Jan. 8, 2000
ST. LOUIS - Saint Louis rallied from a 14-point first-half deficit to knock off Memphis 75-67 this afternoon in a Conference USA men's basketball game before 12,640 at Kiel Center. The victory snapped a three-game losing streak for the Billikens and a five-game C-USA losing streak that stretched into last year.
On the heels of three straight road losses with increasingly poor performances, the Billikens fell behind quickly against the Tigers who sensed injured prey. Tigers center Kelly Wise dominated on the interior early with 12 points, while guard Keiron Shine drained a pair of threes and Memphis cruised in front 32-18 with 6:23 to play in the first half.
Billiken senior point guard John Redden came into the game and led the SLU surge at the end of the first half. Redden, who missed 10 games with a broken right foot, is still working his way back into shape. "I'm just excited to be playing again," Redden said. "Someone needed to give us a boost in the right direction. And if I was able to do that, fine, that's what we needed."
While Redden threw a rope around Shine, Love went to work with 10 points in the Billikens' 16-3 run to close the half with SLU trailing 35-34. Love's 21-foot three-pointer off the run that banked in at the first half horn and his trey to open the second half were the highlights of his game high 23-point performance. "It was good to get back home and have people cheering for us again," Love said. "The three just before the half made people forget that we were still behind."
"John came in and shut Shine down just as it looked as if he was about to go on a streak," Billikens head coach Lorenzo Romar said. "Our guys rallied around that. John gives us presence at both ends of the floor, and he's not back offensively, but he can defend. He did that today."
The Billikens steadily pulled away from the Tigers in the early stages of the second half. Senior guard Dave Fergerson dropped a pair of free throws with eight minutes remaining to give the Bills their biggest lead at 61-49. The Tigers attempted to rally, but could only get back within seven at the 4:27 mark on a Courtney Trask jumper.
Junior center Chris Heinrich, who finished with 13 points and eight rebounds, had his first double-figure scoring game in 11 outings and punctuated his performance with three dunks. "I didn't feel anything different about this game than any other," said Heinrich, who went scoreless in the Bills' dreary loss at Marquette on Wednesday night. "I got the ball in some good positions today and was able to finish them."
Wise led Memphis with 19 points, but had 15 of those in the first half. Trask added 16 and Marcus Moody chipped in with 11. The Tigers shot 50 percent from the field and 57.1 percent from three, but 41.7 percent from the free throw line.
The Billikens out-rebounded the Tigers 39-26 which displeased Memphis coach Johnny Jones. "We have to continue on working on blocking out," Jones said. "Our post players only had three offensive rebounds, so we're not going to the offensive board strong enough. On the defensive board, we're obviously not doing everything perfectly to keep people off the offensive glass."
Saint Louis (8-6, 1-2) returns to Kiel Center on Tue., Jan. 11, at 7:05 p.m. to face SIU-Carbondale in the Bills' final non-conference regular-season game of the year. Memphis (7-8, 0-2) hosts South Florida on Wednesday.
