CINCINNATI – Statistics not often seen for the visiting team in a major basketball conference: Twenty more shots than the opponent. Five turnovers.
Butler did that, and Butler lost.
Bottom line: The Bulldogs might have shown as much growth in a dispiriting defeat as in an epic victory.
This is a bottom-line sport. The Bulldogs were not celebrating an 86-79 loss at Xavier on Tuesday.
Coach LaVall Jordan was critical of the Bulldogs’ offense against Xavier’s 1-3-1 zone, and he said the defense was inadequate. It was.
But in a Big East in which all 10 teams are in the computers’ Top 100, and four are in the Top 25 of the polls, there will be outcomes like this.