Slu opens the Atlantic 10 tournament against Davidson

Washington – When St. Louis University came along the route in the regular season, coach Josh Schertz emphasized that his team was not so important to go to the quarter -finals of the Atlantic 10 tournament, as was the best for his team when the tournament came.

If Slus season had ended at the half -time of his game with Dayton on March 4, this would have been the case: Slu had just beat Loyola Chicago by 31 points and was on dayton at half -time. But the SLU still had the rest of the Dayton game and a whole game with Duquesne, and the last half were not quite as good. Slu lost with eight points against Dayton and met both a Rothößes Duquesne team and his own misfortune with ball handling and took overtime to beat the dukes.

Now the SLU goes out into the conference tournament and looks as it is for a large part of the season: good, not well with just enough to make things difficult.

“We played about 65 minutes what our best looks like,” said Schertz about the games Loyola and Dayton. “It was a bit of our problem, consistency. I don’t think it is a problem that our best is good enough. It is that our soil is good enough and some of the things we do at both ends of the ground, scenarios in which we have to restart from six points in which we have to get back with one minute before the end of six points. I said to the boys today, I said there are actually things that you can do, I know it sounds amazing, but you don’t have to go with a minute before the way. You can actually have a lead and it is a completely different thing. I think it’s more of the consistency. “

SLU (18-13, 11-7) must be required if it is supposed to survive the only way to the NCAA tournament through the A-10 tournament in four days in four days. Slu’s victory against Duquesne gave Billikens the number 5 in the A-10 tournament, which began on Wednesday in the Capital One Arena and defeated Slu on Thursday for a game with Davidson (17-15, 6-12) against Richmond against Richmond with 69:65. If Slu wins this, she will compete against Loyola on Friday at 1 p.m.

There is a solid case to do that SLU is much better than the No. 6 seeds as No. 5 seeds. Slu beat each team in half of the bracket, including the two higher seeds No. 4 Loyola and No. 1 Virginia Commonwealth, compared to 0: 3 against the higher seeds on the other half, No. 2, George Mason and No. 3 Dayton.

The Slu shootout was good – number 1 in the conference in an effective shooting rate at Kenpom.com – but this is compensated for by other factors. The opponents of SLU have made about 200 more shots than the SLU and have wiped part of the advantage of the superior shooting of the SLU with mere volume. And the reason why the opponents make so many more shots is that SLU does not get many offensive rebounds compared to what they give up and turn the ball around at high speed.

“The problem is that we are the 15th place in the sales rate in the sales rate (in the A-10),” said Schertz, “just because there are no 16 teams and our inability to handle basketball and take care of not only endangering what we are offensive, which is really violating her defense.”

“I think it starts with me, my personal self,” said center Robbie Avila, who had 10 sales against Duquesne on Saturday. “I think just being smarter with the ball and being stronger with the ball. I had a couple that I had to tap my wrist and I lose the ball. I had to be able to play through these little ticky tack things. And only the team, only more targeted. I think sometimes we throw passes that are not even there or just don’t do anything for us. And we allow the other team to jump gaps and the like. But I think it starts to be strong with it. “

Less sales, especially the LIVE ball sales of the SLU, tend to lead to the defense better to transfer baskets.

“The only way to win four games in four days is when your defense is good,” said Avila. “You will probably not shoot 60% of the field and 45% in four games in a row. It’s really difficult to do. And so I think if we want to be able to win all four of these games, we have to make ourselves proud of the defense. “

Slu closed his season with victories in four of the last five games, including one about Davidson. But that was one of these games that required an amazing Slu comeback. The Billikens were around 13 years old at 6:31 before completing a 19:5 run to win 57-56. Avila achieved the starting basket with a 4.6 second lead and then Davidson was missing an open 3 in the summer.

Three days later, Slu followed with his romp over Loyola.

“It was a loud defeat,” said Davidson coach Matt Mckillop on Wednesday. “You are really good. Our defense was exceptional for these first 34 minutes of basketball. In the last six minutes they go 8 for 9 and it is not close enough. But they are an absolute handful. … our boys know that we have not closed this game and we can be able to win when we defend the way we did it and we find ways as we did today. “

These last six minutes against Davidson were an example of how this season went for SLU. In the first half of the game it shot 25%, 59% in the second.

“I think that in the second half of the season we were at our climax and what we look like as a team and want to be like a team,” said Guard Isaiah Swope. “Especially with our last victory, it was not overall as we wanted it. At the same time, I think that it was a good foot forward for us to just roll into the A-10 tournament because we knew that we got four games in four days. “