MBB Wins 2OT Thriller over Bradley, 111-110

OMAHA, Neb. -- Sophomore reserve Cavel Witter scored Creighton's final 10 points and doubled his previous career-high with a Qwest Center Omaha record 42 points as the Bluejays defeated Bradley, 111-110 in double-overtime during the regular-season finale for both teams.

The teams will meet again on Friday in St. Louis, Mo., in quarterfinal round action of the State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Tournament. The Jays earned the fourth seed with the win and will wear their home white jersey's, while BU will wear visiting red as the fifth-seed at Arch Madness.

The win extended two conference records for Creighton. It secures CU's 10th straight 20-win season as well as a 12th straight campaign with 10 or more league wins. It also puts the Jays in prime position to make an 11th straight postseason appearance, which would also be a league record.

Bradley had the ball with a chance to win at the end of regulation, overtime and double-overtime, but each time the Jays countered with a defensive stop.

Creighton fell behind 9-0 in the opening minutes and Bradley led by as large as 27-15 before closing the first 20 minutes with a 26-7 run to take a 41-34 lead into intermission. Witter scored 10 points in the opening half as the key a Bluejay offense that shot 51.9 percent before the break.

CU scored the first six points of the second half to build a 47-34 lead. The margin eventually reached 61-44 with 14:22 to go after CU put together a 10-2 run. But just as the Bluejay faithful began to chalk up another 20-win season, Bradley answered with a 14-0 run to get within 61-58 less than five minutes later.

Though Creighton pushed its lead back to eight on three separate occasions, Bradley wouldn't go away. Daniel Ruffin hit two free throws with 2:09 left to finally tie the score at 82-all. The Jays retook the lead with two free throws by P'Allen Stinnett with 1:52 left, only to have Ruffin drain two from the line with 39 seconds left to tie it at 84.

The Jays milked the clock down and let Witter penetrate. His lay-up from the baseline was blocked by Matt Salley, and the Jays were called for a shot clock violation before Booker Woodfox could redirect his tip-in. BU swingman Theron Wilson then went the length of the court in 4.5 seconds, but Bluejay senior Dane Watts stepped in to take a charge as time expired to send it to overtime tied at 84.

In the first overtime, Creighton quickly fell behind. Back-to-back treys by Ruffin and Jeremy Crouch gave BU a five-point lead with 3:08 to play. The Jays countered with Woodfox's old-fashioned three-point play. Ruffin would return BU's lead to five with 1:32 left in overtime, hitting a fallaway jumper to beat the shot clock. After both teams traded missed shots, Witter's three-point play brought the Jays within two with 38 seconds left. Bradley turned it over on the inbounds pass, and Witter once again drove the lane to tie it with 24 seconds to play at 95-all.

Bradley played for the last shot, but Ruffin's turnaround 18-footer from the top of the circle bounded off the rim and time ran out before Wilson could put up another shot attempt.

Double-overtime closely resembled the first overtime. Crouch and Wilson each drained three-pointers to give BU a 101-97 lead in the first 45 seconds. Wilson then hit all his attempts on a three-shot foul to put BU up 104-98 with 3:08 left.

Woodfox hit a three-point the halve the deficit, only to have Tyrone Cole-Scott drive coast-to-coast for a lay-up with 1:58 to go and return BU's edge to five. Witter then started his final surge. He hit a three-pointer with 1:46 to go to draw the Jays within two. After Ruffin missed, Witter tied the game at 106 on another drive to the hoop.

Ruffin answered with a lay-in with 46 ticks left to give Bradley a two-point lead, but Witter drained his fourth trifecta of the game to give CU a one-point lead with 37 seconds left. Bradley big man Sam Singh was whistled for a travel and Witter drained two at the charity stripe to give CU a 111-108 lead with 25 seconds left. Ruffin would be fouled on the other end and sink the first, and then chase down his own miss in the corner and call BU's final timeout.

Wilson was fouled by Witter -- his fifth -- but the BU junior missed the first of two tries from the line. CU senior Nick Bahe would miss two free throws with 11 seconds left to give Bradley a chance to win once again and needing only a basket to win. Ruffin would miss a lay-up and senior Pierce Hibma grabbed the board, only to be whistled for travelling in the scramble for the ball with 2.1 seconds left. With both teams out of timeouts, Bradley inbounded the ball to the husky Singh, who to that point had not attempted a shot all night. Singh had a decent look, but his jump-hook from five feet out rimmed out as the exhausted crowd of 16,257 exhaled and celebrated Creighton's 10th straight home win over Bradley.

Witter hit 13-of-20 shots from the floor, including 4-of-6 from three-point range, while also making 12-of-13 at the line, to score a career-high and Qwest Center Omaha record 42 points. Amazingly, it came after the sophomore was held scoreless in 16 minutes of a 28-point defeat in Peoria to Bradley just two weeks earlier. Witter scored 18 of his points in the overtime periods and also had seven assists, four steals and three rebounds in a career-high 34 minutes.

Also in double-figures for Creighton was Stinnett (14), Kenny Lawson Jr. (14) and Woodfox (13). Lawson was 7-for-7 from the floor to help Creighton shoot 50.7 percent for the game. The Jays owned an improbable 77-13 lead in bench points and blocked eight shots.

Bradley was led by Ruffin's career-high 30 points. The senior, who had missed the previous two games due to a suspension, also had eight rebounds and seven assists while becoming the second player in MVC history with at least 1,000 career points and 600 career assists. Crouch, the reigning MVC Player of the Week, tied his career-high with 29 points, including seven three-pointers. Wilson had 24 points and a game-high 11 rebounds. Bradley shot 44.9 percent for the game but did hit 14-of-28 three-pointers and outrebounded CU 46-41.

The game featured 149 field goal attempts, 71 free throw attempts, 52 fouls (including two technical fouls) and 59 three-point attempts.

Creighton returns to action on Friday at 2:30 pm with a rematch against Bradley in the quarterfinals of the State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Tournament in St. Louis, Mo. The contest will be televised on FSN, and can be heard on KXSP (Big Sports 590 AM).

NOTES: Creighton seniors Dane Watts, Pierce Hibma and Nick Bahe were honored after the game in CU's Senior Night ceremonies ...Creighton has won 12 straight Senior Nights when it has had at least one senior on the roster ...Cavel Witter's 42 points were four more than the previous Qwest Center Omaha record (38 by Nate Funk vs. Dayton in Nov. 2005) and tied for eighth-most in Creighton history. It's also the most points scored by a sophomore in any game nationally this season ...Cavel Witter is the first Bluejay with 40 points in a game since Rodney Buford (1998) and the first with 42 or more in a game since Benoit Benjamin in 1985 ...Creighton has won 58 straight games when scoring 80 or more points and 44 straight games when scoring 90 or more points ...Booker Woodfox has scored in double-figures in 11 straight games, which ties him for the nation's longest streak among reserves ...The game was the first time in Creighton history that both teams scored 110 points or more, and the first since 1989 (and fourth overall) that both teams cracked the century mark ...Creighton is now 40-2 all-time when scoring 100 points or more ...The 110 points are the most allowed by a Creighton team since 1987 (Iowa State), and first time in Dana Altman's 14-year tenure at CU a team has scored in triple-figures ...Creighton's 111 points were a Qwest Center Omaha record, fourth-most in school-history, and its most since scoring 115 against Indiana State on Jan. 19, 1985 ...Creighton has now been 5-4 or better in either the first half or second half of the league slate in 26 straight trips through the league ...The crowd of 16,257 increased CU's to 268,052, the most in one season in MVC history ...Creighton's average or 15,768 is second-most in MVC history, trailing only last year's school and MVC-record of 15,909 per home game ...Creighton is now 15-11 under Dana Altman in one-point games, including a 3-0 record this year.

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Players Mentioned

Nick Bahe

Nate Funk

Pierce Hibma

Kenny Lawson Jr.

P'Allen Stinnett

Dane Watts

Cavel Witter

Booker Woodfox