The Saint Louis Billikens raced out to a 17-point halftime lead en route to a 102-77 pounding of the Georgia Bulldogs in their NCAA tournament first-round game on Thursday. In the game played in Buffalo, the 9th-seeded Billikens never trailed and built their advantage to 40 points in the second half.
With the victory, Saint Louis, now 29-5, will face the top-seeded Michigan Wolverines at 11:10 CT on Saturday. The Wolverines dismantled the Howard Bison, 101-80, in their opening tournament game.
The victory was the Billikens’ first NCAA tournament win since 2014, when they beat the North Carolina State Wolfpack. 83-80, in the second round. The 29 triumphs mark the most in Saint Louis history, and Thursday’s success made the Billikens’ defeat to Dayton in the Atlantic 10 tournament easier to swallow.
Six Billikens scored in double figures, led by senior Dion Brown‘s 18 points, which was achieved by converting on nine of his ten field-goal attempts in just 22 minutes of court time. Sophomore Amari McCottry added 13 points, and senior Robbie Avila pitched in 12. As a team, Saint Louis shot a blistering 58% (42-for-72) from the field for the game, and SLU’s defense held the Bulldogs to just 35% on field-goal tries.
The two teams traded points for much of the first six minutes, but from the 14:00 mark on, the Billikens were not phased by their power-conference opponent. After a Georgia free throw cut Saint Louis’ lead to 10-9, SLU outscored the Bulldogs 17-8 over the next three minutes. From there, the rout was on.
A 12-0 Saint Louis run, fueled by five baskets from four different players, stretched the Billikens’ advantage to 37-18 and forced Georgia to call a timeout with 5:37 to go in the half. The Bulldogs did not significantly reduce the deficit, and the teams went into the locker room at halftime with Saint Louis ahead, 49-32.
If Georgia had the idea of getting back into the game, the Billkens knocked that notion out of their heads immediately. SLU poured in the first 18 points of the second half and held the Bulldogs scoreless for the first five minutes. With still just under 15 minutes of the game, Saint Louis led 67-32, and the competitive nature of the game was over.
Following the game, Saint Louis head coach Josh Schertz noted that while he was proud of his team for Thursday’s victory, Michigan poses a significant challenge. Schertz believes, however, that the Billikens will be up for the task.
“They are, in my opinion, the best team in the country,” he said. “They have elite players [and] an elite coach. I think they’re the favorites to win the national championship, but it’s a one-game deal. We just gotta beat them once, we don’t gotta beat them four. We’ll do everything we can to prepare as well as we can. We know what we’re up against and how good they are. We’ll have to play our best game of the season to give ourselves a chance. We’ll have to find a level even higher than tonight to give ourselves a chance on Saturday, but that’s what we plan on doing.”
As Schertz noted, each game in the NCAA tournament is set up as a winner-moves-on, loser-goes-home format. There are no seven-game series to see who advances, as is the case in the NBA.
Even though the Wolverines are a 12.5-point favorite to move on to the Sweet 16, games are not played on paper. The tournament is not called “March Madness” for nothing, and this month has proven throughout the years to be full of chaos and surprises.
Saint Louis was nationally ranked during most of the season. Now that they have the chance to prove their mettle in the bright lights of the tournament, do not expect the Billikens to flinch. Nothing would make the watch parties at Humphrey’s or McGirk’s more bubbly than to see SLU pull off the upset.
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