What the hell is going on out there in the nation’s midsection? Just three short days after Savannah St. laid a second-half egg against Kansas St. to the tune of four pts in the second half (25 total for the game), Rick Majerus’ St. Louis squad put up a blistering twenty points last night in its game against George Washington. This total of sixty-nine points (49-20) set a new record for offensive futility in the shot-clock era of D1 basketball. Let’s take a quick look at the Billikens’ stats:
- 14.6% shooting (7-48 from the field)
- 5.3% 3FG shooting (1-19)
- 50% FT shooting (5-10)
- 0.35 pts per possession
- leading scorer (Bryce Husak) came off the bench for 5 pts
- SLU missed 23 straight shots at one point in the game
Hey, Coach, do you think you have some offensive issues?
“I thought GW played tough on defense. We had some issues. You have to credit GW for playing very well. We have some issues in terms of our offensive proficiency,” Majerus said. “I tried to keep coaching the game. Sometimes you miss. We are a team that has some issues. That is why we are practicing [Friday]. We did miss some good shots, yes. Anyone can look at us and see we don’t have height, we don’t have depth.”
What gets us is that St. Louis really isn’t that bad of a team. Their record is 9-6 with a win over Southern Illinois to their credit, and their RPI ranking is #144, which puts the Billikens in the range of Maryland and Oklahoma St. Still, their offensive output is troubling in their six losses – 58, 56, 40, 39, 53, 20. We realize their tempo this year is among the slowest in the nation (#336), but clearly something isn’t being communicated well between Majerus and his players. SLU was 20-13 last season and returned four starters, so what’s up? [insert joke here about Majerus spending more time eating than coaching]
Update: our blogpolling colleagues Vegas Watch and Super, Scintilliating & Sarcastic beat us to the punch on this last night, and have better takes than us. Enjoy.