Last Year: 13-20; 5-13 in the Atlantic 10 Conference, No Postseason
Head Coach: Josh Schertz (First Year; had been 66-40 in three seasons at Indiana State, with no NCAA Tournament appearances
Projected Starting Lineup
G Isaiah Swope – 5’10”, 175 Senior
G Kobe Johnson – 6’4″, 200 Senior
G Gibson Jimerson – 6’5″, 215 5th-year Senior
F Kalu Anya – 6’8″, 225 Junior
C Robbie Avila – 6’10”, 240 Junior
Experienced Reserves
G Josiah Dotzler – 6’3″, 185 Sophomore
G Larry Hughes II – 6’4″, 190 Junior
G Kellen Thames – 6’6″, 210 Sophomore
F Kilian Brockhoff – 6’9″, 230 Sophomore
F AJ Casey – 6’9″, 225 Junior
Freshmen
W Amari McCottry – 6’5″, 205
F Dylan Warlick – 6’5″, 210
F Max Pikaar – 6’11”, 200
It’s difficult to pick exactly which moment was the lowest point in a 13-20 stinker of a season for Saint Louis last winter. It may have been in mid-January, when former head coach Travis Ford, in his rovings onto the court got a hand in the face of Dayton wing Koby Brea as though he was a sixth defender. Brea coolly drilled the triple, anyway. The eventual Flyers win pushed Saint Louis to 8-9, and from there, the bottom fell out.
In somewhat related news, Saint Louis has a new guy roaming the sidelines this season, and he’s caused quite a bit of excitement already in Billiken land.
Josh Schertz was a rising star in the Division II ranks just four years ago, and his ascension has been meteoric since moving up a level. He quickly turned Indiana State into a 32-win juggernaut and one of the most skilled and entertaining outfits in the country. In Schertz’s third season, the Sycamores won a Missouri Valley Conference regular season crown and played a great game against equally-hot Seton Hall in last season’s NIT championship game. Now, he’s made the move from Terre Haute, IN, to Saint Louis; and he’s brought some friends along to jump-start the Billikens.
Robbie Avila and Isaiah Swope are a pair of All-MVC performers who were instrumental to Schertz’s success at ISU. Now, they will join with Gibson Jimerson – SLU’s all-time leader in made three’s – to form the backbone of an Atlantic 10 contender. The offensive system Schertz employs is all about movement without the ball, smart passing, and an absolute deluge of triples. With Jimerson, Swope, and Avila to lead the charge, these Bills should be able to light up the scoreboard – and make this campaign a whole lot more enjoyable for the home fans.
In many ways, Avila – or Cream Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Blurred, College Jokic…his nicknames are almost as abundant as the dimes he drops – will be this team’s conductor.
In many ways, Avila – or Cream Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Blurred, College Jokic…his nicknames are almost as abundant as the dimes he drops – will be this team’s conductor. He possesses a great many skills, and in Schertz, Avila has found the right coach to maximize his unique abilities. With dangerous range as a shooter and a smooth repertoire closer to the rim, Avila is growing into a complete scoring big. He can back an opponent in from either side of the lane with precise, patient post-ups, and Avila has shown soft hands and a willingness to go straight to the bucket when his teammates hit him with good passes.
He tends to hit triples in clusters, and Avila’s flair for the dramatic showed up in big moments throughout his breakout sophomore campaign. When the Sycamores struggled to put Tennessee State away around the holiday break in December, it was in part because Avila hadn’t scored in the first half. He went wild with 18 points over the final 20 minutes, though, along with a career-best 14 boards and five helpers. Avila had 35 on 13/19 shooting inside the arc against Evansville, and he showed out with a couple of his biggest performances when matched against established star big men. Early in the season, Avila posted 27/8/8 again Rice’s do-it-all Max Fiedler, and when ISU met Utah and its all-Pac 12 star Brendan Carlson in the NIT semifinals, Avila put up 26 points and 10 rebounds.
He posted six double-doubles, went for 25+ points a half dozen times, and Avila handed out at least five assists in 16 different contests. As a great option to roll or pop after setting a screen, Avila threatens the opposing defense all over the halfcourt. With his full compliment of ways to attack a defense, Avila averaged the third-most points per possession as a ‘roll’ man of any player in the country last year, per Synergy Sports. Once he’s got the opposition worried about all of that, Avila picks them apart with his terrific passing. His 24.2% assist rate ranked seventh in the MVC, and Avila’s cool operation of the offense forces opposing bigs to bring all of their awareness to try and stop him.
By adding Swope, a star scorer who already has a very comfortable rapport with Avila, Schertz is expecting his offense to continue humming. The sharpshooting Swope is a dynamic scorer who can set his team on a run or break the opponent’s will with a flurry of triples in seemingly no time at all. He made the jump from Southern Indiana look smooth in joining the Sycamores last fall, and Swope’s ability to read defenses and the situation as it evolves allow him to make an exciting impact. Swope’s combination of shot-making and playmaking is what Schertz wants at the controls of his offense. He makes up for his lack of great size by establishing a constant threat from the outside. Last year, Swope attempted double-digit treys a dozen different times; and on 15 occasions, he sank at least four deep heaves in a game.
“The first thing that pops out to me with Isaiah is his toughness and courage,” Schertz said. “What he did for our team at Indiana State last year was one of the most selfless and remarkable displays of those traits I have ever witnessed.” Dealing with a bum knee for much of the season, Swope faltered a bit down the stretch of a 37-game campaign. In addition to the sore leg, increasingly intense attention from opponents helped his 3FG rate in a dip to 28.6% from mid-February through the end of the season. Still, Swope scored 34 points combined in the NIT semifinals and championship. Paired on the perimeter with the larger Jimerson, the hope among SLU fans is that opponents will have to pick their poison – and often get picked apart from the land of trey, regardless.
Already one of the most accomplished shooters in Atlantic 10 history, Jimerson is an 1,825-point scorer and would be a featured weapon on just about any team in the country. His decision to return to the Billikens after exploring the transfer portal this spring gives Saint Louis as good a trio of proven scorers as you’ll find outside of the power conferences.
Last season, Jimerson grew his game more than ever before. With outstanding point guard Yuri Collins out of eligibility, Jimerson had to create more of his own shots last year. Given his reputation and the defensive attention he draws, Jimerson also became more of a playmaker for his teammates, and he has become more assertive in using his dribble to attack closeouts and cash in mid-range shots. His shooting splits suffered a bit from all of the attention he received – especially late in the year, as things got tough for the team. Now, though, Jimerson should be seeing comparatively wide-open spaces, and he figures to make familiar foes pay. Going back to his excellent Division II teams at Lincoln Memorial University, Schertz has preferred to have a variety of capable ballhandlers who can score on the floor at all times. Jimerson has shown the skills to flourish in an offense like this, and may be in line for some serious hardware by the end of his final college season.
The team’s other two key returnees will battle some new faces in what has become a race for backcourt minutes. Larry Hughes, Jr, enjoyed his best year last winter, and offers some skills which Schertz can make use of. A taller guard who has become comfortable on or off the ball, Hughes is also a solid defender and a 36.5% career shooter from distance. Kellen Thames is an even bigger guard who likes to get downhill and doesn’t mind mixing it up around the lane. He finished third on the team in both steals and offensive rebounds last year despite playing just under 20 minutes per game, and Thames was just two putback tries off of the team lead. With plenty of deep balls sure to be missed among the makes this year, Thames will be able to make great continued use of his propensity for attacking inside. If he can improve his shooting stroke (54.5% at the charity stripe last year), Thames could grow into a large piece of Schertz’s rotation.
New to the equation are young Josiah Dotzler and veteran Kobe Johnson, who brings 92 games (34 starts) of experience in the Big 12 to Saint Loius. A Creighton signee out of high school, Dotzler didn’t get many minutes to hone his craft on a veteran team looking for another run deep into March. So, the young Nebraskan has hopped the Arch and will get more on-the-job training with the Billikens. A slick lefty who has shown the ability to make things happen all over the halfcourt, Dotzler will provide Schertz with another offense-starter. At the best moments of his prep career, Dotzler became known for his ability to heat up ftom the outside and lead runs; and for his selective use of the dribble and pace to direct the game once he’d shown his scoring. That’s just the sort of play that his new coach would love to see from Dotzler.
Johnson, who arrives at SLU after three years at West Virginia, took a significant step forward last year. After previously playing a backup role, Johnson stepped up at start 26 games last year as the wheels threatened to come off in Morgantown. As a contrast to some of the other guards Schertz has added, Johnson is generally most comfortable around the lane. He gets downhill effectively and can score in isolation around the painted area, though his percentage around the rim last year was inconsistent with the Mountaineers often trying anything for a bucket. With better balance around him – and more shooters to feed – Johnson should get to play a bit more of his game this year
A year ago, Avila’s breakout was aided by a star-making performance from energetic forward Jayson Kent. With Kent gone to Texas, Schertz clearly saw the value in completing his star big man with a Kent-like skillset. Enter Kalu Anya, a bouncy forward who should be able make more sweet music with Rob Wave up front. A former Brown Bear, Anya leveld up a great deal as his sophomore season in the Ivy League went on. The 6’8″ forward finished second in the Ancient Eight with 82 offensive rebounds, and Anya managed 25 putback stabs off of those reloads and tipped balls. His wingspan and athleticism show up at both ends of the floor, as Anya ranked top ten in the league in both steals and blocked shots, as well. So tough was he to contain that Anya earned the third-most free throw attempts in the conference, as well; but headed just 51.4% of those tries. Anya has confidence in his developing jumper, even out to the three-point arc, and if his light comes on from the outside, the Billikens may just have a breakout star on their hands. If all Anya does is make closer to 67% of his freebies while remaining the disruptive guy he’s been so far, Schertz & Co will be well-pleased just the same.
| Five Stats Which Tell The Tale (with national ranks) |
| 79.8 – Opponent Points Per Game (342nd) |
| 36.4% Team 3FG Percentage (40th) |
| 36.6% – Opponent 3FG Percentage (330th) |
| 75.6% – Team FT Percentage (48th) |
| 17.9 – Personal Fouls Per Game (267th) |
Once upon a time, AJ Casey was an AAU teammate of a precocious, spectacled pivot named Robbie in the Chicago suburbs. Now, Avila and Casey have joined up to ride again in the STL. A former Top 100 recruit, Casey played a small role for Miami (FL) the past two seasons. Though his time at ‘The U’ included the exhilaration of a Final Four appearance his freshman season, Casey headed back north in search of a more meaningful role.
“He’s a true hybrid, which means offensively he can play with a big and also operate as a small-ball 5,” Schertz said about Casey this summer. “Defensively, he has the quickness, length, strength and lateral quickness to guard 1-5.” If he can recapture the form that had scouts excited and play to Schertz’s expectations, Casey will give the Billikens the type of position-variable big guy that the coach craves. In Kilian Brockhoff, the Bills may have landed another of those guys to develop at the same time. Though he was particularly three-point-happy for a 6’9″ guy as a freshman for Santa Barbara, Brockhoff has good hands, quick feet, and a smooth stroke from the outside – all attributes that the SLU coaches look for.
Lanky 6’11” freshman Max Pikaar likes to bomb away from the outside, too. He played well at this summer’s FIBA U20 EuroBasket tournament for his native Netherlands, and is hoping to show enough strength and shooting to play for the Bills this winter. Schertz and his staff have also added a couple of contrasting rookies in Dylan Warlick and Amari McCottry. A bouncy wing from Milwaukee, McCottry fits Schertz’s ideal as a full-court player. Warlick, meanwhile, is a powerfully-built but undersized forward whose burly but skilled approach should provide some intriguing matchup options in the years to come.
| Five Out-of-Conference Games to Keep an Eye on |
| @ Grand Canyon – December 22 |
| @ San Francisco – December 5 |
| vs Santa Clara – November 4 |
| N Wichita State – November 22 |
| vs Loyola Marymount – November 16 |
Saint Louis has been one of those teams about which there’s little consensus looking good ahead to the new season. Some sources aren’t even projecting the Billikens as one of the hundred-best teams in the country. Some have SLU as a likely Top 25 squad. With so many new faces, it’s understandable that people don’t quite know what to expect. In a landscape where some teams have 10+ guys who have never played together under the guidance of an unfamiliar coach, though, Saint Louis stands apart due to the cohesion of stars that Schertz already knows well.
“The advantage Schertz brings is allowing people to play to their strengths,” Avila explained to the Saint Louis University News this fall. “He doesn’t change who you are identity-wise as a player. He addresses your weaknesses by bringing in other guys’ skills and blending them together.” The culture that was built at Lincoln Memorial University and refined in Terre Haute will see a grand new wing added on in Saint Louis this year, and the Billikens are headed nowhere but up.
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