I’d always known what it meant to be a St. Bonaventure basketball fan.
I grew up in Olean and graduated from Bona. I’ve lived it. I’ve breathed it. But it didn’t occur to me just how far-reaching and loyal this fanbase truly is until one afternoon in Conway, Ark., in January 2009.
It was my first year as the beat writer for the Times Herald. The only reason both me and the Bonnies were in Arkansas was because we had to be, with Bona making a return trip to play Central Arkansas from two years earlier, back when it took any game it could get in the Anthony Solomon years.
Bona was in its second year of the rebuild under current coach Mark Schmidt. It was a season removed from an 8-22 finish and amid an encouraging, but nothing special 15-15 campaign. We were 1,112 miles from the Reilly Center. And still, across the way, behind the purple and white chair backs of the visiting bench, about 50 Bona fans, clad in brown and white, stood cheering their team on.
In Conway. Arkansas.
THAT WAS then, for a program that many people were only just beginning to believe in again. Over 13 years later, however, as Bona has swelled tenfold in stature within the Atlantic 10, so too has the passion within its following.
And what we’re seeing now? This is something else entirely.
All season long, there’s been plenty to chronicle within the confines of the actual basketball court. The Bonnies came back from 16 down to beat Clemson at the Charleston Classic. They welcomed back Osun Osunniyi from a one-game injury absence and picked up a critical Senior Night victory over Richmond. They earned a thrilling win over Virginia to punch their ticket to the NIT Final Four.
And, in each instance, what they did in those games was almost secondary to the stunning nature of their crowds.
Across three days in Charleston, their fan following WAS the story. Against Richmond, the RC was about as loud as it’s been without a full student section. And versus Virginia, they had an audience of several hundred, which often drowned out the home crowd (numbering some 7,000 in total) with “Let’s go Bona’s” chants.
In Charlotesville. In an ACC venue. Opposing a fanbase whose team had won a national title only three years ago.
That just doesn’t happen.
But that’s what it means to be a Bona fan.
“I’M TELLING you, Bonaventure’s a special place,” coach Mark Schmidt said after the Virginia win. “And people have no idea. They always ask me, what is it like to be the coach at Bonaventure, what is it like to play in the RC? And I can’t put it into words, you gotta see it. And once you see it, you won’t believe it. We had 500 people (here). And Olean’s a long way from here, it’s not easy to get to. And those guys are passionate.”
Citing one of his oft-used phrases, he added, “We have a cult, in a positive way. It’s ‘once a Bonnie, always a Bonnie.’ It’s just a special place and I’m just proud of being a part of it.”
Under Schmidt’s watch, it began with a smattering of fans on nights like Dec. 30, 2008, when a couple dozen showed up to Sojka Pavilion in Lewisburg, Pa., to watch Andrew Nicholson go for a near triple-double (22 points, 9 blocks, 8 rebounds) in a double-overtime win over Bucknell.
And it’s evolved into this …
BONA FANS’ presence in South Carolina was unlike anything you typically see in an in-season tournament. They’ve consistently had the best showing of any fan base at the A-10 Tournament, whether in Brooklyn, Pittsburgh or Washington, D.C. (despite what VCU and Dayton fans will tell you). And older fans have routinely done what they could to help the current student body.
Alumni helped pay for droves of students to be able to get to Charlottesville. They outdid themselves for the upcoming trek to Madison Square Garden, with 600 alums and friends incredibly raising more than $48,000 in donations to send eight coach buses to New York City for the Bonnies’ NIT Final Four matchup against Xavier.
“Unbelievable. That’s Bonaventure,” Schmidt said of those gestures. “That’s what Bonaventure’s all about. Basketball’s extremely important and people are gracious and they just support us wherever we go. And I’ve been the coach here for 15 years; wherever we go, there’s Bonaventure people. Oklahoma, Colorado … and it’s great to have their support and know how much they care.”
Bona students welcomed their team back to campus at 12:30 a.m. following that 70-68 triumph over the Cavaliers. They packed the entryway to the RC ticket office to secure their seats at MSG. They, and the community at large, will no doubt line Main Street in Allegany and Route 417 and North Union Street in Olean to help send the team bus off to its national championship opportunity.
From the looks of it, what we’ll see on Tuesday at MSG could go down as one of the biggest fan spectacles in program history. But that’s Bona basketball. And that’s been as big a part of this impressive, if unlikely, NIT run.
“We just stuck together, we’re a family here,” senior guard Kyle Lofton said. “You see the crowd, they came … St. Bonaventure’s different. It’s like a cult, it’s no place like it. We just love each other, we play for each other and we play for the five seniors. We got five seniors and we wanted to go out the right way.”
