Which Dayton team would show up? The one that lost to UMass Lowell and Libscomb or the who knocked off Kansas. On Tuesday St. Bonaventure found out to the tune of a 68-50 beating at UD Arena. In all fairness to Dayton, those aforementioned losses were two months back. As of late Anthony Grant’s Flyers (4-1 A10) have won four straight. Their lone blemish in A10 play was a one point loss to VCU. The Bonnies are now 2-1 in conference play. The numbers of note:
Possessions: 58 – both teams favor a slower tempo, no discernible advantage here.
Offensive efficiency: Dayton 117, St. Bona 86- outstanding effort on both ends by the Flyers, not so by the Bonnies.
eFG pct: Dayton 64%, St. Bona 39%- This basically told the story of this contest. Dayton shot 18 of 34 (53%) from two point range while blistering the nets at a 10 of 18 (56%) clip from three. Bona was 15 of 31 (48%) inside the arc and 4 of 23 (17%) from beyond it.
TO rate: St. Bona 14%, Dayton 16%- Discuss turnovers a great deal in my summaries but on this night the miscues of both teams were not a huge factor.
Jalen Adaway was Bona’s lone double digit scorer connecting for 15 points. Osun Ossuniyi added 9 points while blocking 4 shots. Flyers were led in scoring by three freshmen. DaRon Holmes and Koby Brea led the way with 20 points. Koby Elvis added 14. Brea was Kenpom.com player of the game, coming off the bench to dial 6 of 7 from long distance. Malachi Smith, yet another freshman, handed out 12 assists, two more than the entire Bona team , for the Flyers.
“When they (Holmes and Elvis) shoot the ball like that they are hard to beat,” Bona coach Mark Schmidt noted on gobonnies.com, “You have to give up something and they played really well. They hit shots and made it difficult on us.”
Bona led 17-12 early before Dayton went on a 18-2 run holding the Bonnies scoreless for seven minutes. Bonnies trimmed a twelve point deficit to nine early in the second half but never drew closer than the three possession difference. “We played a very good team that did a great job keeping us out of rhythm,” Schmidt added.
There were offensive woes for sure.- poor shooting and general lack of offensive cohesion. Once again, though, the three point shooting defense reared its ugly head for Bona. On the conference season the Bonnies are ninth allowing opponents to hit beyond the arc at a 39% rate. That’s something needing immediate adjustment with almost half the conference connecting at a 40% or better rate from beyond the arc.
Next up for the Flyers (12-6 overall) is a visit to George Mason on Saturday. The Bonnies (8-4) will visit Duquesne on Friday.
