Depleted SLU hoops team hosts NAIA team William Woods

When Josh Schertz planned for NAIA school William Woods to be the St. Louis University’s final non-conference opponent Saturday at Chaifetz Arena, it all fit nicely into a neat scheme. After the Billikens had a few days off for Christmas, the team would come back, have a few practices, play a game and then jump into Atlantic 10 Conference play at Fordham three days later.

But, as you may have noticed, nothing about SLU’s season so far has been neat or pretty, and Saturday might be no exception.

Kellen Thames remains out with a strained hip flexor and Isaiah Swope, who played through knee pain against Grand Canyon just before Christmas, is considered questionable for Saturday. And Robbie Avila missed practice Friday because he was sick.

Talk about getting coal in the Christmas stocking.

“Depending on whether AJ (Casey, who has been out with an ankle injury) can go or not, we’ll have potentially seven or eight players,” Schertz said Friday, “which is kind of how it’s been.

“But it makes subbing easy because you really have two or three guys available.”

And just to add a little more to it, William Woods is, well, good. The Owls of Fulton, Missouri, are 10-2 and sit just outside the NAIA top 25. WWU beat Harris-Stowe 100-51 and the University of Health Sciences and Pharmacy 101-43.

“I turned up the planning component of this,” Schertz said. “They are a national championship caliber NAIA team.”

And the competition and the team’s predicament caused Schertz to revise his goals for the game.

“Just try to find a way to get through the game,” he said. “Try to find a way to win a game.”

“Just go out there and compete,” guard Gibson Jimerson added. “William Woods is a good NAIA team, so they will test us a little bit. But just a little focus on us. This is one of those games where we have to focus on ourselves, what we’re doing and go out there and execute it and in the process prepare for the game against Fordham. Just get out there, get on the field, get our wind back a little bit.”

Avila is sick, so while he might sit out Saturday, he doesn’t expect to be out long. Saturday’s game will be the third in a row. Thames will sit out with his hip injury and in the background of all this is his cramping issues. Swope is the new entry on the list, although his knee problems are not. He hurt his knee in the Wofford game and nearly missed the Grand Canyon game, but managed to play nearly 39 minutes.

“Swope, he’s a tough kid,” Schertz said. “Obviously he played through last year with a piece of cartilage chipped off and he tore his lateral meniscus. The piece of cartilage came off in December. He tore the lateral meniscus at the end of January and played through both of them to kind of end the season the last two months of the year. He had surgery in the offseason and there’s just been some inflammation stuff for him right now. So he’s got to feel like he can play.

“At the Grand Canyon, we didn’t think he was going to play, so he could go the night before and do some practice. And then he said he felt good enough to play Sunday against Grand Canyon. But it hasn’t felt good. He was out (Thursday), out (Friday) for training. I think unless there is some kind of turnaround, I would think he would be out (Saturday). But again, not 100% because we thought he was out against the Grand Canyon and he found a way to play and played pretty well.”

Not having Swope would create a significant hole for SLU. Swope plays an average of 35.6 minutes per game. game (second on the team, 25th in the nation), and leads the team in scoring and assists. He touches the ball almost every time SLU runs. If he can’t go, Amari McCottry would step into his spot in the starting lineup.

If Casey is good to go but Swope isn’t, SLU will have eight players, even if two of them, Casey and Dylan Warlick, won’t be fit enough to play long minutes.

The Grand Canyon game was encouraging but painful as SLU couldn’t hold a lead in the final seconds.

“You never want to lose like that,” Jimerson said. “I thought we did a lot of really good things. And to be within 30 seconds or whatever it was of a really good win, it (stinks), but I think there was a lot to learn from it. I think it shows a lot of little things throughout the game that we could have done better. But I thought our effort was great. So much to take from it.

“We had a little break after that, which I think a lot of us needed. But it’s time to get back into it with a good game (Saturday) and start the league game, which will be fun.”