This is the fifth and final installment in a multipart series serving as a preseason primer to all things Saint Louis University Men’s Basketball for the 2021-22 season. Part four can be found here.

Records to Track

With Jordan Goodwin and Hasahn French now on to professional basketball, the era of every single night a Billiken moving up in the all-time record books is probably on pause for the moment. But that doesn’t mean we won’t see historic numbers being established in the 2021-22 season.

Yuri Collins- Going into his junior season, with a shortened first and second Yuri could have already been in the record books. Sitting with 287 total assists, he sits just 60 shy of Erwin Claggett for 10th all-time. If Yuri was to replicate his covid shortened sophomore season, he would find himself 6th all time by the end of the year, just 1 assist shy of Jordan Goodwin’s 404. If he was to replicate the fuller freshman season he played, Yuri will have 458 assists by years end and will be clear and away the all-time leader in assists.

After setting SLU’s freshmen record for assists, and finishing 6th last season despite only 19 games, Yuri will be hunting down LaTodd Johnsons 1981-82 junior record of 153 assists in a season.

Javonte Perkins- The first notable milestone Javonte will be looking to hit is the ever-recognized 1000 points. Sitting at 825 after just two seasons, it all but stands to reason that with his average of 17.1 points per game, if he had played a full season in 2020-21 he would already be at that mark and be looking to make his way up the leader board.

Getting to 1000 would put him at 34th all-time. If Javonte were to score at his 2020-21 pace, Javonte would find himself with 1372 career points, putting him 14th between Easy Ed Macauley and Joe Wiley.

Another, while less recognized accomplishment, would be if Javonte could raise his Free Throw percentage by just .002 percent, Perkins would find himself in the top 10 all time in Billiken Free Throw Percentage. Between his first and second season, Javonte raised his average by a near full 10%. An exact repeat of his 2020-21 season would make him the 7th best free throw shooter in school history.

The Readers Digest

The Billikens are looking to continue being a competitive force in a year-over-year kind of way. The long-term goal of the program, and one that Travis Ford genuinely believes in, is that Saint Louis University can be a program that makes the NCAA tournament just about every single year. Being a team in the bubble conversation every year is a start, but I’d imagine that patience starts to wear thin if you go on an extended run of NIT appearances rather than Big Dance.

This team has one of the most competitive non-conference schedules they’ve had in recent memory. Now is the perfect time to test your iron, rise above the competition, and leave nothing to chance come March. They have given themselves chances against nationally recognized competition and should they win some of these important games, they will leave the committee with no doubt about how good this team is.

With one of their more loaded rosters in terms of depth of talent, combined with their need to now, in a way, reinvent themselves without Goodwin and French, it’s a likely story going forward that this Billiken team will need to forge their own path. Create their own identity and put a stamp on themselves. A lot of that is going to be Travis Ford pulling the right strings and finding the right combinations of players for situations. But a lot of it is going to be players

A lot of finding these roles is going to come from players demanding them with their play–or so you hope. An ideal world would see individuals rising above expectations and making their playing time a necessity, not one dictated purely by matchups…or worse…the failure of others. While Fred Thatch and Yuri Collins have the body of work to prove their time ahead of the season, and Francis Okoro and Marten Linssen are the only bigs so their time is understood, TJ Hargrove has the possibility to play his way into significantly more minutes, Gibson Jimerson, Jordan Nesbitt, Rashad Williams, and Deandre Jones all do as well.

It’s a major prove it year for Travis Ford. He has done a lot at SLU. He’s made an NCAA tournament, won a conference title, changed the culture, put up with a pandemic, managed scandal, and grieved the loss in his family and an employee. He’s recruited his team and now is the time to show that he can turn this program into a year over year winner…without his crown jewel, program redefining recruits.

There is plenty of reason for optimism this fall. Optimism and excitement. The Billikens will be a competitive top 100 team in the nation this year by all professional accounts…and they could be a “great” team.