DAYTON, Ohio — If you’re willing to count it as such, the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team already owns one win over a ranked opponent.
It was back in mid-November, remember, that Bona knocked off then-3-0 Rutgers, 80-74, in the inaugural James Naismith Memorial Classic inside Toronto’s ScotiaBank Arena. And though it might not have felt like it at the time, that win has actually become among the most impressive in the non-conference of the Mark Schmidt era.
Two months later, Rutgers — yes, that Rutgers, now 14-4 with wins over Seton Hall, Penn State and Indiana, among others — is nationally ranked, checking in at No. 24 in this week’s Associated Press Top 25, its first appearance in the polls since 1979. That alone makes it one of the most notable early triumphs of the last decade, alongside victories over Maryland (in 2017) and St. John’s (2010).
Perhaps more than the win itself, however, was the precedent that Bona set.
That night, it beat a nationally relevant team without star center Osun Osunniyi, sidelined for the third of four-straight games due to a knee injury suffered in a season-opening loss to Ohio.
On Jan. 22, though, the Bonnies aren’t particularly concerned with the team at No. 24 in that poll. What matters now is the squad all the way up at No. 7: mighty Dayton, which, in the same time frame, has risen from a potential Atlantic 10 championship contender to one of the best teams in the country.
Bona — Saturday’s ugly 91-63 road loss to VCU aside — has already demonstrated that it’s capable of beating a Top 25-caliber team away from the Reilly Center. Though the task is only magnified in this one, it’s eager to prove that it can pull off a similar — even greater — feat tonight at UD Arena.
“It helps that we have done it before,” sophomore guard Jaren English said prior to Tuesday’s practice. “I don’t think it’s the last time that we’re going to beat a really good team. We’re excited to play the teams in the upper-echelon, that they say, in the A-10. And we’re just going to go out there and compete like no other.
“We’re going to bounce back from this game with VCU, continue to get better today, continue to prepare and just be ready to go (tonight).”
It’s not an impossible task to beat a tremendous Dayton team on the road, though nobody has done it in 10 tries this season, and few have been able to win in at UD, which routinely sells out its 13,000-seat arena, historically.
In the “snub season” of 2015-16, Bona managed to topple the No. 15 Flyers at UD Arena, 79-72. It remains the second of only two victories over Dayton in the Schmidt era, alongside a 2012 home win with Andrew Nicholson.
But it will likely take its most monumental effort since Schmidt’s arrival in 2007 to come away with win No. 3.
And, much like Rutgers, it might have to do it without Osunniyi.
Though the 6-foot-10 sophomore, who missed the VCU game after suffering a concussion last week against UMass, hasn’t yet been ruled out for tonight — he was described as “questionable” by the team on Tuesday — ‘Shoon wasn’t present, at least at the start, of yesterday’s practice.
But whether they have Osunniyi or not, the Bonnies, after being blown out by VCU without him, are expecting much better of themselves in this next “biggest” challenge of the season.
“We weren’t shocked or anything like that,” English said of the VCU debacle. “It was just the intensity of the game. The little things matter in those types of environments, and we just didn’t do the little things. I think we realized, in order to win those types of games … we have to really get going early.
“We had a slow start (Saturday), but I think we’ll be fine. We’re not going to change anything. We’re going to keep working hard and prepare the same way we do for any other team; go in there with a great attitude and great spirit to get a win.”
Despite dropping its last two to ranked teams, and coming in at 5-14 in such contests under Schmidt, Bona isn’t too far removed from a five-game win streak that spanned 2014-’18.
In Dayton, a Bona team gets its first crack at an A-10 foe ranked in the Top 10 since taking on No. 6/7 George Washington in March of 2006 — and its first Top 10 opponent overall since playing No. 5 Syracuse in 2009.
The Bonnies are excited, and motivated, by the opportunity.
“I’m truly excited, especially with my long journey (from the junior college level),” English said. “It’s not the first time I’ve played against a No. 1 team, or No. 1 seed or a Top 25 team in that instance.
“I know everybody’s doubting us, but we only need 13 people in that locker room to believe, and our coaches to believe in us and all the bona fans, and we’re going to be just fine. I believe it. It’s going to be an exciting game, a fun game to watch. I know the guys are excited and we’re ready to go down there and get this thing done.”
(J.P. Butler, Bradford Publishing Company group sports, editor, can be reached at jbutler@oleantimesherald.com)
