Saint Louis University junior center Robbie Avila recently spoke with Mid-Major Madness’ Jimmy James about his time so far as a Billiken and his team’s outlook for conference play, which begins on Dec. 31 at Rose Hill Gym against Fordham University.
Jimmy James: I want to start with how your time with the Billikens has been thus far. With a large chunk of the season now complete, what has it been like suiting up for Saint Louis?
Robbie Avila: It’s been an adjustment for sure. Obviously it’s been a lot of fun getting to know new guys and getting to start another journey here for year three for me. We’ve had our struggles obviously, nobody’s happy with how the non-conference really went. We obviously wanted to do better, and it’s not gonna be perfect. We felt like we left a lot on the table early in the non-conference, but we’re excited to continue to get back to work and get ready for this A-10 play.
JJ: Your head coach Josh Schertz also made the switch from Indiana State to Saint Louis. What’s it been like having that familiarity at the head coach position and how has that helped in your transition to a new team?
RA: It’s definitely made it a lot easier than what it would be if I had a new coach for sure. Knowing what Coach Schertz is like, knowing what I get out of him, he obviously knows me really well. It makes things a lot more comfortable. Obviously the offensive system, the way we want to play defense, I’ve known it for the last two years at Indiana State, and so just having Coach Schertz and being able to continue to play underneath him has made a lot of things easier than if I had ended up at a different school with a whole new coach and new system and stuff like that.
JJ: You’re one of eight transfers on this Saint Louis team. Given there are a lot of new faces, has there been an emphasis at all on building up the team’s chemistry in this slate of non-conference games before conference play ramps up?
RA: Yeah, 100%. With a team full of new guys, really only me and [Isaiah] Swope are not new to Coach Schertz. A couple guys stayed at Saint Louis, but having a new coach, these guys gotta adjust to a new system and everything. So really everybody else is either a freshman or a transfer and don’t know what was expected at the beginning of the season, so it’s definitely difficult to try and maximize what you can right from year one.
It’s a long process that takes a lot of time to be able to do so, and so me and…
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