In the biggest offensive showing of the 2010-11 season, the Saint Louis University men’s basketball team gave up a late seven-point lead to La Salle, falling 78-77. Five Billikens were double figures, a first since February 2009, with Brian Conklin leading the way with 18 points; Kyle Cassity downed 14 while Dwayne Evans, Mike McCall and Jordair Jett added 10 apiece.
The loss almost assures that head coach Rick Majerus will record his first losing season of his 25-year coaching career. With just seven games remaining in the season, SLU, currently 8-15 overall, would have to win-out and win two post-season games in the Atlantic 10 Tournament to finish at .500. With games against Richmond (Saturday, Feb. 12 on ESPN2) and league-leading Xavier, it is a tall task for the young Billikens.
Currently, Majerus’ worst record has a head coach is 14-14. That mark occurred twice: in 1987-88 at Ball State and 1993-94 at Utah. His worst record as SLU’s head coach is 16-15 in 2007-08, his first year on the job.
The loss also leaves SLU in a perplexing position in conference play. To get to Atlantic City, home of the tournament, SLU must finish in the top 10 in the A-10. They currently sit at No. 11 with a 3-7 record. If the post-season were to begin today, the Billikens would first travel to Rhode Island, the No. 6 seed, where they would have to win to advance to the Boardwalk.
“We needed this one. This was a big game for us,” Cassity said. “The road doesn’t get any easier from here, but we didn’t come out, execute and get [the win].”
SLU shot a blistering 56.7% in the first half and an impressive 45.2% in the second half en route to their season-high 77 points. Offense, surprisingly, was the least of Majerus’ worries.
An astonishing collapse of SLU’s defense in the second half gave La Salle the lead with just 19 seconds on the clock and ultimately gave the game to La Salle (12-13, 4-6). After fighting hard in the first half against the Explorers, the Billikens managed to wrestle a seven-point lead before letting it evaporate in a matter of two minutes.
A free-throw shot by Conklin at 4:03 gave the Bills their largest lead of the game. Earl Pettis and Ruben Guillandeaux made back-to-back three-point shots to pull La Salle within one. A La Salle foul sent Conklin to the line for two more, putting SLU up 77-74 with just over two minutes to play. The Explorers hit two free-throws, and Guillandeaux tipped in a layup late to give La Salle its first lead in over 14 minutes of play.
SLU had the ball and the possession arrow but could not get a good look off a high ball screen. Evans tried to force a layup that went out of bounds. The resulting play, with just two-tenths of a second on the clock, was a Cassity lob to Remekun, who could not put the ball in the basket.
The result was a frustrated and furious Majerus.
“Who is our go-to guy? You tell me,” he said. “We can’t play anyone else because this is all we got. Rob [Loe] didn’t show up, so we are playing 5-on-4 defensively, and I told him that. There’s a reason why you don’t want to play freshman. Mike [McCall] is worried about his offense and not his defense … and I have to kiss Kyle [Cassity]’s ass to shoot.”
Cassity, who also appeared exacerbated following the game, pointed to the lack of defense as the fault to SLU’s loss. “We didn’t defend well tonight. Anytime a team ends up with 78 points, you’re probably not going to beat them.
“[But] we can’t let this one stick with us because Richmond is a good team. We’ll watch tape on this and then try to forget about it. This [game] wasn’t a good one,” Cassity said.
