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Saint Louis cruised to an easy victory against the Fordham Rams after a sloppy first half. They have earned their eleventh straight victory and fourth straight in the Atlantic 10 conference to go to 17-2 (4-0, A-10) on the year. Fordham falls to 7-10 (0-4, A-10).
Jordair Jett scored his 1,000th point of his SLU career, finishing the day with 18 points and six assists. Dwayne Evans led the team in scoring with 21 points. Fordham’s Jon Severe scored 22 points, but was 9-25 shooting on the day. He has shot the ball 100 times in the past five games, only making 32 of those shots.
"(Senior Guard) Jake (Barnett) said ‘make sure you knock these down because you had a wide open shot,’" said Jett on scoring his 1,000 point from the foul line. "I wasn’t worried about it, I knew they were going in."
The shooting was just terrible in the Saint Louis-Fordham game. In the first half, Saint Louis was just 28.6 percent shooting from the field while Fordham was shooting 19.4 percent from the field. The shooting at the foul line was the key difference in the first half. SLU went 13-16 from the line compared to Fordham going 1-2 in the first half. St. Louis, using this advantage, slowly built a fourteen point lead going into halftime.
Saint Louis did a better job later in the first half going into the paint feeding Dwayne Evans and allowing Jordair Jett to drive to the basket. Jett’s effort this game was exceptional. One example of that effort was shown late in the first half. After a missed bucket and an easier missed tip-in, he powered his way up against three Fordham defenders around him to extend the Saint Louis lead to 12 with about a minute left in the first half.
After a sloppy first half, the Billikens jumped out the gate to a 7-0 run to start the second half thanks to two quick buckets by Evans and a three-pointer by Jake Barnett. That run extended SLU’s lead to 21 points and they would never look back from that point.
Mike McCall Jr. began to make some buckets in the second half after going 1-5 from the field in the first half. He finished the game with 12 points.
Fordham struggled in the second half. Jon Severe lofted up shot after shot for the Rams, he was their only source of offense as senior guard Branden Frazier was shut down by the Billikens defense. The Rams could not match the interior presence of the Billikens as they caused two Fordham forwards to foul out of the game.
"I thought our defense, except for a few small period, was very, very good," said Head Coach Jim Crews. "It is really hard (to win 11 straight), we are very fortunate. It is not that common and that is a great tribute to these guys."
The Billikens will go back on the road on Wednesday, January 22 to play the Duquesne Dukes at 7 p.m. eastern time. The Rams will return home on January 22 to take on the George Mason Patriots at 7 p.m.