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St. Louis University’s spot in the Atlantic 10 Conference came down to the very end of the final game of its season, and then some.

Another desperate comeback keyed by Isaiah Swope sent the game into overtime, where Swope and Robbie Avila hit 3-pointers a minute apart as SLU won 90-88 to secure the No. 5 seed in the Atlantic 10 tournament. SLU will face the winner of the first-round game between Richmond and Davidson at 1 p.m. Central on Thursday. SLU finished the regular season at 18-13, 11-7 in A-10 play. SLU finished tied with St. Joseph's for fifth and won the tiebreaker by having beaten VCU. 

Gibson Jimerson closed out this portion of his SLU career with a career-high 35 points, making a career-high 14 field goals and tying Erwin Claggett’s record for most 3-pointers made in a season with 103. Avila had 22 points, along with 10 turnovers and had two of his shots blocked. Swope had 17 points, hitting three of his final four 3-pointers.

In regulation, SLU was down a point at 73-72 and had the ball after a Duquesne turnover, but Swope’s attempt to pass to Avila was stolen by David Dixon, whose dunk put the Dukes up 75-72. On SLU’s next possession, Avila had a pass stolen for his 10th turnover and after a Duquesne timeout, Tre Dinkins hit a 3-pointer to put Duquesne up 78-72 with two minutes to go.

Swope hit his first 3 of the game with 34.4 seconds to go as SLU cut Duquesne’s lead to 80-77. SLU forced a held ball on the inbound pass and got the ball on the possession arrow and Swope then hit another 3 from the corner to tie the game at 80-80. Dinkins airballed a 3 that went out of bounds with two seconds left, but SLU couldn’t get anything off Kobe Johnson’s inbound heave.

SLU took the early lead in overtime, fell behind 85-84 and then Swope hit a long 3 with 1:31 to play that put SLU up 87-85. After a Duquesne miss, Avila hit a 3 that made it 90-85 with 31.7 seconds left. Another Duquesne miss gave the ball back to SLU, and even with Jimerson missing a free throw with 11.4 seconds left, held on.

By the time the game started, SLU knew what its situation was: Win and get the No. 5 seed and face the winner of the game between Davidson and Richmond, and potentially face No. 4 seed Loyola Chicago in the quarterfinals; lose and get the No. 6 seed and face the winner of UMass vs. La Salle and then potentially No. 3 Dayton.

With SLU having lost to Dayton twice, while splitting the series with Loyola, including a 31-point win on March 1, that option has to look a little more appealing.

SLU needed a longshot four-game parlay to get fourth place and a double bye into the quarterfinals, and it got the two most unlikely parts of it, with Dayton beating VCU on Friday night and La Salle snapping an eight-game losing streak and beating St. Joseph’s. But UMass, playing Loyola at home, made just one of 21 3-point shots and lost 74-51.

How well SLU was doing depended on when you looked in the first half. SLU used a 9-0 run to lead 27-19, then Duquesne went on an 11-0 run to go up 30-27, then went on a 7-0 run and was back in the lead. But a late run by Duquesne put the Dukes up at the half 40-38.

Jimerson had half of those points, getting his 19 on eight of 11 shooting, though only two of them were 3-pointers. Avila had 12 points, but had five turnovers and Swope had two points on one of six shooting and three turnovers.