Things did not go well for Villanova Saturday evening in Omaha, as a relentless and hot-shooting Creighton team overwhelmed the Wildcats on the way to an 86-70 win.

The first half was hectic, which was not what Villanova was hoping for. The teams combined to take 60 shots, with Villanova actually getting the better of things with 34 of those attempts. The problem was that the Wildcats shot just 41% while Creighton connected on 65%.

Villanova led for much of the first seven minutes, but never by more than four. An 8-0 run by Creighton near the midpoint of the half put the Bluejays up four, and they wouldn’t relinquish that lead the rest of the half. Villanova hung tight, but another 7-0 spurt from the Bluejays pushed the lead to eight with 4:36 to play. The advantage would get as high as 10 before the ‘Cats scored the last four points of the period to cut the lead to six at the break.

Marcus Zegarowski tortured Villanova to the tune of 17 first-half points. Villanova had a 9-2 advantage in offensive rebounds and an identical 9-2 lead in second-chance points, but it wasn’t enough to overcome the discrepancy in shooting. In addition to the 65%-41% advantage in overall shooting, Creighton was +6 from beyond the arc.

The second half brought much of the same. An 8-0 run early in the half pushed the Creighton lead to 13. Nova would get within nine, only for Creighton to rip off a 10-0 spurt to go back up 19. A sequence at the start of that second run summarized how Villanova’s day went. After Creighton made its first five shots to start the half, ‘Nova finally forced a miss at the 14:53 mark. But instead of going the other way with a chance to cut into the lead and build some momentum, the ‘Cats gave up consecutive offensive rebounds before committing a foul and giving up two free throws. By the next time Villanova scored, the game felt out of reach.

After that run pushed the Creighton lead to 19, ‘Nova would never get closer than 13 the rest of the way as Creighton walked away with an 86-70 win.

“Creighton was just outstanding,” Jay Wright said. “Defensively they played extremely well, their energy level was outstanding, and then offensively when they got it going in the second half, when they get going like that, they’re as dangerous as anybody in the country.”

“They’re a great team,” Collin Gillespie said. “They did a great job getting out in transition and getting to the front of the rim and getting open shots.”

Ultimately, the shooting discrepancy was the difference in the game. You’re not going to win a lot of games when your opponent shoots 59% and you shoot 38%.

The turnover battle and free throw line went largely how we expected.

Villanova committed just seven turnovers while Creighton was just slightly worse with nine. However, the Bluejays were slightly better at converting turnovers to points, taking a negligible 11-9 lead in that department.

Both teams shot 13 free throws. Creighton shot better than its season average, hitting 10-13 (76.9%). ‘Nova was again good from the line, hitting 12-13 and taking a small two-point advantage from the charity stripe.

Villanova did pretty well on the offensive boards, taking a 13-5 advantage and turning it into a 17-6 win in second-chance points.

Despite staying pretty even in the turnover and free throw departments and having an advantage on the offensive glass, it wasn’t enough to overcome the shooting advantage for Creighton. The Bluejays shot 46% from 3 while ‘Nova hit just 31%, and Creighton was +6 from beyond the arc. The discrepancy from inside the arc was even worse. ‘Nova was just 14-32 on 2-point attempts while Creighton was 20-28. The Bluejays feasted at the rim, taking a 36-20 lead in points in the paint. Creighton was 10-12 on layups and 3-3 on dunks. ‘Nova was just 8-16 on layups.

Ultimately, it was Creighton that dictated and controlled the pace, and the Bluejays were able to get what they wanted more than Villanova could as a result. “I think they really sped us up and we lost our decision making,” Wright said. Gillespie agreed. “We got a little sped up on the offensive end, went up and down with them a little bit where sometimes we could have slowed it down, made them grind in the halfcourt,” Gillespie said.

At the end of the day, you just have to give Creighton credit. They played an excellent game and completely dictated virtually every aspect of the game. The ‘Cats had no answer for Marcus Zegarowski, Mitch Ballock, or Christian Bishop. When Creighton gets all three of them cooking, the result is what we saw on Saturday.

Villanova will get another shot at the Bluejays in March, but for now, the ‘Cats get a week between games with UConn awaiting next Saturday.