The Flyers don’t have much time to celebrate their response to the first loss of the year. Fresh off an 81-68 victory over the Texas A&M Aggies, the Flyers entertain a former Great Midwest and Midwest Collegiate Conference foe in the Saint Louis Billikens on Thursday. The Flyers look to improve to 10-1 before taking a short break for the Christmas holiday. A victory is far from assured, as the Billikens will be a more formidable foe than the Aggies. A victory will be more in doubt if the Flyer Faithful take the night off like they did Tuesday. Simply stated, the University of Dayton Arena bore a greater resemblance to a funeral home than the home court of a 9-1 team on Tuesday evening. As the competition gets tougher the Flyer Faithful will have to turn up their intensity too.

Saint Louis is 6-3 under first year coach Lorenzo Romar. Romar, who formerly coached at Pepperdine, took over for long-time SW Missouri State and Saint Louis coach Charlie Spoonhour. The Billikens claim Alabama and Missouri among their victims this year, while two of the losses have come at the hands of Kansas State and Cincinnati.

Romar inherited an experienced team, but a team experienced playing a far different brand of basketball. Under Spoonhour the Billikens relied on physical half-court defense, that, at times, looked more like wrestling than basketball. Romar prefers a more athletic style of play on defense. It is a defensive style that requires long-limbed players that can cover a lot of ground, something in short supply at SLU prior to Romar arriving. The Billikens are also changing their style of play on offense by moving to more of an up-tempo game. They like to get out on the break and are adept at finishing plays when they do.

The Billikens return Justin Love, Matt Baniak, and Justin Tatum as key players from the 98-99 squad. Love is a 6’2″ senior shooting guard. Love is the only consistent threat from behind the three-point line — he is shooting 37% on treys after hitting 38% last year. Where Love really excels is taking the ball to the rim where he relies on his physical strength and ability to draw fouls to finish plays. Fouling Love is not a good idea as he connects on better than 80% from the charity stripe. Love also leads the team in assists (3.6 per game) and steals (1.8 per game), but can cough the ball up as evidenced by his nearly 1:1 assist to turnover ratio.
Joining Love in the backcourt is 6’1″ freshman point guard Marque Perry, a consensus Top 100 recruit from Chicago. Perry possesses superb penetration skills and a mid-range jump shot, but is not much of a threat from deep. Perry has connected on just 2 of 9 treys for the year, but is connecting on 63% of his two point attempts. He has done an excellent job distributing the ball as a freshman, averaging nearly three assists per game with an equal number of turnovers. Not bad for a true freshman on a team without great perimeter shooters.

The primary back-up at both guard positions is Dave Fergerson, a 6’4″ senior. Fergerson distributes the ball and is a decent shooter, but struggles to create shots for himself or his teammates. Fergerson has the ability to get on a hot streak shooting the ball, and in many ways is very similar to former Flyer Shawn Haughn. Playing the wing forward is 6’4″ Maurice Jeffers, a junior college transfer from Westark Community College. Jeffers is not a particularly adept three point shooter, making just 2 of 14 so far. At Westark, Jeffers shot just 31% from behind the arc. Jeffers is a gifted slasher who can finish plays inside and crashses the offensive glass. Unlike many JUCO transfers, Jeffers is more than willing to make the extra pass, averaging two assists to go along with two turnovers. He is also an adept defender — averaging more than a steal per game.

Manning the power forward slot is Justin Tatum. Tatum is only 6’7″, but is a rock-solid 235 pounds. Tatum is no threat from the perimeter, but is hitting 56% from the floor. Many of his baskets come off the offensive glass or dishes from penetration by Love or Perry. Tatum also leads the Billikens in blocked shots with one per game.

Troy Robertson is the primary backup at forward, typically playing on the wing with Jeffers moving to the power forward slot if the two are in the game together. Robertson is primarily a perimeter shooter with 60% of his attempts coming from behind the three point line. He has connected on 35% of those. Unlike the other Billiken forwards, Robertson is not much of a threat on the glass. His 14 rebounds have all come on the defensive end of the floor. Chris Heinrich, a 6’11″ 250 pound senior and Matt Baniak a 6’9″ 235 pound junior round out the frontcourt — both of which are criticized at times for playing soft. Baniak is averaging slightly more than two rebounds and five points in ten minutes per game while Heinrich averages six points and five rebounds in more than twenty minutes. Heinrich is very prone to turning over the ball. For the year he has one assist against 24 turnovers.

The recipe for success in this game is nearly identical to that in the Cleveland State game. There are a lot of similarities between the two teams. Neither had a lot of weapons from the three point line. Both have guards who like to penetrate and forwards who score their points inside and crash the offensive boards. Both Cleveland State and Saint Louis like to cause havoc on defense, pressure and trap the ball, and score in transition off of turnovers. Like the CSU game, to pull out a win the Flyers need to take care of the ball and get good shots, and on the other side of the court they must deny penetrations and defend the initial shot. But unlike their last two outings, they must do a better job of pulling the ball off of the defensive glass. Saint Louis has had four games with 15 or more offensive rebounds and the Flyers can not afford to give up that many if they hope to have Santa visit a 10-1 team.