A-10 tournament diary: Following the Dayton Flyers in D.C.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — There’s a giant, inflatable Billiken standing across the street from Capital One Arena this morning. My 3-year-old Chase thinks the Billiken is an elephant. It’s as good a guess as any.

Saint Louis, the No. 5 seed in the Atlantic 10 tournament, was one of the surprise winners Friday. It knocked off the defending tournament champions, No. 4 seed St. Bonaventure, 57-56 in the quarterfinals. The dramatic finish included a go-ahead jump shot by Gibson Jimerson and then two missed free throws by St. Bonaventure senior Kyle Lofton, who grabbed his own rebound after the second miss but missed a contested layup at the buzzer. It was a heartbreaking finish for one of the most veteran teams in the country.

“One play doesn’t define you,” St. Bonaventure coach Mark Schmidt said. “He’s been everything to our program.”

The Billikens advanced to face No. 1 seed Davidson in the first semifinal at 1 p.m. today. It’s the sixth semifinal appearance for Saint Louis in 15 A-10 tournament appearances. It won the tournament in 2013 and 2019.

“We knew the challenge at hand,” Saint Louis coach Travis Ford said. “They were the reigning champions. I was glad our guys responded. We talked about this was going to be an all-out battle. We knew that. We wanted it to be. Both teams made big plays.”

Davidson won the tournament the last time it was played at Capital One Arena in 2018. It has reached the semifinals in all seven of its A-10 tournament appearances. The Wildcats advanced with a 74-56 victory against No. 8 Fordham.

Of the four semifinalists, Dayton has the longest championship drought. It won the A-10 tournament for the first and, so far, only time at UD Arena in 2003. Richmond won its only championship in 2011, beating Dayton in the final in Atlantic City, N.J.

8:30 A.M., SATURDAY

WASHINGTON, D.C. — I rushed onto the court with my camera after the Dayton Flyers beat Massachusetts 75-72 on Friday night, figuring there would be an emotional moment in the handshake line between Dayton coach Anthony Grant and UMass coach Matt McCall. I was right.

I’ve described Grant as the best hugger in college basketball. He had a special embrace for McCall, who had known since March 1 his five-year run in Amherst would end when his team’s season ended. The Minutemen won three straight games after the news broke, and they almost won a fourth straight game, giving Dayton a scare in the quarterfinals. The No. 2 seed Flyers survived and will play No. 6 seed Richmond, which beat No. 2 seed Virginia Commonwealth 75-64, at 3:30 p.m. today.

Tom Archdeacon and I decided after the game he would write about McCall and Grant, and my main story would focus on Dayton’s DaRon Holmes II, who scored a career-high 28 points.

• Here’s the link to Tom’s story: For Flyers’ Grant, friendship with UMass coach ‘bigger than basketball.’

• Here’s the link to my story: Career night by Holmes keeps Dayton alive in A-10 tournament.

I waited much longer than usual after the game to talk to Holmes and Malachi Smith. Both were getting extra fluids through IVs from trainer Mike Mulcahey in a room behind closed doors. The other Dayton-area reporter here, Andre Johnson, of Dayton 247Now.com, and I both grabbed our laptops and stationed ourselves in the hallway because we weren’t 100% sure when Holmes and Smith were done, and if we had returned to the media room, we would have missed them.

A spot on the floor with my back against the wall is fine with me. I can work anywhere. Holmes and Smith are always great interview subjects, and the wait was worth it when they got to us. Below are videos of both interviews.

1:30 P.M., FRIDAY

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Springfield native and Wayne High School graduate Darius Quisenberry sat on the Fordham bench — sidelined by injury — in warm-up clothes Friday during an Atlantic 10 Conference quarterfinal against No. 1 seed Davidson at Capital One Arena.

In his first season at Fordham after three seasons at Youngstown State, Quisenberry has averaged a career-best and team-best 16.8 points per game. He won an A-10 Player of the Week Award in January. He was the first Fordham player to win the weekly honor since 2017.

Quisenberry missed five games in February with an injury but had played in the last four games and saw 20 minutes of action Thursday in a 54-49 second-round victory against George Mason.

Quisenberry graduated from Youngstown State in three years and entered the transfer portal last March. He has 1,634 points in four seasons.

11:40 A.M., FRIDAY

One of my favorite places in the world — other than the beaches of Maui or the firepit in my own backyard — is a giant media room. I experienced some of the best covering the Ohio State Buckeyes in the postseason four straight seasons and the Dayton Flyers in four straight NCAA tournaments. And I’ve now been to nine Atlantic 10 Conference tournaments — even the one that was cancelled in 2020; I was there for a few hours — though there was not a giant media room to enjoy last year at the Siegel Center in Richmond, Va.

The media room at Capital One Arena is my home as long as Dayton is alive this week. It’s situated in the Caesar’s Sportsbook Lounge, but most of the reminders this is a room for fans during the NBA season are gone — except for the shelves full of liquor bottles in the middle of the room. There’s free coffee and pop all day and plenty of food at different times. I finished only about half of a giant peanut butter cookie on Thursday. There are five long tables with plenty of room to plug in your laptop and get some work done.

As someone who writes and shoots photos and video, I brought a lot of stuff with my to Washington: two cameras; two phones; numerous charging cables; headphones; a digital recorder, you name it. I’ve been dragging a suitcase with all that junk one mile back and forth to the arena the last two days from my AirBnB.

The quarterfinal action kicks off at noon today with No. 1 seed Davidson playing No. 8 seed Fordham. Davidson has an 80 percent chance of winning, according to KenPom.com. The Wildcats beat Fordham 69-66 and 66-45 in the regular season. The last No. 1 seed to lose in the quarterfinals was VCU in 2019. It fell 75-70 to No. 8 Rhode Island.

The second game, at 2:30 p.m. features No. 5 Saint Louis vs. No. 4 St. Bonaventure. The teams played twice in a four-day stretch in February. The Bonnies won both: 68-61 and 83-79.

No. 2 seed Dayton plays No. 8 UMass at 6 p.m., and No. 2 VCU plays No. 6 Richmond at 8:30 p.m. in the final quarterfinal. Richmond lost twice to VCU in the regular season: 64-62 and 77-57.

The blowout loss to VCU still stings the Spiders.

“I think that means a lot,” Richmond coach Chris Mooney said Thursday night after a 64-59 victory against Rhode Island. “The first half of that game was fairly similar to the first game in that it was back and forth, and we did some things well. But the second half, we were just very much outplayed and beaten to loose balls and beaten to the backboard. All those things. We’re anxious to get as much rest as we possibly can this evening and come out tomorrow and play much better.”

6 P.M., THURSDAY

The higher seeds have all advanced in the first four games at the A-10 tournament. No. 8 Fordham beat No. 9 George Mason 54-49 in the first game of the second round Thursday at Capital One Arena. Fordham, a perennial A-10 doormat, continued a remarkable transformation under first-year coach Kyle Neptune, whose team reached the quarterfinals for the first time since 2015.

“I think we’ve been playing our best basketball,” Neptune said. “That was our goal to start this year, to play our best basketball by the end of the season.”

Fordham will play No. 1 seed Davidson at noon Friday.

No. 5 Saint Louis beat beat No. 12 La Salle 71-51 in the second game of the day. The Billikens have won their first A-10 tournament game six years in a row.

“Very good performance,” Saint Louis coach Travis Ford said. “Very, very good defense. Extremely, extremely good defense.”

Saint Louis will play No. 4 St. Bonaventure at 2:30 p.m. Friday.

4 P.M. THURSDAY

Here’s the important information about this tournament. The A-10 hands out media gifts every year when you arrive at the conference tournament and pick up your credential. In the past, I have taken home a coffee mug and a Bluetooth speaker among other things.

This year, it was two nice glasses, the kind you would pour beer in. I immediately put mind to use by drinking a Mountain Dew out of one. I plan to give one of the glasses to the winner of my A-10 tournament bracket contest.

NOON, THURSDAY

WASHINGTON, D.C. — I just landed at Ronald Reagan International Airport in Washington, and I’m waiting on my bags. I had some great views of Columbus on the way out of town.

At some point later today, I’ll have to find time to update the results of my Atlantic 10 Conference tournament bracket contest, which I’ve been holding since 2015 or so. I invite fans on Twitter to fill out a bracket and sent to me.

This year, 76 people entered the contest, and 61 of them picked Dayton. Even though Dayton hasn’t won the tournament since 2003 and has never won the tournament outside UD Arena, fans keep picking the Flyers. They do have the best odds this year, according to KenPom.com. Davidson, VCU, St. Bonaventure and Saint Louis also got votes from the fans.

Twenty six people got both games right Wednesday as No. 12 seed La Salle beat No. 13 Saint Joseph’s 63-56 and No. 11 Rhode Island beat No. 14 Duquesne 79-77 in the opening round at Capital One Arena.

The second day of the tournament starts at noon Thursday with No. 8 Fordham playing No. 9 George Mason. The four second-round games will air on the USA Network.

9:40 A.M. THURSDAY

COLUMBUS — The road to the NCAA tournament goes through Washington, D.C., this week for the Dayton Flyers, and all roads have seemed to pass through Washington this season for me. I’ve flown into and out of the two airports in the D.C. area for six different games this season.

I’m getting on a flight from John Glenn International Airport in Columbus to Ronald Reagan International Airport in Washington in about an hour. Then I’ll grab an Uber and head to the Entertainment and Sports Arena, where Dayton is practicing at 1:30 p.m. The Washington Mystics, of the WNBA, and the Capital City Go-Go, of the NBA G League, call that arena home.

I then will talk to UD coach Anthony Grant one last time before his team plays in the Atlantic 10 Conference tournament at 6 p.m. Friday and shoot photos of the first 10-15 minutes of the team’s workout.

After leaving UD’s practice, I’ll head straight to Capital One Arena, where I’ll work on my stories and photos. I’m sure I’ll miss the end of the first second-round game between George Mason and Fordham, but I’ll be there for the La Salle vs. Saint Louis and the George Washington vs. Massachusetts games. Dayton will play the winner of the latter game, so I’ll keep a closer eye on that matchup.

I love the A-10 tournament because I know the teams so well after covering Dayton for nine seasons. In the last two years, I’ve written about my A-10 journeys, ranked the 14 A-10 arenas and shared a photo gallery of my travels in A-10 country.

I’ve seen every team play this season — some of them twice. I’ve seen the veterans from Richmond and St. Bonaventure play longer than my 3½-year-old son Chase has been alive. Amazingly, Richmond’s sixth-year senior Grant Golden was on the roster way back in the 2016-17 season when Scoochie Smith was a UD senior and is still playing with Scoochie’s brother Malachi Smith now in the league.

I have loved conference tournaments since my high school days. My family traveled to Chicago, Memphis and Milwaukee to see the Cincinnati Bearcats play in the Great Midwest Conference tournament in 1992, 1993 and 1995, and they won all three tournaments. They also won the championship in 1994 in Cincinnati, and we were there for that tournament as well.

It’s the idea of so many teams playing in one arena in such a short time with a NCAA bid on the line that makes it special, and the conference tournaments also provide a reason for hope all season. There’s always a chance a struggling team can get hot and make something happen in the conference tournament.

If there’s any team due to win a conference tournament, it’s Dayton. Will this be the year? Stay tuned. I’ll keep this diary updated throughout the week and weekend as the tournament continues.