At the start of each film session with his team, St. Joseph's coach Phil Martelli shows his players clips of the next opponent to set the mood for what awaits them. After last week, he's taking a new tack: He's starting each session by showing his players the Atlantic 10 Conference standings.
The point he's trying to bring home: "If you want to label (someone as a) big game, we have big games every night in February the way the league is bunched," Martelli said.
You want bunched? Seven games into A-10 play, the top 11 teams in the 14-team league are separated by two games in the standings. When SLU (16-5, 4-3) faces St. Bonaventure (12-7, 5-2) tonight at Chaifetz Arena, it will be SLU's third straight game against a team that's in first place in the league. And SLU was in first place in that span as well.
"Every team you're playing has either beaten someone you've lost to or is tied for first," SLU forward Brian Conklin said. "Every team is going to be a tough team. We hold our own destiny because we play all those teams we're tied with or we're one game out from, in this stretch coming up. Wednesday we have a big one and Saturday we have a big one (against Dayton) and the rest of the season we have huge ones."
All but one of the teams in the league will have played half their games after tonight, and some of those records are still subject to the whims of the schedule (UMass, which is tied with La Salle and St. Bonaventure for first, has a killer six-game stretch coming up later in February), but the league looks wide open. UMass and La Salle were both picked to finish in the bottom half of the league and the absolute unpredictability of the A-10 was shown Saturday when Rhode Island, generally considered the worst team in the league, went to league-leader Dayton, which had the league's best RPI at the time, and won by five. Meanwhile, Fordham, which had lost its two previous games by a total of 88 points, beat George Washington.
"You look at the scores in the league," Fordham coach Tom Pecora said, "and you're not shocked by anything."
The league may well get four teams in the NCAA Tournament — at the moment, SLU, Temple, Xavier and Dayton are solid candidates, with Temple having the best case — but none may be seeded better than eighth. ESPN.com's latest projection has five teams getting in, equal to the SEC and Big 12 and behind only the Big East and Big Ten, but that's a statistical blip more than anything because none of the league's best teams in terms of RPI are in the group in first. That in itself says something about the wide-open nature of the league; its best teams are no better than fourth.
The most obvious reason for the league's success is an abundance of well-spread talent. "It's players, and anyone who doesn't think it's players should look at Pittsburgh, or the zenmaster (Phil Jackson) when 23 (Michael Jordan) was playing baseball," SLU coach Rick Majerus said. "There's great parity among players and more depth and more outstanding players. In a league rife with terrific coaches, the quality of players in the league has measurably improved in the time I've been in it."
What that means for SLU, coming off its worst effort of the season in a loss at UMass, is that every game is a big game. "We just showed up for one half," guard Kyle Cassity said of the UMass game, "and by that time it was too late. It wasn't us (in the first half). The first half was terrible; they scored at will. We've got to come out and put together 40 minutes. We're not a team that can beat you in 20. It's something we've got to work on. We can't have that happen again."
Conklin, who was held out of the starting lineup Saturday after rolling his ankle, said Tuesday his ankle felt "FAN-tastic." He needs four points to reach 1,000 for his career but will face a tough defensive assignment guarding St. Bonaventure forward Andrew Nicholson, a Wooden Award candidate who is averaging 15.6 points and 7.2 rebounds. At least seven NBA scouts will be in attendance, and it's clear who they're coming to see. "I don't think Conklin and Cassity are on their way to the NBA," Majerus said.
