PHILADELPHIA — This wasn’t the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team we’d become accustomed to seeing.
The league’s rebounding leader, Bona was out-boarded 23-14 and had just one offensive rebound in the first half. A team that fares well at the rim, it was trailing the points in the paint category, 20-12. More than anything, however, it had simply failed to play “Bona basketball” against the last-place team in the conference, finding itself down 30-27 at the break.
In that time, coach Mark Schmidt feared that perhaps the Bonnies were succumbing to the dreaded “trap game” after all.
His halftime message?
“I told them, ‘we can’t waste the great effort that we had against Duquesne and with an opportunity to have a big (nationally televised) game on Friday night by coming here and just playing the way we were playing.’”
And very quickly, Bona demonstrated why it’s become one of the hottest teams in the Atlantic 10 and why it should probably be perceived as one of its most dangerous squads as the league tournament approaches.
Justin Winston scored a career-high 20 points and Kyle Lofton matched that figure as Bona ultimately ran away from the cellar-dwelling Hawks, 74-56, before a crowd of 1,595 on Tuesday night at Hagan Arena.
Bona (17-8, 9-3) turned a nine-board rebounding deficit into a plus-eight (38-30) advantage. Ignited by Winston, who tallied 13 of his points after halftime, including an initial 5-0 spurt to give his team the lead back, it nearly doubled up the Hawks (43-22) over the final 20 minutes.
And in the end, it kept the proverbial train rolling.
At 9-3, Bona tied its best start in conference play under Schmidt (set in the 2015-16 campaign) and is now one win from tying the program record in that category (1982-83). It now sits a full game ahead of idle VCU and Richmond for third place in the A-10 standings. It’s won five in a row overall with three home games on the horizon.
“Give the guys credit, they showed great character,” Schmidt said of the Bonnies’ second-half effort. “We got off to a good start, we got some confidence. We made a few adjustments, and the guys did a really good job.”
Bona did a much better job against Saint Joe’s matchup zone in the second half, shooting 50 percent, including 8-of-16 from 3-point range as Winston, Lofton and Dominick Welch began to heat up. It made a key defensive change by putting Lofton on Ryan Daly, who limited the Hawks star to just one point over the final 15 minutes after scoring 20 prior to the switch.
By the second media timeout, it had opened up a 13-point lead. And Winston and Lofton were at the center of the turnaround.
Winston finished 8-for-14 from the field, including 4-of-7 from distance, while adding five rebounds and three assists. His performance left fans wondering where Bona might be come tournament time if the freshman forward continues to develop at his current rate. Lofton went 7-of-13 from the floor while also connecting on four treys and adding six rebounds. It was the first time the Bonnies had two 20-point scorers since Lofton and Courtney Stockard each reached that figure against Vermont in December of ‘18.
“I thought Justin was terrific,” Schmidt said, “making shots …
“We couldn’t have played better in the second half both offensively and defensively, and that’s what we need to do. We’re not good enough, we’re not well-coached enough just to play for 20 minutes. We’ve got to play an entire game. If we’re going to beat Davidson on Friday, we certainly need to do that.”
Osun Osunniyi added 12 points, nine rebounds, three blocks and three steals while Welch (3-of-8 from distance) chipped in a career-high seven assists. And on this night, the Bonnies not only extended their current win streak, but continued their domination of Saint Joseph’s.
Schmidt’s teams have now won four-straight and 11 of 12 over the Hawks, the last three by an average of 23 points. After dropping 22 of 24 on Hawk Hill from 1990-2010, it’s made Hagan a friendly confines, taking six of the last eight there.
On Tuesday, they were eventually able to take care of the rebuilding Hawks (4-20, 0-11) by doing what they do best: imposing themselves defensively, finding enough offense and, most importantly, rebounding.
“That’s all effort; we have it in us,” Schmidt said, before adding with a smile: “they’re dumb enough to show they can it for 20 minutes, now we need to do it for 40 minutes. One offensive rebound, 14 total rebounds (in the first half), that’s embarrassing. We’re the No. 1 rebounding team in the A-10, but for the first half we were the worst …
“But our guys responded. We showed some great character. It showed our young guys that they can learn from their mistakes.”
Schmidt admitted afterward that, given the emotional pull of the Duquesne win and the magnitude of what lies ahead, “one of my biggest concerns going into this game was … us overlooking them.”
“We have such a young team; we talked to the guys about it. You know how young guys are. (They say,) ‘Don’t worry, Coach, don’t worry; everything’s good.’ And then we came out … we just didn’t play well at all.”
Ultimately, though, they showed just how bright the future is while continuing to make their move in the month of February.
“Kyle did a great job (on Daly), we did a better job of getting into the gaps, Shoon did a terrific job of blocking shots,” Schmidt said. “It was a team effort.”
