Getty Jordan Goodwin of the Saint Louis Billikens.
Saint Louis broke its four-year NCAA tournament drought last season and will look to continue to upward trajectory as they open the 2019-20 season against Florida Gulf Coast on Tuesday.
The game (8 p.m. ET start time) will be televised on Fox Sports Midwest+ locally, but if you don’t have that channel or don’t have cable, anyone in the US can also watch it live online on ESPN+, the streaming service from ESPN that has exclusive coverage of many Saint Louis and A-10 games this season, plus tons of other college basketball and live sports every week, all the 30-for-30 documentaries and additional original content (both video and written) all for $4.99 per month.
You can sign up for ESPN+ right here, and you can then watch Saint Louis vs FGCU live on your computer via ESPN.com, or on your phone (Android and iPhone compatible), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or other streaming device via the ESPN app.
Florida Gulf Coast vs Saint Louis Preview
If Saint Louis want to make it back to the NCAA Tournament, head coach Travis Ford believes his team will have to have have a renewed defensive focus, using a press look to utilize a deep and athletic roster.
“How much time we spend on defense in practice hasn’t changed,” Ford told the St. Louis post Dispatch. “The look of it is now picking up 94 feet, and I’m doing it for several reasons. I think it’s a great way to use 10 guys that haven’t differentiated themselves from each other.
“We need everybody to play, so what is the best way to use eight to 10 guys who are are pretty good athletes but all kind of similar and can guard multiple people?”
Saint Louis got hot last year in the postseason, winning the Atlantic 10 tournament to punch their tournament ticket. They were picked to finish seventh in the A-10 this year.
The Billikens return key players in Jordan Goodwin and Hasahn French, but they’re also excited about the addition of freshman guard Yuri Collins.
“I try not to talk about freshmen too much too early,” Ford said. “Sometimes that’s not the case, with Hasahn and Jordan who had no choice but to come in and start. But a guy like Yuri Collins has earned the right for me to talk about him because of his toughness and his competitiveness. How hard he plays, every single second. And he’s extremely unselfish.”
After making the tournament in back to back years and making noise as “Dunk City,” Florida Gulf Coast has struggled, stumbling to a 14-18 record a year ago.
“I think I’m most excited that this is really Year 1. It’s not Year 2,” FGCU head coach Michal Fry said. “You’re playing with the hand you were dealt before. This is the first time we’ve kind of had a chance to have the pieces that we put together.”
Despite having a returnees list that is very short, Fly believes his team can compete.
“I think we have better pieces that fit together than we had last year,” Fly said. “But we only have three payers that have suited up in green and blue and played together.”
Saint Louis is a 9-point home favorite for the game, which has a posted total of 133.5.