In the past couple of weeks, the St. Louis University basketball team has shown it's really good at shooting free throws in pressure situations. Or really bad. Or really good.
Go back to SLU's win at Xavier, where the Billikens made their final nine free throws and 13 of their final 14 to snap Xavier's 43-game home conference winning streak. Three days later, at UMass, SLU made just eight of 19 free throws in a 13-point loss. And the Billikens followed that Wednesday by making 26 of 31 free throws against St. Bonaventure, including 12 of 13 to start the second half as they ran away with the game.
So when it comes to the real Billikens, who are they? The gang that couldn't miss against St. Bonaventure and Xavier or the gang that couldn't shoot straight against UMass?
"(St. Bonaventure) and Xavier, because that's two to one," said SLU forward Brian Conklin.
Of course, as Conklin admitted, it's not hard to find examples to put on the other side of the scale. Go back one more game, to SLU's game with Duquesne, and the Billikens shot 62 percent from the line, their season-worst before UMass. When it comes to free throws, SLU has, literally and figuratively, been all over the map.
The hard and fast numbers say SLU is not a bad free throw shooting team. Its 70.4 percentage is fourth best in the Atlantic 10. What's been maddening is how it has gotten to that number. In the UMass and the St. Bonaventure games combined, SLU shot a respectable 68 percent on free throws. But that's the product of shooting 42 percent in one game and 77 percent in the other.
Free throws could well be an important commodity when SLU (17-5, 5-3) faces Dayton (14-8, 4-4) today at Chaifetz Arena. In the past six seasons, SLU and Dayton have had six games go to overtime (two to double overtime) and another game that was decided by a point. When the teams met in January, SLU lost in overtime, 79-72, and missed four of six free throw tries in the extra period.
"All you can do is keep trying to address it, incrementally, and hope to get better as you go on," SLU coach Rick Majerus said. "It's a real concern. I think it's deflating to get up to that line and miss. Then the next guy misses and I think it puts more pressure on the third guy. Subliminally, he capitulates sometimes. It's funny, because you look at certain games, we shoot well."
The Xavier and St. Bonaventure games are proof of that, though the Xavier game was a mix of good and bad. In the second half, SLU made just three of eight free throws in a 4 1/2-minute stretch. But then, it started making its shots, some in high-pressure situations. Three times in the final 2 1/2 minutes, Xavier cut SLU's lead to three and sent SLU to the line. Each time, SLU made both foul shots to protect its lead.
"I guess it's a bug," Conklin said. "When one guy's hitting, everyone's hitting. When one guy's missing, everyone's missing. It's good to be able to knock down those free throws."
Even more mysterious is that no one is immune. Conklin is sixth in the Atlantic 10 in free throw shooting at 81.7 percent, but he missed four of seven against UMass and then missed his first two against St. Bonaventure. (He said the ankle he twisted in practice the day before UMass threw off his shot since he couldn't lift on his toes.) He followed that up my making seven straight. Jordair Jett, whose foul shooting has improved more than anyone on the team, made 17 of 35 in the first 11 games, but he made five of six against Xavier and seven of eight against St. Bonaventure. Still, he made just one of five at UMass. Meanwhile, Mike McCall goes into the Dayton game having made 11 straight.
"We address it," Majerus said, "and the players work on it. It's not a neglected aspect of practice, but it is a concern. I almost don't know how to deal with it, other than to work harder at it. That's the solution to a lot of things in life. If it's not going well, work harder."
