St. Louis
- Thread starter cyclone111
- Start date
My daughter graduated from SLU this past Spring, so I had the opportunity to follow the Rick Majerus hire and attended a few of the home games the past few years. It was a big shock to the college basketball crowd when SLU got Majerus to ink a contract when he was the "hot" coach on every coaching vacancy for several years after his successful run at Utah. His background at Marquette drew him to a Metropolitan Catholic private setting and the promised new on campus facility was the "kicker". St. Louis metro area may be near the population of the State of Iowa with no NBA team and a NFL & MLB franchise, so the opportunity for Corporate and private funding for SLU are enormous. The St. Louis area is heavily catholic. Jamie Pollard started his AD career at SLU.
The SLU program was in negative limbo when Majerus came on board. Charlie Spoonhour was successful years ago but since, the program went in the tank. SLU had two locally grown guards that complimented each other the past two years for Majerus to work with and the team kept the scores low with a structured offense and tancious defense. I expect the same concept as Majerus builds the program. The A-10 is a tough conf. I saw them beat UMass last year early in the conf season and at that time the A-10 had 5 teams ranked in the top 25. Probably a little of that can be attributed to the influence of the Eastern press in rankings, because as the season wore on, most were eliminated from the rankings. But, this will be a good test to see how good the Clones are. SLU will be fundamentally sound and play good defense. And the game will be on the road without the Hilton Home cushion. I expect a grinder game and if the Clones win by double digits, it will raise my expectations.
The SLU program was in negative limbo when Majerus came on board. Charlie Spoonhour was successful years ago but since, the program went in the tank. SLU had two locally grown guards that complimented each other the past two years for Majerus to work with and the team kept the scores low with a structured offense and tancious defense. I expect the same concept as Majerus builds the program. The A-10 is a tough conf. I saw them beat UMass last year early in the conf season and at that time the A-10 had 5 teams ranked in the top 25. Probably a little of that can be attributed to the influence of the Eastern press in rankings, because as the season wore on, most were eliminated from the rankings. But, this will be a good test to see how good the Clones are. SLU will be fundamentally sound and play good defense. And the game will be on the road without the Hilton Home cushion. I expect a grinder game and if the Clones win by double digits, it will raise my expectations.
Hey all,
I am an ISU fan in St. Louis and my love for college basketball led me to get SLU season tickets when Rick Majerus was hired.
As for the Billikens, I would say that most of the posts are pretty accurate. They only have one Junior and he is injuried for the entire season. Kwamain Mitchell is a very smooth PG and is the heart and sole of the team. Willie Reed is their best post player, but is still working on his post moves. He gets a lot of his buckets off set ups from his guards. His FG% is crazy high, but that is because they are mostly dunks. He is a good shot blocker, but Brackin's ability to step out and hit that 15-18 footer should give him problems.
If Dendy is back, that will give them major problems. The other post starter is Brian Conklin. He is a white Kenny Pratt. Undersized, but plays tough. Conklin can't quite score like Pratt could, but his bruser mentality is what draws the comparison. Conklin will be over matched with either Dendy or Brackins.
SLU has no depth off the bench in the post. Cory Remekin is the only true big off the bench. Jon Smith is a true SF but is being forced to play some post due to lack of depth. They are both Frosh that are still a step slow (think frosh Jared Homan).
SLU's backcourt is as good as ISU's if not better. After the previously mentioned Mitchell, they have Kyle Cassity who is a glue type player that does a little bit of everything and a couple of nice looking freshman that can shoot the ball really well from the outside in Justin Jordan and Christian Salecich. Salecich is from Austrailia and was the "lesser" of two Austrailian players that were supposed to be headed to SLU.
SLU is going through a "Lucca" situation right now with thier other Aussie recruit, Cody Ellis. Ellis is a pure stud that has an NBA future, but the NCAA, in thier infinite wisdom, is holding him up over one class that was pass/fail. It is funny, being a fan of both of these teams, I see the sames posts that I saw with Lucca. How the NCAA wouldn't be doing this if we were UNC or Duke and that they don't care about programs like ours.
Anyway, this is probably TMI, but SLU fans are still hopeful that Ellis will be able to play in the 2nd semester and if he does, they will be a much better team.
I offered my buddy that I split my season tickets with to give him SLU and 10 points and he wouldn't take it.
One last note, SLU was amongst the top 10 in the country at defending the 3 last year and they continue to do a good job in that area this season.
Hope that helps.
I am an ISU fan in St. Louis and my love for college basketball led me to get SLU season tickets when Rick Majerus was hired.
As for the Billikens, I would say that most of the posts are pretty accurate. They only have one Junior and he is injuried for the entire season. Kwamain Mitchell is a very smooth PG and is the heart and sole of the team. Willie Reed is their best post player, but is still working on his post moves. He gets a lot of his buckets off set ups from his guards. His FG% is crazy high, but that is because they are mostly dunks. He is a good shot blocker, but Brackin's ability to step out and hit that 15-18 footer should give him problems.
If Dendy is back, that will give them major problems. The other post starter is Brian Conklin. He is a white Kenny Pratt. Undersized, but plays tough. Conklin can't quite score like Pratt could, but his bruser mentality is what draws the comparison. Conklin will be over matched with either Dendy or Brackins.
SLU has no depth off the bench in the post. Cory Remekin is the only true big off the bench. Jon Smith is a true SF but is being forced to play some post due to lack of depth. They are both Frosh that are still a step slow (think frosh Jared Homan).
SLU's backcourt is as good as ISU's if not better. After the previously mentioned Mitchell, they have Kyle Cassity who is a glue type player that does a little bit of everything and a couple of nice looking freshman that can shoot the ball really well from the outside in Justin Jordan and Christian Salecich. Salecich is from Austrailia and was the "lesser" of two Austrailian players that were supposed to be headed to SLU.
SLU is going through a "Lucca" situation right now with thier other Aussie recruit, Cody Ellis. Ellis is a pure stud that has an NBA future, but the NCAA, in thier infinite wisdom, is holding him up over one class that was pass/fail. It is funny, being a fan of both of these teams, I see the sames posts that I saw with Lucca. How the NCAA wouldn't be doing this if we were UNC or Duke and that they don't care about programs like ours.
Anyway, this is probably TMI, but SLU fans are still hopeful that Ellis will be able to play in the 2nd semester and if he does, they will be a much better team.
I offered my buddy that I split my season tickets with to give him SLU and 10 points and he wouldn't take it.
One last note, SLU was amongst the top 10 in the country at defending the 3 last year and they continue to do a good job in that area this season.
Hope that helps.
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With how Colorado has been playing in Maui this week, you could see a "changing in the guard" for last place in the B12....and Nebraska is calling for it this season. (Where they belong.)
Nevertheless, St. Louis beating a B12 team should get our guys focused for that showdown on Friday night. We need to come out sharp and do all the little things better to get the win. I see this being a tight contest....but with the Clones finishing well.
I want ND too on Saturday. Will be a nice test for this team....but will give us nice pub since The Brack vs. Harangody will be huge in the eyes of the media. A win there....1. Helps our NCAA resume early 2. A possible T25 ranking to follow.
BA-BA-BA-BAAAAH!!!
GO CYCLONES!!!
I watched them play, they have a pretty good point guard, he looks strong and is quick, they have some kid who is pretty good cant remember his name but i think he is a guard or a forward? Anyways he can shoot the three pretty well. St. Louis likes to shoot the three, but i think brackins, gilstrap, and dendy will have a hayday down low
I am sure this has already been talked about somewhere on this site, but does anyone know if any of the games this weekend are televised?
Sounds like we need to guard the perimiter and have Brackins or Gilstrap camp out in the lane.
If we can contest shots and rebound half way decent, we should have a decent chance.
Interesting story on Majaris. Interesting a Cathloic boys fit in so well with the Moormans in Utah.
If we can contest shots and rebound half way decent, we should have a decent chance.
Interesting story on Majaris. Interesting a Cathloic boys fit in so well with the Moormans in Utah.
The Big Ten Network is picking up the Northwestern-Notre Dame game. There is no coverage for our game with St. Louis.
If we were to face Northwestern in the next round, there's a decent chance the BTN will pick up that game. If we get Notre Dame, who knows, but right now there is nothing.
I think it will be a close game. Majerus is a great coach. His teams always play great defense and he does a masterful job of exploiting other teams weaknesses. I am happy to see he is not announcing games anymore. The way he drooled over Adam Haluska when doing Iowa games made me literally turn down the volume at times.
