ST. LOUIS -- Putting the unpredictability of the Atlantic 10 Conference on display, the last-place Saint Louis Billikens turned back the previously surging La Salle Explorers 68-64 in overtime on Sunday afternoon.
The Billikens (11-16, 3-11) had lost four straight, while the Explorers (15-12, 7-7) had won five of seven, including an impressive victory at conference front-runner VCU.
But despite trailing for virtually all of the first 39 minutes in regulation, the Billikens pulled off the upset before 7,980 at Chaifetz Arena.
Well, it was an upset based on the standings. La Salle coach John Giannini doesn't believe in upsets in the A-10.
"Sometimes people drive me crazy with how they expect certain teams to win certain games," Giannini said. "You can't expect anything in this league, especially on the road. Just throw expectations out the window in this league. It's too deep of a league and it's just too hard to win."
3-POINTERS
• Roby leads the way. Freshman guard Davell Roby's first points did not come until he missed a point-blank layup and tipped in the miss with 12:07 left in regulation. But he made up for his lack of points from then on. Roby finished with a team-high 16 points, equaling his season high, on six-of-12 shooting that included three of six 3-pointers.
Coach Jim Crews has harped at times about his young players giving up on the offense during a possession and forcing a shot. But sticking with the system paid off for Roby against the Explorers.
"In the beginning, I couldn't get the looks that I wanted," Roby said. "Coach was telling me to just stay with the offense, just trust the offense. In the second half, I got some good looks and was able to knock them down."
• Refusal to give in pays off. The experience of all those close losses finally paid off for the Billikens, who flat-out refused to go away against La Salle. Six times the Billikens pulled within two points in the second half and six times they were unable to even the score.
But on the seventh try, with 1:07 left, they finally pushed through.
Roby converted a La Salle turnover into two points to tie the game at 56. Milik Yarbrough then stole the ball from Jordan Price, and Ash Yacoubou scooped it up and raced in for a layup to give SLU its first lead since the second minute of the game. The Billikens would need an extra period to secure the win, but for once, they ended up on the right side of a close game.
"We've been in this type of situation so many times this year, it was like we were used to it," said Yacoubou, who finished with 13 points. "We just had to stay mentally strong and keep fighting through it."
• The break the Billikens needed. Price, La Salle's leading scorer and a likely first-team all-conference player, had a chance to give his team the lead with 11 seconds left in overtime. La Salle trailed by two points but instead of trying to score from the lane, where he'd been able to exploit his weight advantage over the slighter Billikens, Price opted for a 3-pointer.
It not only missed, it got stuck on the rim when it wedged between the iron and the backboard. With the possession arrow pointing to SLU, the Billikens got the ball and Mike Crawford was promptly fouled. He made two free throws then and two more with four seconds left to seal the victory.
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No one could remember a shot like Price's missing in such a way at such a crucial time.
"Freakish," Crews said.
"He liked to go left hand a lot, so I was trying to take away his left hand," Yacoubou said. "I saw he got some space and I tried to contest as hard as I can and I was hoping that shot didn't go in. I'm not going to say I thought it was going in. I was just saying in my mind, 'This has to miss.'"
"It wasn't close," La Salle's Giannini said. "That's why it got wedged in there. It wasn't an in-and-out shot."
It might not have been the shot Giannini preferred, either, but he put his trust in Price, who led La Salle with 22 points.
"You don't want to take your most talented offensive guy and tell him, 'Don't do this, don't do that,'" Giannini said. "It was a decent look. It could have been a game-winner."
You can follow Stan McNeal on Twitter at @StanMcNeal or email him at stanmcneal@gmail.com.
