Nov. 8, 2006

Box Score

ST. LOUIS -- Saint Louis knocked off Harris-Stowe 95-47 in a men's basketball exhibition tonight at Scottrade Center. Junior swingman Danny Brown led five Billikens in double-figures with 18 points, and sophomore guard Tommie Liddell threw in a double-double with 13 points and 14 boards. It was the final exhibition test for the Billikens, who open up the regular-season this Saturday against Quincy in a 7 p.m. tip at Scottrade.

"I've tried to communicate to my team that if we want to have a great season, we are going to have to be an elite defensive team, we just can't play good some nights and poor other nights," Billikens head coach Brad Soderberg said. "I thought we were sub-par the first half. Harris-Stowe got a lot of easy looks, open shots and transition baskets. To my kids' credit, they responded at halftime and played a really solid second half of defense."

Neither team was able to take control of the tempo in the beginning stages. The motivated Hornets hung around early thanks to an efficient shooting touch from behind the arc. HSSU hit four of their first seven tries from 3-point range to stay within the single-digits of the lead through the first 10 minutes of action. For SLU, Liddell hit his first five shots of the night, which included 3-3 from the field, 1-1 from 3-point land and 2-2 from the charity stripe, to keep the Billikens ahead.

Harris-Stowe utilized that hot 3-point shooting to eliminate the Billikens' possibility of establishing an offensive rhythm. After an outside bucket from sophomore guard Danny Brown to push the Bills to a 28-18 advantage, HSSU's John Hotaling nailed a three on the other end. It was the same story after layins from junior forward Luke Meyer and senior center Ian Vouyoukas - the Hornets countered with a three to stay in the game.

The Billikens opened up their biggest lead to that point late in the half. A 3-pointer from Liddell pushed the Billikens to a 10 point lead with 3:54 to play in the opening session. A couple of free-throws from Lisch and Brown's third 3-point bucket of the half stretched the Billiken lead to 15 as the Billikens took control of the game for the first time.

SLU took a 48-32 lead into halftime after shooting 58 percent from the field and 46 percent from 3-point range. Liddell went 4-for-5 from the field in the first half and nailed his only two 3-point attempts en route to a then game-high 11 points. Lisch put up a 3-for-4 clip from the field in the first session and gathered 10 points. For Harris-Stowe, Kenny Lee led the Hornets through the first half with eight points, followed by Melvin Martin and Phillip D. Stewart's six points.

SLU utilized some three-point shooting of its own to expand on its lead at the beginning of the second half. Brown hit three treys in the early stages of the second stanza, and the Billikens shot 60 percent as a team to roll out to a 73-39 lead.

Meanwhile, Harris-Stowe came out of the break struggling to find its shooting touch. The Hornets hit just one of their first 10 tries to begin the second half.

Freshman forward Horace Dixon and junior forward Wendell Bennett kept the Billikens rolling down the stretch. In five-minute span late in the game, Dixon nailed eight points, pulled down six boards and contributed a block. Bennett, a former walk-on, delighted the crowd after accumulating his first points of the game on a 3-point try.

Overall, the Billikens shot 53 from the field, 43 percent from beyond the arc and 69 percent from the line. They dominated the inside play, out-scoring the Hornets 41-16 in the paint. Along with Brown and Liddell's 18 and 13 points, respectively, Lisch tallied 14 points and Vouyoukas chipped in with 13. Junior forward Obi Ikeakor rounded out the double-figure scoring for the Bills with 10.

It was the second straight game that Brown led the team in scoring. In the two exhibition games, he has reeled off an average of 18 ppg and has hit 10 of his 15 tries from 3-point range.

Harris-Stowe shot 27 percent in the contest, which included a dismal second-half in which it converted on only 18 percent of its tries from the field. Stewart led the squad with nine points, while Martin and Lee each threw down eight points.

The 2006-07 season begins for real on Saturday when the Billikens host the Quincy University Hawks in the regular-seaosn opener. Tip-off at Scottrade Center is slated for 7 p.m.