Bay Area Billiken

Agreed for sure. Xavier was a perennial thorn in SLU's side in the Rich Grawer Era in the old MCC. X used to have an utterly biased "play by play" announcer that tried to make fun of the Billikens in the early MCC days. SLU was just recovering then from the darkness of the Ron Ekker Era. When SLU improved and turned into a contender, X was still the roadblock standing in the way. Conference tourney finals were in Indianapolis and Dayton. Heartbreakers were the norm. Some very good SLU teams, one that won 27 games, was relegated to the NIT. In SLU's last year in the MCC, the pro-Xavier crowd in Dayton taunted the Billikens with chants of "MCC, MCC." SLU was leaving for the Great Midwest. But it was not long before Xavier and Dayton bolted themselves for the A-10. A good rivalry with Xavier has been restored. How sweet it is to sweep Xavier.

Contrary to Miller's purported claims, SLU actually ran a little today and scored on some fast breaks. I don't know what game Miller was watching. His team played a lousy, lackluster game, and the better team won in a game that was not close.

Agreed. SLU played a fine game and deserves some credit in the local daily.

I think it was a mix of good SLU defense and poor X shooting. X really struggled on offense, missing shots, throwing the ball away, etc., but a lot of that had to do with SLU's defense. When X was unable to hit the 3's, SLU was able to pack the inside. SLU looked much better on offense for much of the game. The ball movement was often quick and crisp, especially when SLU put some distance between itself and X in the first half.

Bravo, Billikens! That was a very impressive victory over a good team from Xavier. The game was on Fox Sports Ohio. The crowd chanting, "SLU, SLU ..." came through loud and clear on the broadcast. Luke Meyer is a gamer; the guy simply makes things happen. He gets those loose balls. Kevin Lisch, Tommie Liddell, Ian Vouyoukas, Anthony Drejaj, Dewayne Polk, V. Newborne, B. Husak, Danny Brown all of them get credit for this great team victory. We are 12-9, 6-3 in the A-10 with this young team. There is hope. This team is going to get better too. The team could make a run at the Big Dance as soon as this year, and certainly the NIT is well within reach.

If these guys can shoot, if they are zone busters, then they will be the answer to today's question. Now what about power forward?

The only point is that SLU needs scorers. Frankly what SLU needs is a zone buster. Remember the great Marquette teams under Al McGuire always had that zone buster, Gary Rosenberg, as I recall.

Can an offense be altered at this point in the season? It seems that the opposition knows what SLU is going to do. Some of the traditionally better teams in the A-10, like St. Joe's and Temple play those tough East Coast zones. If Ian Vouyoukas is completely surrounded, can something be done to run a different offense? Or is it too late this year? And are players like Kevin Lisch, Tommie Liddell, and even Luke Meyer being held back by the offensive system in place? What happened to Danny Brown? He was hitting some 3's a while ago. Frankly, I really don't care if SLU wins 50-48, as long as SLU wins. But even the defensive minded Billikens cannot win scoring 39 points.

Remember the old saying, "Those who do not learn from history are destined to repeat it." Hopefully, Dustin Maguire will be able to hit outside shots and score at SLU. See Ace's post. We need someone that can shoot. It is not all about defense. Gonzaga proves that night after night.

Adam Morrison is not the best on defense either. Yet, we saw him score 41 points on Monday night against USF. Would SLU have passed on him too because of his defensive shortcomings? I want SLU to win. SLU is my double alma mater, and I will always root for the Billikens. I know that defense is important. But so is offense, perhaps even more so. You can't win if you can't score. That is my point.

Hardly. I want SLU to win. I think a recruiting mistake was made.

At the risk of incurring the wrath of this board, two words are offered: Blake Ahearn

How about Mike Martz? Seriously, at the risk of incurring the wrath of this board, 2 words are offered: Blake Ahearn. He had 23 points in last night's Missouri State loss at Bradley. A friend who was there told me that he kept Missouri State in the game. Ahearn is averaging 18.1 PPG, shooting 45.3% overall, 41.1% on 3 pointers, and 94.1% at the free throw line. And MVC naysayers to the contrary, the MVC has the 5th highest conference RPI, so Ahearn has not been doing this against chopped liver. I know Ahearn's supposed limitations have been debated ad nauseum on this board. But the guy can score, and it looks like Soderberg and SLU made a big mistake in letting him go. When SLU scores 39 points and cannot hit the proverbial broad side of a barn, perhaps it would have been nice to have someone who can shoot the ball. After all, the game of basketball ultimately boils down to making baskets.

I think you are right about Vouyoukas being out of the game. That likely forced Coach Soderberg's hand. I am just very pleased and pleasantly surprised by this big win. Everyone, including the Coach, deserves a lot a credit.

I listened to the Xavier broadcast for the second half. Byron Larkin was doing the color commentary. I don't like the idea of taking the air out of the ball with 5 1/2 minutes left and going into the stall, mitigated only by the shot clock. However, tonight the strategy worked, and we will gladly take the win, irrespectve of the circumstances. And the team deserves a lot of credit for this very big and important road win over a very good and probable NCAA Tournament team.

go to the Billikens for the biggest win of the year. Xavier was very likely about to be ranked in the Top 25.

Rich Grawer can hardly be considered to have been a failure at SLU. He saved the SLU basketball program. He had 3 NIT teams, two of which were the NIT runner-ups. One of his teams won 27 games; another won 25 games. I could go on and on about how bad things were with the SLU basketball program before Grawer took over. Suffice it to say that we were at rock bottom. Younger fans really have no idea how bad it was in those days. We actually lost a home game to McKendree College. The Craig Upchurch fiasco probably cost SLU and Grawer a trip or two to the NCAA. You are right in that at that time SLU was in the MCC (now known as the Horizon League), a mid-major one bid league. And the perennial roadblock was Xavier. SLU had one good big, Anthony Bonner. Xavier always had two, one of which was Tyrone Hill. If SLU had two bigs (i.e. Upchurch to go with Bonner) perhaps SLU could have beaten Xavier. And Charlie Spoonhour, a good coach, took two teams comprised of many Grawer recruits (Erwin Claggett, Scott Highmark) to two NCAA's. Many thought it was unfair when Grawer was dismissed after a 5-23 year in the first year of the Great Midwest, a much harder league than the MCC, a year in which Grawer was playing those freshman recruits.

There are certainly similarities. First, let me say that Rich Grawer was the saviour of the St. Louis U. basketball program. There can be no doubt whatsoever about that. My four undergraduate years at SLU coincided with the "Ron Ekker Era." We were positively at rock bottom at the end of those four years. A game against #1 ranked DePaul drew something like 3,200 fans. We actually lost a home game to McKendree College. There was talk that St. Louis U. would drop down to Division 2. Then Rich Grawer was hired. And Billiken Basketball underwent a rebirth, a veritable Renaissance. But Grawer did have that tendency to yank players after one mistake. The year after Anthony Bonner graduated, Grawer tried to play an up tempo attack ala the then Loyola-Marymount powerhouse teams. That didn't last very long, as Grawer soon reverted to the old half court, slow down game. The similarities to what Brad Soderberg said he was going to do this year are there. What happened to wanting to run, to play up tempo? Why do these players have to be yanked after one mistake? We are all human. We all make mistakes.

Agreed. This business about a player making one mistake and he gets yanked has simply got to go. That is not the modern game. It does not work. It makes the players play too tentative, afraid of making that mistake. We don't need that anymore at St. Louis U.

Man, that was exciting. My 16 year old son and I simultaneously shouted for joy out here on the West Coast when Liddell's jumper went through the net. The game was on the A-10 Network and shown on ESPN+. The announcers were complimentary of the Billikens, especially Ian Vouyoukas, Kevin Lisch, and Tommie Liddell, as well as Coach Soderberg. The analyst thought SLU was underrated in the pre-season A-10 prediction. This A-10 is beginning to grow on me. This is an underrated league with some fine players. And with the A-10 TV package, SLU is getting some good exposure in other parts of the country. As for Family Arena, on TV the court at least looked a bit less embarrassing than 2 years ago in the NIT game when the St. Louis Swarm bumble bee was still painted on the court. But those 3 three point lines were still confusing tonight. And the green paint on the court looked out of place. It looked like a good crowd was present. The Billiken Band could be heard during the timeouts. Bully for the Billikens. That was a very good win for SLU over a pretty good team.

Based upon the needs of this year's team, I would say Erwin Claggett. No team would try to zone us if EC was out there popping 3's. That team, which included Scott Highmark and H Waldman could really shoot the ball. Otherwise, Anthony Bonner, a great power forward, has never really been replaced at SLU.

#3 SLU 75 Mizzou 72 at The Dome in Lorenzo Romar and Snyder's first years at their respective schools. We were surrounded by Mizzou fans, but we beat the Tigers that day.

#1 SLU beats Minnesota in first round of NCAA Tournament in Baltimore. That was the team when Erwin Claggett and Scott Highmark were Seniors. This poster's 4 undergraduate years at SLU coincided with the Ron Ekker Era. Thus, I almost could not believe what I was watching that day in Baltimore after flying all night from the West Coast to get there. It was like Heaven on Earth. Many were talking about the Billikens at Baltimore's Inner Harbor after that victory. #2 SLU beats UMass in first round of NCAA Tournament at Georgia Dome in Atlanta. Larry Hughes took over that game at crunch time. That win was very exciting too.

Did the Iowa football team have a layover in St. Louis on its way to the Bowl game in Tampa? Did they bring the zebras with them from Iowa City or Keokuk? This poster is used to watching the finesse, touch foul Pac-10, which is one extreme, and a bad one at that. Then you see a Big Ten football team playing basketball by setting illegal moving screens, hitting the opposition on layups, and witnessing first hand a wrestling takedown against SLU's center that was incredibly called "traveling" on IV, and you truly have to wonder. If Iowa had been playing that game in Haas Pavilion in Berkeley, half the Iowa team would have fouled out. This being said, SLU still would have won had it hit a few more shots and shot better at the free throw line.

JJ does appear to have a nice shooting touch. Can he shoot the 3, or is his range in the 12-15 foot range?