NEXT GAME
Dayton at Fordham, 4 p.m. Sunday, CBS Sports Network, 95.7, 1290
The Dayton Flyers wore their blue jerseys for the first time this season. They hired their lucky charm — Marty the Bus Driver, who drove them around for four games in the the NCAA tournament in 2014 — to chauffeur them around snow-covered Olean for two days.
The Flyers didn’t bring any horseshoes or four-leaf clovers to the Reilly Center on Tuesday but enjoyed one of their best evenings of the season — for one half at least.
Dayton led St. Bonaventure by 27 points at halftime and by 31 points seven minutes into the second half. They rode that hot start to an 85-79 victory in front of a white-out crowd of 4,176 that didn’t get loud until the final minutes.
The Flyers (15-3, 5-1) won despite allowing 61 points in the second half, though the Bonnies (12-5, 4-2) never got closer than six points.
“I thought our team, for the first time, took the floor with a mind-set that we have to have moving forward,” Dayton coach Archie Miller said. “That was as good as a half we’ve played all season. In the second half, we had (that mind-set) at times, but it got away from us. That’s kind of how our team is. We’re a little bit loosey-goosey. We don’t understand that a couple possessions can turn it around. We fought it out all the way to the end. If there was another two minutes, I don’t know if we would have finished it out.”
Charles Cooke led the Flyers with 21 points. Dyshawn Pierre scored 20. The Flyers shot 65 percent from the field in the first half and made 5 of 7 3-pointers.
St. Bonaventure shot 25 percent from the field in the first half and made 1 of 10 3-pointers. The Bonnies got back in the game by shooting 54 percent from the field in the second half and making 10 of 18 3-pointers, while turning up the pressure on defense. Marcus Posley scored 31, and Jaylen Adams had 27.
“All the credit goes to Dayton,” St. Bonaventure coach Mark Schmidt said. “The first half, I thought they played tremendous from a defensive standpoint. They shot the ball well from 3. They took us out of what we wanted to do. I thought the game was lost in the last 10 minutes of the first half.”
The Bonnies started showing signs of life midway through the second half. They still trailed 65-45 with 6:36 to play and 78-61 with 2:34 to go. They had a slim chance at that point but made it interesting by making four 3-pointers in the last 2:10.
Dayton, which beat Arkansas in overtime after leading 27-4, had seen this happen before.
“I know my crew,” Miller said. “Until that horn sounded, we’re never safe. Our team is just like that this year. I think our older guys aren’t doing as well as I would expect them to in key situations on offense and defense, fouling in certain situations or taking care of the basketball or making free throws.”
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