Big East preseason player of the year Ryan Kalkbrenner scored a career-high 49 points, and 15th-ranked Creighton needed just about every one of them in a season-opening 99-86 win over UT-Rio Grande Valley on Wednesday night. The 7-foot-1 Kalkbrenner, a fifth-year center, was 20-of-22 from the field, including 2-for-2 on 3-pointers, and he made 7 of 8 free throws. He also grabbed 11 rebounds and blocked three shots. "We kind of went into the game with a plan to establish me in the post and we went with that," he said. "I kept working and wasn't really thinking about what happened the previous play. I was just trying to make the next one." The eye-opening stat line put him at or toward the top of a number of records, including: • The fifth-most points in a game in Big East history • The second-most points in Creighton history behind Bob Portman's 51 against UW-Milwaukee in 1967 • The second-most points by a player in a season opener in the past 25 years...