It’s not the tournament they wanted to play in, but Kwamain Mitchell, Willie Reed and the Saint Louis University Billikens pummeled Indiana State Tuesday night in the first round of the College Basketball Invitational. Mitchell scored 19, including his first-ever collegiate dunk, while Reed added 17 in a 63-54 victory over the Sycamores.
The win puts the Bills (21-11) into next Monday’s quarterfinals against Green Bay-Wisconsin. The game will tip-off at 8 p.m. Mar. 22 at the Chaifetz Arena.
The Billikens (21-11) had hoped to receive an invitation into the National Invitation Tournament. When they did not, head coach Rick Majerus decided to take his team into the CBI after its parent company, the Gazelle Group, offered the Billikens a place in the 2012 O’Reilly Auto Parts CBE Classic in Kansas City, Mo. Syracuse and Kansas are also confirmed for the tournament.
“I was ready to play another game because the sting from the Rhode Island game really hurt,” Mitchell said. “When we came back, everyone was watching TV to see if we made the NIT, so we didn’t make it there but Coach [Majerus] told us we had a chance to play in the CBI. It was fun to go back out there.”
SLU hit the first seven of its eight shots to set the pace against Indiana State. They would never trail. Up 17-4, the Sycamores would get their chance to get back into the game; the Billikens tallied just one point on their next six possessions, but ISU tallied just four points in the stretch. The missed chance would be devastating. SLU caught fire again, scoring on four straight, going on a 10-3 spurt.
The Billikens led by as many as 18 in the first and led by 13 at the halfway mark. Reed scored 13 points on five-of-seven shooting in the first half, including sinking three of his four free throws. Mitchell and freshman forward Cody Ellis each added six points in the first half.
As the Billikens so often do, the shooting went cold in the second half. Indiana State took advantage this time, going on an 11-0 run, bringing the tally to 57-48. A free throw by Dwayne Lathan whittled one more point off the SLU advantage, but that was as close as the Sycamores would come.
Offensive rebounds on the next two possessions allowed SLU to drain precious time off the clock, and the Billikens converted six of eight free throws to build a 63-51 lead and render a late ISU three-pointer meaningless.
“I thought the guys responded well, especially psychologically,” Majerus said. “We came out with great energy and enthusiasm tonight … We did some things well,” Majerus said. “To shoot so poorly and to have such great looks and to still win is remarkable. We made some nice hustle plays and some nice defensive plays. They are a good club.”
Majerus also commented on the NIT’s snub of his squad. Though SLU beat Dayton twice and finished with three more wins in Atlantic 10 Conference play than Dayton, the NIT rewarded the Flyers with a No. 3 seed in the NIT, much to the bewilderment of Majerus and SLU fans.
“We’ve never been accepted as [legit],” he said. “We got the short end of the stick. We finished a definitive fourth in the sixth best league. There’s a prestige of a climbing program going into the NIT. If you go on the standards the committee uses, we go 11-5, since Ellis arrived, won eight of our last 10 … I am certainly puzzled by it.”
