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ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ University coach Josh Schertz wants to build his team’s depth. He wants to get his young players more experience and make them steady contributors for the Billikens.

Schertz also likes to win, and right now, that’s not mutually compatible with that depth development.

After playing his starting five — Isaiah Swope, Kobe Johnson, Gibson Jimerson, Kalu Anya and Robbie Avila — for 180 of the 200 minutes available Friday in one of the team’s toughest tests of the season, against St. Joseph’s, SLU faces an even tougher test Wednesday against St. Bonaventure at Chaifetz Arena, which means unless someone off the bench gets hot when he gets a chance, it’s going to be the starters who are on the court most of the time.

“We looked at it after the game,� Schertz said Tuesday, “against St Joe’s, those five guys together as starters, played 27 minutes in that game. They were plus-33, and any time we had a reserve in, which was 13 minutes that some reserve played, we were minus-17. That’s not good.�

It is not. It means a lot of wear and tear on the starters. Jimerson (third) and Swope (10th) are both in the top 10 at for percentage of team minutes played, and Avila and Anya are both averaging more than 30 minutes. SLU ranks 362nd out of 364 Division I basketball programs in bench minutes at 18.4%. (Beneath them, in case you’re wondering, are Drake and North Carolina A&T.) The subs played just seven minutes in the second half against St. Joseph’s.

The starters also did much of the heavy lifting against Fordham, and in SLU’s two Atlantic 10 games, the starters are plus-47 when together on the court, while when at least one sub is on the court, SLU is minus-6. For the starters, Schertz acknowledged, that’s “pretty impressive.�

So Schertz seems inclined to run with that, and who can blame him? SLU is the only team in the nation with three players averaging more than 18 points per game, and the team has held its past three opponents to 63 or fewer points as the team has finally hit its stride as its many new pieces have come together.

But the team is about to find that the A-10 can bring one challenge after another.

“It’s just continuing the same mentality, not getting complacent,� Avila said. “Schertz always talks about it’s easy to respond to failure because everyone wants to prove people wrong and it’s hard to respond to success. The ability to continue the same mentality has gotten us to this point and allowed to continue to get better and better over time. ... You lose one game here, it can cost you first, second or third spot. So we’ve got to approach every game the same way and try to win every single one.�

SLU’s bench has one experienced player in guard Kellen Thames, who has started at points but has had his time limited because of a hip flexor strain that kept him out three games aside from his persistent cramping issues, which have at times knocked him out of entire halves.

After that, everyone is new to SLU or college basketball — and sometimes both. Kilian Brockhoff is a sophomore who transferred to SLU from UC Santa Barbara. Amarai McCottry, Max Pikaar and Dylan Warlick are true freshmen.

“It shows you two things,� Schertz said. “Those (five) guys are starting to play well together and starting to understand who they are, and it also says, ‘Hey, you got to do a better job of getting your bench guys to where they’re playing minutes that are championship-level caliber, winning minutes, above the line.’ We talked about that with the group, we got to get guys playing more confidence, guys playing more toughness.

“I thought in the St Joe’s game, not (Thames), because I think his situation is so different, but the other younger guys have to play with more confidence, got to kind of put their chest out, go out there and play. And that’s like the Amaris and Maxes and Kilians and Dylans, those guys that are that are going to give us bench minutes. They got to come out, and it’s not about necessarily moving the needle in a huge way, but you got to go out, you got to compete, you got to do it with confidence, got to take care of the ball, defend and rebound and at least be a neutral at worst.

“And I think we can get those guys playing much better. And I think they will.�

But that may not be against Bonaventure, which is 14-1 overall (its best start since the 1969-70 team that, led by Bob Lanier, went to the Final Four) and, like SLU, 2-0 in league play. The Bonnies rank 11th nationally in scoring defense. It’s an early and unlikely meeting for first place in the league. SLU and SBU are two of only three undefeated teams left in the A-10.

“The first five will play a lot,� Schertz said. “I always coach to win the game in front of me. I’m not coaching to think about what’s going to happen two months from now and what’s it going to look like in March or April. That’s a million years away to me. I’m trying to win the game. My job is to help the team, do my part to win the game that’s right in front of me.

“So if that means we got to play five guys 40 minutes, we play five guys 40 minutes. It’s my job to make sure they’re in shape to play 40 minutes. Hopefully, that’s not the case. I’m hopeful that those guys are going to get chances. We’re going to put them in there, but they have to go in there and play in a way that gives me confidence, that they can perform at a high level in game.�