Dan Hurley’s UConn Huskies suffered a shocking 91-84 home loss to Creighton on February 18, 2026, their first conference defeat at Gampel Pavilion.
The game was tied 45-45 at halftime after UConn’s Braylon Mullins hit a buzzer-beating 3-pointer. But Creighton sprinted ahead with a 14-2 run in the second half as the Huskies went cold, shooting just 34% from the field while missing 10 of 11 shots during the stretch.
Creighton dominated free throws 27-11 and shot 52% overall to hand No. 5 UConn (24-3, 14-2 Big East) its first Big East home loss, boosting the Bluejays to 14-13 (8-8).
The Huskies’ head coach was furious at his players after the loss. He pointed out the biggest issue that resulted in an upset on Wednesday night.
“Our defense has just been so so bad,” Hurley said. “We’ve been playing with fire with this overall defense. Dreadful. Then, minus Braylon in the second half, the shot-making was just ice-cold. But his has been brewing, you know, for us just based on what the defense has looked like.”
“The defense has been a joke. You know you are in trouble to start the game when you are subbing people within the first minute and a half on blown assignments. I could have just done that the whole game because it was a game of really bad individual defense.”
UConn’s Braylon Mullins, with 25 points, was the pick of the night. Silas Demary Jr. added 17 points and 9 assists, and Tarris Reed Jr. posted 15 points and 11 rebounds despite just 2 in the second half.
For Creighton, Josh Dix led with 21 points (13 after halftime), Nik Graves scored 18, and Fedor Zugic added 14 as the Bluejays spoiled Emeka Okafor’s jersey retirement.
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Dan Hurley Shares His Feelings About Fans’ Support
Fans were under some scrutiny during the buildup to Wednesday’s game against Creighton. The whole program had been urging the supporters to show up at Gampel Pavilion. Dan Hurley was gutted by the loss, especially after people turned up for the game to cheer for his team.
“Crowd was awesome. I feel like a little bit of an idiot,” Dan Hurley said. “You criticize your home environments, and then today, they were just awesome. But it’s like what I said in the media availability the other day. We have a tendency with this year’s team to kill the crowd.”
The Huskies take on Villanova in their next game on Saturday.
