Photo: St. Bonaventure Athletics
BY NATHAN SOLOMON, SPORTS EDITOR
St. Bonaventure trailed by as many as 16 points in the second half, but a late run fell short as the Davidson Wildcats held on to win 81-76 over the Bonnies on Tuesday.
“Our guys showed a lot of fight,” said coach Mark Schmidt. “I thought going into the game, if we can keep [Davidson] below 10 [3-pointers], then we would’ve had a shot… every time we made a mistake, they hit a big one.”
St. Bonaventure (12-6, 4-3 A10) and Davidson (18-3, 8-1) stayed nearly deadlocked for the first 18 minutes of the game before an 19-2 Wildcat run propelled the visitors ahead by 16 with 15:37 to play. St. Bonaventure cut its deficit to 12 multiple times, but Davidson responded to every Bonnie basket to hold a 15-point lead with eight minutes remaining.
“I thought the effort was there,” Schmidt said. “When we went under a ball screen or made some error, they hit a three. They hit a couple of contested threes — that’s what they do.”
The Bonnies slowly chipped away, trimming their deficit to nine after a pair of Jaren Holmes free throws with 1:46 left. Davidson’s Luka Brajkovic split free throws and St. Bonaventure’s Jalen Adaway responded on the other end with a 3-pointer.
After Hyunjung Lee added two from the charity stripe, the Bonnies inched closer with a 5-1 spurt capped by a Dominick Welch layup with 54 seconds left. St. Bonaventure fouled Lee immediately and he missed both free throws to give the Bonnies possession down five with 44 seconds left.
Holmes, running the offense, tried to kick the ball out to Kyle Lofton with 31 seconds remaining and overthrew him, resulting in a backcourt violation. The Bonnies forced a quick turnover and Jalen Adaway was fouled on a 3-point attempt with a chance to cut the lead down to two.
Adaway connected on two of the three shots to make it a three-point game, but the Bonnies again fouled. Foster Loyer, a Michigan State transfer, made two free throws with nine seconds left to ice the game for the Wildcats.
“The game is 40 minutes… our guys weren’t going to quit,” Schmidt said. “I knew our guys were going to fight.”
Adaway scored 21 points to lead the Bonnies and Lofton recoreded a near triple-double with 19 points, nine rebounds and eight assists. Welch scored 18 points, his second-highest point total of the season, and hit three 3-pointers.
Davidson had four players in double-figure points, including Loyer with 21. Lee added 18 off four 3-pointers and Michael Jones added 17. The Wildcats made 12 3-pointers and hit 47% of their shots.
“For us to be them here, I think that’s a big step for our team,” Davidson coach Bob McKillop said. “You can’t make a mistake against St. Bonaventure because they’ll make you play. They’ll cut you up surgically.”
St. Bonaventure made 46% of their shots but made just five 3-pointer. They did, however, win the rebound battle by two. Both teams turned the ball over 12 times.
Next up, Davidson concludes its two-game road trip with a stop in Washington D.C. to face George Washington. The Bonnies hit the road to face Richmond on Friday with the game scheduled for 6 p.m. ET on ESPN2.
