular, James getting into the paint some, and now when we get there we just need to make good decisions with the basketball. I thought Tulsa did a really good job of that tonight, only turning it over seven times when they have been a team that has been turning it over a lot. And obviously we do not turn it over much and we turned it over 13 times tonight.”
On Tulsa's growth as a team…
“They are playing different than they did last year, but it is still a lot of the same guys. To me, from when we played them a year ago, I did not see them during the 11-game win streak when they were obviously playing well. This is a much better basketball team than when they came to our place a year ago. There is a lot of improvement being made. They spread you out, even Smith at the power forward is a hard guard because he puts it on the floor, and tonight he makes a three that we did not anticipate him making. This is a team that is going to win some games before it is all said and done because it is so difficult to keep them out of the paint.”
