DAGS'12

Dear ’05, Although we are daily readers of the blog, over served, seniors, and have been to as many games as our lives would permit, being as rowdy as was appropriate… and often very inappropriate, we have not yet met. We respect all that your bring to Billiken Nation. What we are asking for is simple: we want to help bring the flags in to the arena. We heard that you are the guy who coordinates the whole process and knew no other medium by which to get in contact with you other than Billikens.com. Billikens basketball has meant more to us than anything else in our college careers… including our general education. The sacred right of bringing in the flags should not be taken lightly. If you want somebody who would casually wave around the flag like a middle school marching band… we are not your guys. If you want grown men in white women’s leisure suits who, upon the last fleeting minutes of their lives will reflect on their time carrying out the age old tradition of SAINT LOUIS flag carrying... WE ARE YOUR GUYS. We understand if you don’t see this or have no control over the situation. But if you do, know that it would make our fleeting time here complete. Whether you see this or not… fate will or will not bring us together. Ad Majerus Dei Gloriam DAGS’12 and Billsfan’12 file:///Users/jaredfechter/Desktop/IMAG0241.jpg

I hadn't seen any topics started about it yet but maybe I was mistaken. Does anyone have any information as to whether the Dayton game will be on T.V. or streaming anywhere?

I'm so pumped to see this game. I have heard a lot about the pit and you tubed a little about it. It seems they get pretty personal in their jabs against players. A simple google search for the Lobos would give some pretty good ammunition against a certain leader on our team. I am almost excited to see it. KM will probably face a lot of adversity from opposing fans... but of anyone on this team I see him just saying, 'Alright time to put the team on my back and go ham'. This is the first real legitimate road game with a crazy crowd we will play and I think our boys have been coasting and are down to go hard. I'm so pumped. KM 30+ pts Win by 12

I hope Oklahoma kills them, and then we beat a Big 12 team by over 10. That would just be awesome.

I have been a Bills fan for my whole life growing up in St. Louis and going to games with my Grandpa, who's had season tickets for 35 years. Now I am a senior here and have watched this team develop and always knew we had so much promise. I am so so excited that we are finally getting national attention. I am just desperately pleading to the basketball gods to let our boys take this national praise and use it to rise up to their fullest and dominate instead of crumbling under the pressure. We are holding them to higher expectations than ever before, which in so many ways is just awesome. What a great season this will be. I'm going to chalk a noticeable drop in GPA to Billiken success. How I am supposed to write a research paper and study for a test tomorrow when the Bills are getting so much love. We may need to brew some more Billiken Kool Aid and clear some room in the bandwagon and make room in the Fetz for the rest of Saint Louis.

Can someone explain what year these recruits are, when they would be coming in and what not? I was under the impression we will be losing 2 and gaining 2 for next year. Is someone else leaving or are these guys for 2013? Also, if Fotu signs, I'm proposing a mandatory rat tail shaving upon arrival in the USA.

First time I ever got to heckle a player in German, and I loved it. But I must say, I wouldn't be upset if Breunig was a Billiken. He looks like a pretty good talent.

I don't know a ton about the coaching staff and I know some people on this board have mentioned that it will hurt our recruiting with new, older guys. However, when thinking in a present POV, these guys have been around the block. For a team that already has so much promise, its great that you have other coaches that have that head coach mentality and know what needs to be done. I heard from one of the walk-ons, who said Crews is just a tough dude who doesn't let any bogus happen. He worked under Knight for so many years. It could be a great attitude and intensity to bring to the bench. Whitesell looks like a pretty mild mannered guy who does a lot of instructing on the court. RM just sits in the corner, buddha like and concentrates on all the strategy of the game. I'm just saying they seem to be a good compliment of styles along with a ton of experience, that not many mistakes are going to go unaddressed. I would love to see some of these guys take extended contracts for recruiting, but I am very confident they have more than enough to get the job done this year.

Not anything too important to report from Fan Fest. KM was out pretty early with a slight injury but seems to be fine. BC and KC had night class. I have to say I am so excited about this years team. Everyone looked healthy, fit and ready for a great season. We are so deep. I think the reason there were not too many glaring observations is because for every offensive player there was a close to as good defensive player guarding him. My friend and I were debating who the starting 5 would be and we never really could figure it out exactly because our 6,7,8,9 men are just so solid. Here are some thoughts.. Dwayne (RM keeps calling him Johnson) Evans- is going to be a beast. Is going to dunk all the time. I'm saying possible 3rd or 2nd team all conference. KM, MM, JJ- going to be one of the deepest set of guards in the conference. They just take it to the hole whenever they want. JB- I think will turn it up later in the season. Has been out of playing attitude for a while but has a lot of promise. Needs a little more killer instinct from what I saw in the scrimmage. RL- Looked very fit and I think is going to improve dramatically this year if he can consistently hit that 3 ball. I think the coaches should prepare like 10 hours of Dirk game film and just tell him to model his game after him and he could be a heck of a player. He still needs a better back to the basket set of moves. JM- Will be a good compliment to Loe because he is a similar build but plays like a classic 5 man. Will probably be able to teach Rob a few things in that department but probably will not make a big impact early. The Greek- didn't look half bad but I expect the least from him of anyone. GG- Just a goof but I think will bring a muscular, bruiser, tough-guy presence to the team that we needed. Will get so many boards. However, it may take years to develop some skills. CR- Looked more athletic, muscular and assertive than last year. I think this may be a good year for him where he starts to be a leader. Maybe not a huge dominant force but good enough that you can't leave him unguarded. Probably going to throw down some filthy dunks as coach said he had a 30 inch vertical which doesn't hurt. CE- Looks healthy and made a few good plays. Still needs to play more assertive and aggressive so I'm not sure about him. But, if he played with the fire he did freshman year, he may be an off the bench player, and that is a heck of a sub to throw in. Not sure if I'm missing anybody but... Go Bills. I'm well hydrated off that blue cool-aid. Its going to be a great year.

Haven't seen this video posted yet of drew, but he seems like a solid get to me. He is definitely an area we needed to address, a mid sized cutter/slasher. You also have to love the quote he made saying he wanted to win championships... loving the attitude Jared.

Super excited about this commitment and for the season on a whole next year. Just the fact that the one video had him dunking in a game makes me happy, because I am pretty confident that I have not seen Conklin dunk in his time as a Billiken. We need a rebounder and someone who can get those rebounds and put them back up strong. This is an article from the end of his '09 season after he had a 41 point game, and although it may not be as competitive of a team as his prep team was, that is still very encouraging. http://www.nbebasketball.com/w3/2009-0305/class-of-2011-intro-grandy-glaze/ He wants "most importantly, a place were people will work with me and push me everyday so I can become a better player each day. I do not want to go to a school that just lets players slack, I want a coach that’s gonna bust my butt.” ... you have to love that mentality. Welcome to Saint Louis Grandy, we need you to be a monster out there. “I dont think I’m the next anyone, I want to be, and I will be, the FIRST Grandy Glaze“.

It said Jett Ellis Eckerle Cassity and Conklin are starting. Also the pregame college announcers said "I expect us to absolutely annihilate this weaker team". No respect for the Bills.

One of the uglier second halves I've ever seen. Cody looked very poor. He has to get tougher, stronger and start to find his shot or I don't want him to be on the floor at all. Made me so happy to see Paul play as well as he did.

If you have student tickets you use your slu id. If you don't then you have to get them at the door.

I am pretty sure that at the dinner with Coach for the student season ticket holders last Thursday that Rick described Barnett as a future all conference type player and went on to say he doesn't say that likely. He could possibly surprise a lot of SLU fans with how good he is next year.

Just out of curiosity, is this for sure or are you speculating about Jon Smith red shirting? I was just surprised because I hadn't heard it and in my opinion I think he will absolutely be the most improved player on the team. He is so athletic and has so much potential. If he worked real hard in the off season and got a mid range jumper and some dribbling ability I think he could be pretty unbelievable next year.

livin' la vida loca by Ricky Martin or better yet "Still DRE" by Snoop Dog

I am studying abroad in Ireland right now and I just walked into our kitchen and saw on the TV people playing basketball which was weird enough in Europe but then a whole section came up on Rob Loe and it was all about the Nike Summit. They had 2-3 minutes of clips of him. He looks phenomenal. It didn't seem like he did much back to the basket from what I saw but there were at least 3 clips of him driving from the 3 point line and dunking amidst traffic. I would kill to see him in a Bills uniform.

Do we have any most recent updates on Loe? When is the point when he has to make a decision?

I have seen that on a couple boards. When and how did that nickname originate?

I am a SLU student living in St. Louis and a huge bills fan checking the blog 5 times a day at least but I could not attend because of a family christmas party that'd been planned for months. It killed me to not be there and especially listening on the radio and trying to figure out why there were audible chants against the bills. That being said it frustrates me to hear everything chalked up as student apathy. My parents and my grandparents went to SLU and I just know how much the demographic has changed in the past years. Biondi has transformed the university from a more locally attended school to a much broader range of people that go here which is great. I am pretty sure my class is around 60% out of state, not counting the amount of people from the state who are not local. And yes there are a good amount of locals who live here and just didnt show up, but as in my circumstance and I know a couple of close friends who had weddings or other events preventing attendance it may not be student apathy. I believe completely that if it were not on break this would not happen. It is part of our school becoming a more nationally recognized school. I have friends from all over the US where as when my parents went here my understanding is that it was much more local. I can tell just from my year as a freshman compared to now students are only getting more and more excited about it and as we get better, the buzz will only pick up. I won't reiterate too much but I think a lot of this is the administrations stupid idea for the student section. It was just dumb and I recorded the game and I had to turn it off midway through because it was disgusting to see willy get cheered against while shooting a freethrow. I am also not trying to say that our students are perfect, just trying to bring up a new point about our student body. We have had great attendance for most every game during school so far and I think you will see a return to great student attendance when school starts back up. I think someone said earlier that SLU was 50% from st. louis but I think that statement is very flawed. I think that MSU has far and above more students from St. Louis than SLU was making the advertising mistake ever worse. Just making a plee for the die hard alumni (like my grandpa, 35 year holder) to not lose all faith in the students because as a student I can tell you tonight was not all student apathy and in the near soon future these games (for sure during school) will always be packed with students.

"Our philosophy is, problems create opportunities," Majerus said. "This is an opportunity for someone else. No one knows how someone will play until the game unfolds. We had a plan for Kwamain being out 10 minutes, but not a plan for a game or two games." Rick Majerus in today's newspaper.

I don't think it is any disrespect and I understand that your guys are just as big but I know our team and in my opinion our big men are our heart and soul of our team. KM is the brains of the operation and will be a super tough loss, but our frontcourt is the passion of the team (also the two most experienced although that doesn't say much) which is important in this situation because my guess is that they are gonna get super pumped and relish an opportunity with our leader gone to step up and show Majerus that they can lead the team too. Our backcourt is a huge 'if'. They may also relish an opportunity or just really throw it away. This will be a big game for them and for evaluating our team. For this I am so excited. Also, as to whether or not we are predicted underdogs, I think, and hope, our team will play with the 'nothing to lose' attitude of underdogs coming from the mentality that, as ive been speaking of, our captain not being present and so we are at a disadvantage so someone needs to step up.

In a way im very frustrated because if we had KM I am very confident we would win. However, I also kind of pumped because this is everyone on the teams chance to see who has the balls to step up. I predict BC almost getting pissed from the start and throwing around whoever that 6'6 dude is that guarding him. I think CS will step up, Femi will play decent. What it revolves around is Reed. I could see him seeing this as his time to shine and just going nuts and dominating. I think this will be my decision day on KC. Sometimes he frustrates me so much because I know he could be good but he plays like a freshman in high school. I'm hoping this is the game where he comes out and says I KM is out and I need to step up. If we win tomorrow, which I think there is a chance but a lot of if's, then that will show unbelievably well for our future.