ANALYSIS: Three takeaways from Dayton’s victory against Longwood

Wood is short for Longwood, and Longwood was a longshot playing on the road against one of the hottest teams in the country, the Dayton Flyers.

Dayton had not trailed at halftime in its four previous December games against Grambling State, Troy, Cincinnati and Oakland and won those games by an average of 20 points but faced a 37-34 halftime deficit Saturday. It was only that close because Dayton forward DaRon Holmes II made a 3-pointer in the final seconds of the first half. That shot gave the Flyers a bit of momentum, and they build on it in the second half en route to a 78-69 victory.

“That was a big one,” Holmes said.

Dayton (10-2) won its seventh straight game, its 17th straight non-conference home game and stayed perfect at home this season with its seventh victory in front of a sold-out crowd of 13,407.

Here are three takeaways from the 12th game of the season:

1. Dayton’s eight-man rotation appears set for now: Freshman Petras Padegimas made Dayton’s first 3-pointer of the game Saturday. He finished with three points in 10 minutes. He has passed Zimi Nwokeji, who has not played in the last four games, except for a brief stint at the end of the Oakland game, in the pecking order.

“For a freshman, (Padegimas) has done a really good job of competing,” Dayton coach Anthony Grant said, “and I think he’s done a good job of learning, offensively and defensively, our system. He’s got great size. I think he’s got a really bright future ahead of him. He’s got a really good IQ. I think he’s done a good job for us.”

Injuries could lead to another chance for Nwokeji because the only remaining scholarship player not seeing time right now. Guard Kobe Elvis hurt his ankle in the final minutes and was icing his ankle on the bench at the end of the game.

“I think he’s fine,” Grant said. “The game just ended, so I don’t really know a whole lot.”

With Dayton redshirting freshmen Jaiun Simon and Marvel Allen and Malachi Smith out for the season with a knee injury, the Flyers have nine scholarship players available for the rest of the season.

2. Second-chance points continue to hurt Dayton: Longwood grabbed 11 offensive rebounds and turned them into 17 points. That’s been a trend all season for Dayton, which ranks 300th in the country in offensive rebounding percentage by opponents (33.1).

“I hate to put it like this, but it comes down to ‘want to’ at the end of the day,” Grant said. “Who’s going to go get the ball? At times, we block out really well, but then you’ve got to go get the ball. Sometimes we get caught watching, and the other teams pursue it, and they’ll be first to the spot and they go get the ball. It’s not one thing. It’s not one guy. But I think it’s something that as a team, you recognize, ‘OK, this is what needs to happen,’ and you collectively go out and try to make that happen on every given night.”

3. Koby Brea made big plays in the second half: Brea was one of the hottest shooters in the country entering the game but missed his three 3-point attempts in the first half. In the second half, he got back on track, making 2 of 4. He finished with 12 points on 5-of-10 shooting.

Brea also had three steals. On another key play, he saved a ball from going out of bounds in the second half. That play led to a Dayton basket on the other end. He led Dayton in the plus-minus stat. The Flyers outscored Longwood by 13 points when Brea was on the court.

“Brea affected the game in a lot of ways,” Grant said. “I think we had a lot of guys tonight who did some really good things.”

STAR OF THE GAME

Daron Holmes II led Dayton with 27 points and 10 rebounds. He made 9 of 13 shots from the field, including 3 of 5 3-pointers. He improved this scoring average from 16.8 to 17.7 with his second-highest points total of the season.

STAT OF THE GAME

Dayton committed six turnovers after having two in its previous game against Oakland and six in the game before that against Cincinnati. The 14 turnovers in a three-game stretch is the lowest total since at least the 2009-10 season.

LOOKING AHEAD

Dayton opens Atlantic 10 Conference play at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Davidson (10-3). Davidson beat the Ohio Bobcats 72-69 on Saturday in Cleveland for its seventh straight victory.

Last season, Dayton won 69-55 at Davidson last season and beat Davidson 68-61 at UD Arena. The Flyers have won seven straight games in the series since a 73-67 loss to Davidson in the Atlantic 10 Conference tournament in 2017.

Davidson finished 16-16 overall and 8-10 in the A-10 last season. It was picked to finish 12th in the A-10 preseason poll.