GAME THREAD: Georgetown at Creighton

Game 24: Georgetown Hoyas (6-17, 0-12) at Creighton Bluejays (15-8, 7-5)

When: Monday 9pm

Where: Chi Health Center Omaha

Series: Bluejays lead 11-9 (Hoyas are 2-6 in Omaha)

Last meeting: Creighton beat Georgetown 80-66 two days ago

TV: FS1 (Matt Schumacher & Nick Bahe)

Radio: 99.1 FM (Rich Chvotkin, 48th season), SiriusXM 384, Radio.com

NET Ranking: Creighton 71, Georgetown 218

KenPom Ranking: Creighton 70, Georgetown 213

KenPom Projection: Creighton 77, Georgetown 64 (88%)

Line: Creighton -10.5, o/u 142

Mutombo Coffee:

Happy Valentines Day!

It’s a new day and Georgetown gets a chance to fix their defensive mistakes from just two days ago in the rare home-and-away NBA type matchup with Creighton.

Former D2 standout Ryan Hawkins - 30 points and eight 3s - was more than Georgetown could handle on the outside while Ryan Kalkbrenner was dominant down low with 22 points and 15 rebounds. Seven of those boards came on the offensive glass.

Led by Don Carey and Kaide Rice - 16 points apiece - the Hoyas were in the mix with 14 minutes left by completely fell apart down the stretch for their 12th straight L.

Coach Patrick Ewing mentioned changes more than a few times during this post game press conference. It will be interesting to see what that means given the short turnaround.

WHAT’S AT STAKE

Georgetown - Hoyas are just in survival mode and trying to do anything they can to break a program-long 13-game losing streak and avoid a winless Big East season.

Creighton - The Bluejays are still in the mix for an at-large berth to the NCAA Tournament and must continue to beat the teams they should beat. A loss at home to a current Quad 4 opponent would likely be too much to overcome on Selection Sunday.

FLIGHT INFO

Below is proof that one can travel from the DC area to Nebraska without setting foot in Manassas, Va.

CURSE BROKEN?

With the loss to Creighton, Georgetown has now played - and lost - to all of the teams it beat on the way to the 2021 BIG EAST Championship. The regular seasons losses have occurred in the exact same order as they did in the Hoys historic run last March.

Order of 2021 BIG EAST Championship - Marquette, Villanova, Seton Hall, Creighton

Please note that it took the Creighton game getting postponed to hit this exact order for the 2021-22 season. But the game scheduled for Dec. 28 didn’t happen and we hit the same order.

So if there was some kind of curse that was triggered with the Hoyas cutting down the nets at MSG and grabbing an NCAA Tournament berth out of nowhere, it should probably be over.

Right?

WHAT THEY ARE SAYING

Former Georgetown great Austin Freeman can be spotted at just about every Hoyas home game. On first glance I didn’t see him over the weekend against Creighton - he wasn’t in his usual spot - but after looking a bit closer the current DeMatha staff member was picked out of the crowd. As he should, he’s always got good seats. Here’s his gameday tweet.

FOR STARTERS

Patrick Ewing did shake up the line-up last game in giving Ryan Mutombo his first career start. Mutombo had four points and two steals in 12 minutes. Despite the shake up, Ewing ended up giving backup center - and former, former starter - Malcolm Wilson 15 minutes due to style of play. Wilson responded by matching a career-high with eight rebounds in his most minutes since Jan. 7.

KAIDEN CLOSING IN

Kaiden Rice finished with 16 points on 6 for 11 shooting in the loss to Creighton over the weekend. He made two 3-pointers to push his season total up to 82. I know this section is about his shooting from deep but Rice actually made a season-high four 2-point FGs against the Bluejays. He has made 15 twos this season.

Here are the all-time single-season 3-point leaders at Georgetown

Allen Iverson 87 - 1996

Rodney Pryor 84 - 2017

Kaiden Rice 82 - 2022

FORGETFUL FIVE

Georgetown is one of five D1 teams that remain winless in league play. Western Michigan was able to come off the list on Saturday after a 14-point victory over Central Michigan. Hoyas get another shot to come off the list tonight although KenPom isn’t very optimistic.

Bobby’s Prediction

Georgetown 75, Creighton 72

Hey, last year Georgetown was a 14-point dog before winning in Omaha.

Leave your witty (and non-witty) in-game comments here!

HOYA SAXA!