Each of these miscues contributed to an 81-77 overtime score at the Reilly Center that dropped St. Bonaventure to 18-10, 10-5 in the Atlantic 10. Bona missed an opportunity to sweep the regular season series and now find themselves just one game ahead of the 9-6 Dukes in the conference standings.
In the last six seasons, which have seen them win at least 10 A-10 contests each go-around, the Bonnies have 17 home-and-home sweeps, six home-and-home splits and five home-and-home 0-fers. Duquesne knows the receiving end well; the Dukes have been swept the last three years and haven’t defeated Bonaventure since Jan. 16, 2016.
The Bonnies are in third place in the Atlantic 10 standings despite lacking a prolific scorer. One player has scored more than 22 points this year: Kyle Lofton dropped 32 on Dec. 30 against Buffalo.
Fortunately for the Bonnies, all they had to do was make free throws and defend like they had all night. They held on to defeat Richmond 75-71 in front of a sold-out arena to improve to 18-9 overall and 10-4 in the A-10, their sixth consecutive season with double-digit league triumphs.
St. Bonaventure can regain the third spot in the Atlantic 10 standings with a win over Richmond on Saturday night.
SBU is still in control of its top-four destiny. If the brown and white win the remaining five games of the regular season, they are assured a double-bye in next month’s A-10 Tournament. They would also be assured of at least the three seed, with the head-to-head tiebreaker over Richmond.
Saint Louis outscored La Salle 31-7 over the last 12:16 of the first half and went on to post an 84-69 Atlantic 10 Conference victory over the Explorers Saturday afternoon at Chaifetz Arena…
The Bonnies fell into a double-digit deficit just 10 minutes in and never worked their way back into the game, dropping to 17-9 overall and 9-4 in the Atlantic 10 as their five-game win streak came to a halt.
Growing up in Queens in the 1950s and ‘60s, McKillop listened to Bona games on the radio. As he developed as a ballplayer in his own right, going on to play for Chaminade High School on Long Island as well as Hofstra University, he idolized Fred Crawford and the Stith brothers, Sam and Tom.
The Bonnies opened up the second by scoring six unanswered to regain the lead, an advantage they extended to 13 with 10:55 remaining. They never stepped back, winning 74-56 for their fifth consecutive victory. SBU improved to 17-8, 9-3 in Atlantic 10 play.