Friday, March 2, 2012
ST. LOUIS--The Drake Bulldogs fought an intense battle with the 25th-ranked Creighton Bluejays on Friday night in the State Farm MVC Tournament quarterfinals before falling, 68-61, before a crowd of 14,412 at the Scottrade Center.
Box Score | Updated Season Statistics
Drake trailed by just three points, 63-60, with 1:24 to play in the game after a jumper by sophomore Rayvonte Rice (Champaign, Ill.). The Bulldogs, however, could draw no closer, as Creighton's Doug McDermott made two free-throws with 1:07 to play to push the lead to five points en route to the seven-point Bluejays win.
Junior Jordan Clarke (Rockville, Md.) led four Bulldogs in double-figures with 11 points, and added 11 rebounds for his fourth double-double of the season.
Rice led the team with 15 points and contributed 8 rebounds, while senior Kurt Alexander (Toronto, Ontario) scored 14 and Ben Simons (Cadillac, Mich.) added 11.
"It was a real battle," head coach Mark Phelps said in the postgame press conference. "I think both teams gave great effort, but for us, the scoring drought in the second half ended up being a tough situation to overcome. At the same time I thought our guys did a great job battling back to get back into the game."
Drake sprinted out of the gate in this quarterfinal matchup, building leads of 9-0 and 12-2, and showing it was not in awe of the nation's 25-ranked team, to whom it had lost twice in the regular season.
All five Drake starters scored in the initial surge, including the senior Alexander, starting for the second tournament game in a row in place of the injured Karl Madison (back).
Creighton countered by scoring eight consecutive points to close to 12-10, as each team showed a propensity to push the ball up the floor and set an up-tempo pace to the game.
A back-and-forth battle continued throughout the first half with seven ties and three lead changes. Each team shot the ball well, with Drake making 46.7 percent of its field goals (14-of-30) and Creighton at 48.3 percent (14-29) before intermission.
Creighton carried a 35-34 lead into the locker room at halftime, courtesy of a layup by senior Antoine Young with two seconds remaining.
Drake held McDermott, the nation's third-leading scorer, to just three points in the first half on 3-of-7 shooting.
Rice scored the first points of the second half to put the Bulldogs back in the lead at 36-35. After a Creighton basket by Young, Alexander came back with a jumper to give Drake what would turn out to be its last lead at 38-37.
From that juncture the No. 2-seed Bluejays embarked on a 15-4 run, keyed by three McDermott three-pointers, to open up a 52-42 lead with 9:03 to play. Creighton built the lead to as many as 13 points, at 61-48, with 4:33 to play.
The determined Bulldogs, however, continued to fight and overcame a tough shooting half (10-30-30%) to whittle the lead down to three again in that final flurry.
Drake scored seven consecutive points in less than two minutes, and outscored Creighton 12-2 in a little more than three minutes to position itself for a chance to pull off the upset.
"I can't say enough about our guys," Phelps continued. "The really, really laid it on the line out there. Jordan Clarke is a guy that we kind of look to set the tone and kind of show us how to be a tough guy and play the right way. I thought he wore that badge tonight better than he ever has. He had a double-double, threw his body around and did everything that he could possibly do to set the tone and set the example for the rest of our guys, who, in turn, followed suit and really, really battled."
For the game, Drake shot 40 percent (24-of-60), while Creighton shot 46.3 percent (25-of-54). No Bulldogs opponent since Jan. 7 (Northern Iowa) has shot higher than 50 percent against the Bulldogs, whose three-point field-goal defense is No. 1 in the Missouri Valley Conference. That ranking was bolstered tonight, as the Bluejays shot just 26.3 percent from beyond the arc (5-of-19).
The Bluejays were uncharacteristically cold from three-point range as well, managing just one triple in 15 attempts, its lowest total of the season.
"It's tough because we never know what's going to happen tomorrow," said Clarke. "But it's tough with the seniors, Kurt (Alexander), Cory (Parker), Kraidon (Woods) and Greg (Whitaker), that it could be the last time you suit up with the people that you call your brothers. But we felt that we laid it out on the line, and we're proud of that. We felt like we can walk out proud with our heads held high because we left it all on the floor."
Creighton narrowly won the rebounding battle, 37-35. The Bulldogs shot 12-of-16 from the free-throw line (75 percent), while the Bluejays made 13-of-19 (68.4 percent). McDermott finished with a game-high 26 points.
In all, the lead changed seven times and the score was tied on seven occasions in the difficult-to-swallow elimination game at "Arch Madness."
"There are a lot of guys in (the locker room) that are disappointed," Phelps continued. "They laid it on the line. At the same time, there is a lot to be proud of with the season, and so we move on."
The possibility remains for the Bulldogs to play in a postseason tournament, giving the seniors hope of taking the floor at least one more time together with their teammates.
"We'll have an invite from some of the other tournaments to play beyond this tournament here," Phelps added. "So we'll process all of that and move forward."
