Saint Louis' First Exhibition Game

[tornado]

The Billikens hosted Harris-Stowe, a small NAIA school that was considerably under .500 last season (13-19), and who only returned three players from that team and weren't expected to even be as good as last year!

Harris-Stowe boasts 12 new rostered players, and faced a Billiken team with a good mix of top veterans (Tommie Liddell and Kevin Lisch are preseason All Conference) and numerous freshmen.

Saint Louis hammered Harris-Stowe 86-40 in front of a sparse crowd. (they generally draw home crowds of about 9,000)
7-ft center Brett Thompson from Vienna, IL debuted with 10 points in 16 minutes in a start but only grabbed 4 rebounds.
Harris-Stowe had no answer for SLU's athleticism and got beat in every aspect, most notably rebounds 61-37 (including 23 offensive rebounds), and 35-17 in FG made.
Kevin Lisch left the game early with a back injury then did not return, and no word on his status.
One observer said on their message board that the competition (Harris-Stowe) was the caliber of a high school team.
Saint Louis unveiled one new player at the game who was previously completely unknown...a walk on named Andre Craig who got some minutes last night.

http://slubillikens.cstv.com/sports/m-baskbl/recaps/110508aaa.html

I am wondering if this is the kind of really weak competition some would prefer Bradley play in their exhibitions?
I think this was such a weak test that it will not help SLU.


a couple photos show a ton of empty seats...

[Da Coach]

Too bad this isn't a local rivalry like Evansville and University of Southern Indiana! They drew 11,000 for their exhibition game in Evansville.

Harris-Stowe is just a short distance from SLU, with both being located in the heart of St. Louis.

The game was the first event played in the new Chaifetz Arena on the SLU campus and was part of their season-ticket package. It holds 10,600, but the report in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch was that only about 100 students were there and total attendace was estimated at 6500. But the pictures suggest it wasn't that high. The official dedication for the new arena will be Friday when SLU hosts Missouri-St. Louis in their next exhibition.

http://slubillikens.cstv.com/school-bio/stlo-facilities-chaifetz.html

[real fan]

That"s why you try to schedule good D2 or D3 teams that are well coached so it better prepares you for the start of the season.

[tornado]

The question is soon to be answered as to whether it was the right move to change to an on-campus arena, the newly built Chaifetz Arena.

Here are the only measures....
Saint Louis has perennially drawn well, and they have always played in a large, municipal arena that was easy to get to and well accepted by the fans.
In 2006-2007, their average attendance was 9,667.
In 2007-2008 they played in the ScottTrade Center and averaged 8,837, a surprising drop off in Rick Majerus' first year, but the team did not do well, and finished 16-15 but 11th in their conference.

In their first exhibition game last year, in 2007, they drew over 8,000 to the ScottTrade Center...
In their first exhibition game this year on campus at the Chaifetz, they drew far fewer, only 6,000 in an arena with a capacity of 10,600.

Over the years, SLU has played at many venues, the Kiel Auditorium, the old St. Louis Arena, Savvis/ScottTrade, and others.
The talk is mixed, some really like the new arena, others say they will not go because of traffic, parking, and location concerns....and even a few have yielded up their long held season tickets.
The fellow who gave $12 mil for the naming rights, Richard A. Chaifetz, is a Saint Louis alum who is a Psychologist and Neurophysiologist who founded a company that supplies services to millions of people.
The tentative nickname of the arena was once "The Rack" based on the guy's initials "RAC", but the school has done everything it can to strongly denounce the use of that nickname.



Just to show the kind of business they will likely lose.....in Dec. of 2006 (12/22/06) they hosted UNC at the ScottTrade center and sold well over 22,000 tickets.
Numerous other games in the past few years have also sold over 10,600 tickets.
The present arena is smaller and won't lure the huge non-conference foes like UNC.

[Murph]

Rick Majerus had some pretty blunt comments about his players after their first game against Missouri-St. Louis...

Regarding Paul Eckerle, who came off the bench to play 23 minutes:
"Paul Eckerle got 23 minutes...Majerus wasn??™t too happy when Eckerle
took a shot late in the game rather than taking time off the clock.
"...with that lead, Paul takes that shot, I told Paul, look at the scoreboard,
you??™re playing time and score, you??™re playing the clock. If you don??™t understand
that, I don??™t want you cutting into my stomach.??? (Eckerle is pre-med)

Regarding Ruben Cotto who got yanked after taking some wild shots and was benched much of the rest of the game...
"Ruben??™s not as bad as he looked...Ruben is a lot better player than
what he is right now. ... ???I thought Ruben was great on the bench."

Regarding Brett Thompson, highly touted 7-ft freshman:
"Brett Thompson didn??™t play in the second half. Majerus said it was because
of a bad matchup. (Though Brian Conklin went to the scorer??™s table
immediately after Thompson missed a 16-footer.."

Re Kwamain Mitchell:
"Asked about Kwamain Mitchell??™s play, Majerus said: ???It??™s one game.
Kwamain??™s not as good as he looked"
???Kwamain??™s shooting was real disappointing???

and Femi John, and possibly Daniel Lisch are redshirting
http://www.stltoday.com/blogzone/bil...game-thoughts/

Hillarious quotes, as far as attendance 6500 isn't bad for them.

[tornado]

Last night Saint Louis lost to Nebraska, and thus far in home games, they have sold fewer tickets than they had hoped, and are way under their average from past years, despite lots of promotion and a brand new arena.
Now they realize they had greatly overpriced their tickets and they are simply NOT going to sell.

Now they have decided to discount them.

They are "expanding" their ticket promotions...
which means they are going to sell any decent seat for $12 bucks in any game, and even have some $7, $5, and even $2 tickets for various games.

I guess if they don't sell, then just give 'em away! Too bad for those loyal fans who had already paid for theirs.