A mere two days later, the situation was no less frustrating.

Last Friday, the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team had a seventh game affected by COVID-19, seeing its home matchup with George Washington, scheduled for the following day, postponed due to virus concerns at GW. By Saturday, however, the Colonials were already back on the practice court.

GW broke its quarantine after a mere 24 hours, presumably due to a false positive test, CBS’ Jon Rothstein reported Sunday. That means the only thing truly affected was its trip to Bona and a game that will now be moved to a later date.

Of course, at a time when teams must err on the side of caution for safety’s sake, you can’t criticize the Colonials. They’d already had one game postponed last week due to Wednesday’s events in the nation’s capital and wanted to return to action. But that must have only added to the discontentment that has mostly defined this Bona season.

Now, coach Mark Schmidt’s team must do what it’s already done a handful of times under these circumstances: turn the metaphorical page. And that means focusing on tomorrow’s mid-afternoon matchup with Fordham (2 o’clock, ESPN+-live stream, WPIG-FM, WHDL-AM) inside Rose Hill Gym.

EVEN IN a disjointed season that’s produced just five games, Bona has begun to gain some recognition for a solid 4-1 (2-1) start.

The Bonnies checked in at No. 6 nationally this week’s “Other Top 25” poll, (for non-power league programs), by midmajormadness.com, released Monday. That’s second among A-10 teams, behind only No. 2 Saint Louis. They were listed as “also considered” (after the ‘first four out’ and ‘next four out’) in ESPN’s Joe Lunardi’s latest NCAA Tournament bracket projection.

Additionally, Jaren Holmes on Monday was named the Atlantic 10 Player of the Week for his 38-point outburst against Saint Joseph’s, making the junior guard, rather surprisingly, Bona’s first A-10 POW since Jaylen Adams won his last on Feb. 12, 2018.

And that — the fact Bona has been able to play so well amid such trying conditions and command some attention for it despite a ravaged non-conference campaign — has been a bright spot in a still-largely uncertain season.

Its next challenge: to continue its roll against the Rams … even after having the momentum it garnered in back-to-back wins over Richmond and Joe’s come to a slight halt over the weekend.

FORDHAM, in many ways, remains the cellar-dwelling team we’re accustomed to seeing.

The Rams, whose season didn’t start until Dec. 30 after their entire non-conference slate was wiped out for COVID-related seasons and the only A-10 team that’s played fewer games than Bona, are 1-3 overall. They dropped their first two league contests by 24 (to GW) and 37 points (to La Salle), respectively.

In five-plus years under Jeff Neubauer, they’ve turned in just one winning season (his first, in 2015-16) and finished last in the league standings each of the last three years, a continuation of the struggles that have consistently marked this program since its arrival in the A-10 in 1996.

This is also a Fordham team, however, that’s coming off one of its most notable weeks in recent memory, having knocked off Dayton (preseason No. 3), 55-54, last Wednesday at Rose Hill and taken Duquesne (preseason No. 5) to the wire before falling 48-45 on Saturday. And though both opponents were without multiple key players, it served as a reminder: Even Fordham is a team you need to show up and play against.

And that’s something of which Bona is well aware after needing overtime — and a career night from Dominick Welch, who totaled 22 points and 14 rebounds, both D-1 bests — to beat the Rams at Rose Hill, 62-55, just last February.

STILL, THIS is a game that Bona, as a potential league championship contender, even after a week off, will be expected to win.

And that’s mostly what it’s done in this series under Schmidt.

The Bonnies are 16-3 against the Rams under their 14th-year coach, having won nine in a row and 15 of the last 16 dating back to 2013. They’ve only lost once in eight games at Rose Hill, where it often feels like a home game for Bona due to the large alumni contingent in the area, under Schmidt’s watch, back in his first season (2007-08).

To push that winning streak to 10, the Bonnies will have to once again weather Fordham’s trademark pressure defense.

The Rams, who like most A-10 teams, are comprised of largely the same personnel as last season, have a handful of capable scorers in guards Chris Austin (12 points), Josh Navarro, and Ty Perry, the latter of whom had 16 in the teams’ last meeting, but has missed the last two games of this season. They also have a budding star in 6-foot-11 sophomore Joel Soriano, averaging 11 points and 10 boards.

But their identity centers on a snail-like pace and their trapping halfcourt defense.

Fordham used it to stifle the Flyers and Dukes into an average of just 51.5 points. And even in winning both games, Bona had problems against it last year, pulling away late in a 64-44 home win and tallying just 53 points in regulation (its second-lowest output against an A-10 foe) in that overtime victory at Rose Hill.

Bona, though, is far more athletic and offensively talented, and has also hung its hat on quality defense, currently ranking near the top of the A-10 in scoring defense (4th, 65.8), field goal percentage defense (3rd, .411), 3-point defense (1st, .257) and rebounding margin (3rd, plus-4).

And that needs to be its recipe for a season-best third-straight win.