Courtesy of GoBonnies.com
CEDAR FALLS, Iowa – On a night where offense was at a premium, St. Bonaventure’s efforts to push past Northern Iowa came up short as the Panthers captured a 62-52 win on a snowy night in the Midwest Wednesday evening.
The Bonnies finish their non-conference schedule at 6-7 overall, and like in each of those early season setbacks, Bona had a chance late in the going to move ahead.
SBU held UNI, traditionally one of the Missouri Valley Conference’s top offenses under longtime head coach Ben Jacobson, well under its season average (71 points, fresh off 83 points in a win over Towson Saturday). In the end, though, Bona couldn’t find enough of its own offense.
“We couldn’t score and when you can’t score it puts more pressure on the defense and we broke down at times,” St. Bonaventure head coach Mark Schmidt said. “But when you hold that team to 62 points, it gives yourself a legitimate chance to win, we just … we couldn’t score tonight. They did a good job of doubling Chad. I thought we competed, I thought we defended well enough. We had some breakdowns but that’s going to happen with a young team.
“But we just couldn’t score and that put so much more pressure on our defense.”Despite never finding much consistent traction on the offensive end, SBU pulled within one possession, 48-45, following a Daryl Banks III with under eight minutes to go.
Defense prevailed for much of the night and the stretch that followed was no different as that score held for over two and a half minutes.
There was one player who defied the offensive sluggishness in the McLeod Center, though – UNI’s Tytan Anderson.
The sophomore forward dominated much of the night, but he had been held in check while the Bonnies clawed back into the game.
As the minutes ticked away, though, Anderson helped fuel UNI’s final charge, helped in part by Bona foul trouble that limited multiple Bonnies, most notably Yann Farell who made a difference on both ends of the court.
The defending Missouri Valley regular season champion Panthers scored six straight points to pull ahead 54-45 with 4:19 left, a seemingly monumental advantage on this night.
With Farell back in the game, the Bonnies got back within two possessions, 56-50, following his offensive rebound and three-pointer at the 4:02 mark.
Anderson filled the paint with another bucket on the next trip for the Panthers, however, and the lead was never again threatened.
Farell finished with 11 points and eight rebounds despite being limited to 21 minutes, eventually fouling out. Chad Venning added 12 points, as did Kyrell Luc.
For the Panthers, 39 points came from two sources – Anderson, who recorded a double-double of 25 points and 10 rebounds – and preseason MVC All-Conference guard Bowen Born who, despite being held five points under his season average, finished with 14 points, including multiple key three-pointers late in the second half.
Two long frosty stretches during the first half limited Bona’s fortunes during the opening half.
SBU opened with three-pointers on each of the first two possessions as both Luc and Farell sank shots from deep, but that merely preceded a 13-0 UNI run as the Bonnies went scoreless for nearly five and a half minutes.
Moses Flowers started a thawing of the Bonnies offense as the visitors got back within two, 17-15, with 9:19 left in the half before he had to sit with two fouls, along with Farell who eventually picked up three whistles in the opening stanza.
Another Bonnies cold snap – this one lasting 6:42 – allowed the Panthers to slowly pull away, though Bona’s defense kept them in the game as the hosts could only muster a six-point advantage at the break.
UNI (5-7, 1-1) shot just 39 percent from the floor in the first half but connected on 13 of 22 tries after halftime as the lid eventually came off the bucket for the hosts while the Bonnies finished at a 37 percent clip for the evening.
“As I’ve said from the very beginning, we’re going to take two steps forward, one step back and we’re going to look good at times and we’re not going to look good at times. That’s just how it is,” Schmidt said. “We’ve got a young team that’s still trying to figure out what their identity is. So we’ve just got to continue to work at it.”
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