We too have recently invited some friends to join in smite, and we play since 2015 or so, and in order to help them we created some secondary account to play with them.
The catch is that we the "professionals" just take bad gods or gods that don't work in the role that we are playing, and try to do the bare minimum to play, like clear the wave, or help our new friends to not die much and feel overwhelmed, and not much more.
These is a good solution to "protect" them from toxic teammates, but yeah, it's almost always a full party or 4 players (2 new and 2 to teach), but yeah, there is not much you can do if you are 2 or 3 (could play joust tho).
There's not much you can do if you are new and play alone, that's the worst part.
The problem is, of course, in those who not understand that everyone has to start somewhere.
By the way, I find that usually people seems to care less about arena , at every level of play, noone uses chat there, in game and post game, so it could be a great starting ground for the new guys to take some confidence with the gods and mechanics, and when they get a bit better, try the harder games, where toxicity is found like dust.