Bluejays dominate Huskers in 95-76 rivalry blowout

OMAHA – Saturday marked Fred Hoiberg’s first taste of the Nebraska-Creighton rivalry, and the first-year Husker coach got a thorough education on how the series has gone in recent years.

Creighton burst out to a 10-0 lead from the opening tip and led by as many as 31 points before handing NU a 95-76 defeat at the CHI Health Center.

While NU battled much better in the second half, it wasn't nearly enough to overcome the Bluejays shooting 53 percent overall and hitting 13 3-pointers, led by a game-high 30 points from Marcus Zegarowski.

"Give Creighton credit; they obviously came out and threw the first punch, and then second, third, and fourth punches as well," NU head coach Fred Hoiberg said. "We just didn't handle it well."

Creighton now leads the all-time series vs. Nebraska at 27-26 and has won eight of the past nine meetings. The last time Nebraska beat Creighton in Omaha was a 71-70 victory in the NIT back in 2004, and Saturday extended that drought to 15 years.

The day started about as poorly as Nebraska could have feared, as Creighton jumped out to a 10-0 lead and the Huskers missed their first seven shots from the field.

Junior forward Damien Jefferson, who came into the game just 1-of-15 from 3-point range on the season, knocked down two threes in the first four minutes to push the Bluejays’ lead up to 21-4 less than eight minutes into the game.

The deficit would grow to as much as 40-9 with six minutes left in the half, which topped Creighton’s biggest opening lead over the Huskers since starting 38-8 back in 2013.

"The No. 1 thing we talked about going into this game was finding a way to get back (on defense) and slowing them down," Hoiberg said. "That's the most talented offensive team by a long shot that we had played to this point, and you have to do the little things to get back and at least slow them down and make them execute in the halfcourt. We didn't do that."

Nebraska was able to outscore CU 13-8 over the final 4:15 of the half, but that only cut the lead down to 48-22 going into halftime. The Huskers shot just 23.4 percent from the field and 21.1 percent from 3-point range, while the Bluejays were 51.5 percent overall and made 8-of-16 from behind the arc.

Unlike the first half, NU came out firing to start the second and hit 11 of their first 14 shots from the field to cut the lead down to 67-48 on a layup by Cheatham, who scored 12 of his team-high 14 points in the second half.

In fact, Nebraska actually outscored the Bluejays 52-47, shot 61.3 percent in the second half, and ended the game on a 13-2 run. But that was all far too little, too late, as Creighton kept its lead above 19 the rest of the day.

"We have to build on that," said Thorbjarnarson, who finished with career-high 12 points and was 4-of-5 from behind the arc. "We obviously see what we can do. We scored 50-plus points in the second half. But maybe it's a little bit different when you're already in the hole."

Six Huskers scored nine or more points in the loss, including five finishing in double figures. Creighton's backcourt trio of Zegarowski, Ty-Shon Alexander (22), and Mitch Ballock (13) combined for 65 of CU's 95 points.

Nebraska will get some needed time off before the schedule ramps up even more next week with two Big Ten Conference games in three days. The Huskers will travel to Indiana on Friday night before returning home on Sunday to host Purdue.

Tip-off for NU’s trip to Bloomington is set for 7 p.m. CT and will be televised on BTN.

"We've talked a lot with this group, you've got to find a way to battle through the tough times," Hoiberg said. "We've got to find a way to learn from it and be better the next time we step on the floor, and that starts with practice on Monday."

1. Nebraska was overwhelmed at the start

One of the biggest questions coming into this game was how Nebraska would respond to its first true taste of a hostile road environment.

Given how disastrous the day started, it was obvious that the Huskers weren’t mentally ready at all. There was no rhythm to the offense, the shots were rushed, and the defensive intensity just was not there through the majority of the first half.

Hoiberg called three timeouts in the first 14 minutes just to try and get his guys settled down, but it took until the end of the opening half for NU to even play functional basketball.

"I wanted to take eight more (timeouts) on the next eight possessions, but I didn't have them," Hoiberg said. "You only get five."

We knew this was going to be a season full of learning experiences and some tough lessons to be learned along the way, but even the most pessimistic fan couldn’t have projected that Saturday would begin with that much of a wake-up call.

2. It was ugly, but at least NU kept fighting

There aren’t many positives Nebraska could take away from that one, but if anything, at least the team didn’t give up.

While the start was as awful as it could get, the Huskers actually settled down a bit and played some OK basketball at the end of the first half. Then they were downright good in the second.

Nebraska made 11 of its first 15 shots and shot 61 percent after halftime to post their highest-scoring half of the season at 54 points. All that did was turn a 26-point halftime deficit into a 19-point final margin, but there is still longterm value in how the Huskers didn't give up.

There’s obviously so much for NU to improve upon in so many areas, including some things – like shooting and rebounding – that probably won’t get much better this season.

But when it comes to effort and persistence, those are things that can develop a lot over the year. As ugly as things got, Saturday could be an important step in that regard when looking at the big picture.

3. This game meant more to Creighton

Saturday was such an interesting dichotomy because while the Nebraska-Creighton rivalry has been heated for years, this Husker squad really didn't have a sense of just how much it meant around the state.

For everyone on NU's roster outside of junior Thorir Thorbjarnarson, it was basically just another non-conference game on the schedule. For the Bluejays, there couldn't have had much more motivation.

Zegarowski and Alexander both said after the game that last season's loss in Lincoln was something they'd been thinking about for the past year, and both seemed disappointed they let Nebraska chip away at the lead and didn't win by even more.

"I still remember the feeling that I had last year," Zegarowski said. "I just wanted to use that experience to really motivate not only me, but the whole team. We obviously still felt that game last year, and this game is very important to us."

Added Alexander: "(Last year's loss) really hurt a lot, especially all the messages and things that people were saying down in Nebraska last year. We just took it personal. Obviously, we wish we could've beaten them by more, but we did what we had to do."

That type of incentive simply couldn't be replicated by a Nebraska team that had no idea what the rivalry was all about.