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NCAA Tournament Cheat Sheet: Getting to know Creighton

Doug McDermott

Read through the rest of the Cheat Sheets here.

Conference: Missouri Valley

Coach: Greg McDermott

Record: 27-7, 13-5

Rankings and Ratings:

- Kenpom: 15
- RPI: 32
- AP/USA Today: N/A

Seeding?: Our Dave Ommen had Creighton as a No. 9 seed in Friday’s Bracket Projection, but another win over Wichita State and a duel-MVC title might be enough to push them out of that 8-9 game.

Names you need to know: Doug McDermott (23.4 ppg, 7.6 rpg), Greg Echenique (9.6 ppg, 6.5 rpg, 1.6 bpg)

Stats you need to know: Creighton is second nationally when it comes to shooting from beyond the arc, hitting 42.0% of their threes.

Tendencies: Everyone knows the story about Creighton at this point: they have Doug McDermott, they spread the floor and shoot a lot of threes, and they can struggle on the defensive end of the floor. When they get stops -- Indiana State scored 0.73 PPP and Drake scored 0.84 PPP in the first two MVC tournament games -- they win.

Big wins, bad losses: The Bluejays have some good non-conference wins -- Wisconsin, Arizona State, Akron, Cal -- and picked up a pair of wins over Wichita State in the last two days. They do have a couple poor league losses, however: Indiana State, Drake, Northern Iowa.

How’d they get here?: Creighton capped off a five-game winning streak that netted them two MVC titles over Wichita State in the span of eight days. They won the league’s autobid on Sunday with a 68-65 win over the Shockers.

Outlook: Creighton’s a dangerous team. For starters, they have an all-american on their roster in Doug McDermott, a forward that is a lights-out perimeter shooter that moves as well as anyone in the country without the ball and can score in the post. They have a pair of playmakers in the back court and shooters up and down their lineup. They can score and, as they proved in the regular season finale, they can put on unreal shooting displays -- they were 22-26 from two, 11-21 from three and 14-16 from the free throw line in a 91-79 win over Wichita State. The irony? Creighton’s best chance to advance past the opening round may have been losing in the first round of the MVC tournament and getting out of that 8-9 game.

How do I know you? Creighton is the home of Doug McDermott and company. The Bluejays beat Alabama last season before falling to North Carolina in the third round.

You can find Rob on twitter @RobDauster.