David Roddy goes for 36 in Rams’ blowout win against the Jays
The Creighton Bluejays allow David Roddy to go off for 36 points and allow the Colorado State Rams to set a new school record for threes made in a game after losing to the Rams, 95-81. This game was a dud in the way of defensive game plan, as Roddy was just one of seven Rams players with a three, and one of four Rams with multiple threes. Roddy knocked down seven threes, Isaiah Stevens got a double-double for Colorado State with 17 points and 11 assists, and Dischon Thomas added five three-pointers to a 21-point performance.
Although Creighton had not allowed an opponent to shoot better than 40% from three for a game, Colorado State blew that number out of the water; the Rams shot 20-34 from three, good for 58.8%. This doesn’t often correlate to success, and it didn’t today. The Rams had their way with Creighton offensively, with multiple players for the Bluejays trying to cover Roddy, including Ryan Kalkbrenner, Ryan Hawkins, and KeyShawn Feazell. The shooting from deep that Roddy was able to provide opened the court up for people like Thomas, Stevens, and John Tonje to combine for 10 threes between the three of them.
Creighton wasn’t that bad on offense, either. Arthur Kaluma led all Bluejays with 16, including some good transition points and a few threes. Nembhard cleaned up his turnover totals, scoring 15 points and dishing 5 assists with just 2 turnovers. Kalkbrenner was efficient, with 13 points on six shots. Hawkins knocked down three three-pointers en route to 13 points. Creighton just struggled to keep up with the three-point shooting of Colorado State, and at times were trading twos for threes against the Rams, something that did not work in their favor.
Creighton did also manage to limit turnovers and have an assist to turnover ratio above one for the second time in the season. Nembhard was effective at distributing the ball today, but he was not the only one; O’Connell had three assists without a turnover, and bench pieces combined for seven assists and three turnovers. If you want to take positives out of a 14-point loss that felt like a 25-point loss, hang your hat on the below average turnovers (13 for the game) as well as the scoring of your starting five.
Creighton drops to 4-1 on the season, with Colorado State jumping to 5-0. The Bluejays have a quick turnaround, playing Southern Illinois tomorrow. The Salukis were just defeated by Northeastern after the end of the Creighton game, so both teams will be running on fumes after playing three games in four days.