ST. BONAVENTURE, N.Y. — Mariah Ruff and Mckenna Maycock combined for 45 points in St. Bonaventure’s win over Penn State on Saturday night, but an arguable difference-maker didn’t score a basket.

Abigail Johnson, SBU’s British freshman forward, made an unexpected appearance. In her first game action since her injury in the exhibition game, she played 18 minutes, grabbed six rebounds and played tough defense on Lady Lions post players Alisia Smith and Jaylen Williams.

The small Bonnies were relentless against the Lady Lions, corralling just one fewer board and holding PSU to 34 percent shooting (22-of-65) in the 65-62 victory. They improved to 5-5 on the season.

“I thought we were playing harder than they were,” Bonnies coach Jesse Fleming commented.

A boosted interior forced the Lady Lions to shoot 28 three-pointers; they made just four of them. Once again, the Bonnies had a formidable third quarter, outscoring Penn State 21-12 in that ten-minute period. PSU missed 11 of its 14 shot attempts in the third, while SBU made eight of 17.

After completing the concussion protocol and participating in what Fleming estimated were “four or five live practices, if that,” the 6-foot-2 London native made the impact she was expected to make. She would have scored a point on a foul shot, but left the free throw stripe too early and was whistled for a violation. It was one of the only blemishes on an encouraging night.

“She’s a difference-maker as far as we kind of can change how we guard ball screens, because she can kind of cover up and rebound,” Fleming noted. “And the issue we were having is if we made one mistake rebounding, if one guard didn’t make an extra step and help box out, we weren’t gonna get the rebound. And now, she can go in there and kind of win some one-on-one rebounding battles, get us some extra possessions. That’s obviously huge for us.”

The contest came down to the buzzer, with the Lions having three chances at the tying three-pointer. Teniya Page missed the initial chance, but Penn State grabbed an offensive rebound. Amari Carter then missed a three, but Jaylen Williams corralled the miss. Finally, Carter missed at the buzzer.

“Obviously they got three looks at the basket,” Fleming said. “Now it was all scramble stuff, they kind of got rebounds and tossed them up. It kind of looked like the Ray Allen thing with the Heat (in the 2013 Finals) against the Spurs.”

Fleming said Ruff’s game was probably her best in his coaching tenure and praised both Maycock’s game and the performance of Rhianna Council, who scored nine points on 4-of-5 shooting in 29 minutes off the bench.

When Bonaventure’s guards are playing at their best, and those three combining to shoot 22-of-39 while dishing out 10 assists certainly fits that bill, the team is a darkhorse contender in the Atlantic 10.

“Obviously I have been struggling a little bit,” Ruff said. “But I always think that getting my teammates involved is a big part of it… now teams aren’t paying as much attention to me as they are everybody else.”

Fleming was both complementary and comical in assessing Maycock and Ruff and the job they did to dethrone the previously 8-2 Lions.

“Mar’s had a really good week and she’s been locked in,” Fleming said. “Obviously, Kenna’s been Kenna. Kenna’s had a really, really good year. We’re always worried about Kenna at finals time, because she’s a brainiac. Nothing against you Mar; you’re a chem person, whatever. But they both locked in, made plays, you could just tell they wanted it tonight…. It was all just really, really good stuff from them.”

The Bonnies have now outscored opponents by 59 points in the third quarter in their five home games this season. Rather than some secret formula or method to the performances out of the halftime locker room, Fleming said his team must be playing poorly in the first half.

The numbers show some support of Fleming’s claim; Bona scored 37 of its 65 points in the second, shooting nine percentage points better in the final 20 minutes.

“It’s nothing at all that I’m doing… they do come out of the locker room with good energy,” he said. “They’re always locked in in the locker room; there’s no blame game. If we’re up, if we’re down, I feel like they approach it the same way, which is a really good thing to see.

“It kind of shows that the team’s maturing a little bit.”