Dayton basketball: Celebrating the 2015 Dayton Flyers 10 years later

Archie Miller jumped at the chance to talk about the 2014-15 Dayton Flyers. Ten years after that memorable season, Miller shared his memories at Atlantic 10 Conference Media Day in October.

Miller was about to enter his third season at Rhode Island after four seasons at Indiana. He has been a head coach for 13 seasons now and guided Dayton to the Elite Eight in his third season in 2014. That 2015 season, however, stands above the rest in terms of the job he did getting the most out of a limited roster.

Playing with six scholarship players and one walk-on for a majority of the season, Dayton finished 27-9 and won two NCAA tournament games.

“Of all of the years that I’ve been a part of team sports, the book or the chapter, so to speak, on that one was unmatched,” Miller said in October in Washington, D.C. “It was almost really, as you look back on it, unfathomable that the team was able to continue to do what they were doing at that level and then continued to drive toward the NCAA tournament, winning games. That season could have went sideways.”

Miller credited trainer Mike Mulcahey, who has remained on Anthony Grant’s staff for the last eight seasons, for helping the players navigate that season.

“He probably more than any human being deserved a raise after that year just because of what the players went through on a daily basis,” Miller said. “It was very hard on our staff to be able to manipulate the weeks, the days in between the games. There was some art to how we had to practice to do things.

“Looking back on it now that it’s over, I’ve never seen a group be as cohesive on the floor and resilient in terms of not giving up what they worked for to get to where they were.”

After the success of 2014 when Dayton beat Ohio State, Syracuse and Stanford before losing to Florida in the Elite Eight, Miller knew there was a chance Dayton would be a “flash in the pan” in the Atlantic 10 Conference. La Salle, for example, made the Sweet 16 a year before Dayton reached the Elite Eight and finished 15-16 the next season.

“You can go to the tournament one time,” Miller said. “You could make a run one time in the tournament. Our goal was always to be consistently there every year. That team could have very easily just checked the box, so to speak, that it wasn’t going to be doable. They didn’t. They deserve a lot of credit.”

Here’s a look back at that season:

MVP: A 6-foot-4, fifth-year senior guard from Cincinnati, Jordan Sibert led the team with 16.1 points per game. He improved his scoring from 12.2 points per game as a junior when he made his UD debut after two seasons at Ohio State.

“Jordan Sibert was fantastic that year,” Miller said in 2024. “In my opinion, he was the player of the year in the league. He was an unquestioned leader. He was a huge sounding board for the young guys throughout adversity. We still had to coach extremely hard to do what we had to do. We had a little bit of freedom to know that those guys were never coming out of the game, so they weren’t going to be too upset. But Jordan was fantastic as a leader.”

Sibert scored 1,030 points in two seasons with Dayton. He ranks 47th in school history in scoring.

Biggest off-court news: Dayton was 7-2 after a 69-55 loss at Arkansas on Dec. 13. Four days after that game, junior forwards Devon Scott and Jalen Robinson were dismissed from the team for breaking into dorm rooms on campus. Scott started the first nine games, averaging 9.1 points. Robinson averaged 3.2 points off the bench.

Robinson and Scott both served jail time in 2015. Robinson issued a public apology to UD in 2016 and enjoyed a long pro career overseas. Scott and Robinson, who also played in many different countries during his pro career, have both played for Dayton’s alumni team, the Red Scare, in The Basketball Tournament.

Worst injury news: Dayton’s depth took another hit when Ryan Bass, a 5-9 guard who played his first three seasons at Oakland, ended his college career in early January after the latest in a series of concussions. He averaged 9.5 minutes in eight games.

Credit: David Jablonski

Other roster limitations: Three of Dayton’s scholarship players never saw action.

• Detwon Rogers, a 6-6 junior forward, who played the previous two seasons at a junior college, was sidelined by a knee injury through December. He returned to practice but then stopped practicing and even attending games because of academic troubles. He transferred after the season.

• Junior guard Charles Cooke, who would lead Dayton in scoring the next two seasons, had to sit out the season as a transfer.

• Freshman center Steve McElvene practiced with the team, as did Cookie, all season but sat out the season as a NCAA partial qualifier.

Most improved player: Kendall Pollard, a 6-6 sophomore forward from Chicago, improved his scoring average from 2.2 to 12.7 and his rebounding number from 1.3 to 5.3. He won the A-10′s Chris Daniels Award as the most improved player in the league.

“Kendall is a stud, a guy who is a very tough cover,” Miller said that March. “He’s very versatile. We rode him in games at times. We needed him. As important as Jordan is, as important as Dyshawn (Pierre) is, Kendall is as important as any of them.”

Pollard finished his career in 2017 with 1,171 points. He ranks 38th in school history.

Best freshman: Darrell Davis, a 6-4 guard from Detroit, averaged 4.8 points in 18.7 minutes per game as Dayton’s top reserve.

Davis led the nation in 3-point shooting percentage in mid-January and made 17 of 19 3s in a five-game stretch. His final percentage was 45.2 (47 of 104). That’s the fourth-best mark by a freshman in school history and the best mark by a freshman who attempted 100 or more 3-pointers.

Davis played in his final season in Grant’s first season in 2017-18 and hit the 1,000-point mark in his final game. He ranks 50th in school history with 1,008 points.

Best rebounder: Dyshawn Pierre, a 6-6 junior forward from Whitby, Ont., averaged a team-best 8.1 rebounds and tied Pollard for the second-best scoring average (12.7).

“Dyshawn had to switch positions in the middle of that year,” Miller said in 2024. “He had to become more of a power forward, so to speak, rather than the traditional wing that he was. Him seamlessly being able to become a jack of all trades at the forward position kind of changed who we were.”

Top playmaker: Scoochie Smith, a 6-2 guard from the Bronx, N.Y., led Dayton with 3.8 assists per game and averaged 9.2 points. He ranks 29th in school history with 1,289 points and was the first member of the 2014-15 team inducted into the UD Hall of Fame. He was a member of the 2024 class.

“He continues to give us really steady play at the point guard spot,” Miller said in January 2015. “For the first time in his career, he’s very comfortable going to the basket. He’s converting a lot of layups and two-point finishes. He’s really a confident shooter, and that makes it easier on our team now. He’s a terrific steady ship.”

Best defender: Kyle Davis, a 6-0 guard from Chicago, joined Smith and Pollard as first-time starters. Each averaged between 29 and 33 minutes per game. He ranks 75th in school history with 830 points.

“The three true sophomores — Kyle, Scoochie and Kendall — their careers were sped up faster than we ever anticipated,” Miller said in 2024.

Credit: HANDOUT

Best walk-on: With only six scholarship players available for more than half the season, Dayton turned to walk-on Bobby Wehrli, a 6-6 forward from Naperville, Ill. He provided an unexpected boost, averaging 2.3 points and 2.1 rebounds in 14 minutes per game.

“We said that we needed more walk-ons, more guys to help us in practice,” Miller said in 2024. “And Bill Comar (director of operations), give him credit. He found Bobby.”

Best stat: Dayton ranked among the best teams in the country at getting to the free-throw line. It ranked 12th in free-throw rate (48.2%), which is calculated by dividing free-throw attempts by field-goal attempts. That’s the best number the program has produced in all the years (since that 1996-97 season) that KenPom.com has tracked the stat. The number would have helped the team even more if it had shot better at the line, but it shot 68.6%.

Dayton also excelled at not letting opponents get to the line. It ranked 44th (30.6).

“It’s the secret to this season’s success: that overwhelming number,” Miller said in 2015. “Not putting people at the line and getting to the line. I wish we made more. But that’s one of the more prideful numbers we represent here for our kids and our staff.”

Worst stat: Dayton’s lack of depth caused it to rank 341st in the country in bench minutes. The reserves played 21.4% of the total minutes. Sibert, Pierre and Smith all averaged more than 32 minutes per game.

Late in the season, the players often shot down the idea that the minutes would catch up them.

“No, we don’t get tired,” Sibert said.

“Can’t afford to get tired,” Smith said.

Best non-conference victory: Dayton beat Mississippi 78-74 on Dec. 30 at UD Arena to close non-conference play with a record of 10-2. Ole Miss finished 21-13 that season and made the NCAA tournament as a No. 11 seed.

It was Dayton’s third straight victory after the dismissal of Scott and Robinson.

“To me, this is one of our more impressive non-conference wins just because of some of the things we’ve had to overcome,” Miller said then. “A lot of these guys have stepped up in a big way.”

Best A-10 victory: Dayton started 5-0 in Atlantic 10 Conference play before losing three of its next five games. It then won six of its next seven games. In that stretch was a 59-55 victory on the road against Virginia Commonwealth on Feb. 28. Sibert scored 19 points. Pollard had 16.

VCU finished 26-10 that season. It was the final season for coach Shaka Smart.

“It’s the right time to play this type of basketball,” Smith said. “We played hard. March starts tomorrow.”

Worst regular-season loss: Dayton lost 83-73 at Duquesne on Feb. 21. The Dukes entered that game with an 8-16 record and finished 12-19. The Flyers lost despite the best individual performance of the season. Pierre scored 27 points on 11-of-17 shooting and grabbed 13 rebounds.

“Everything that’s good about our team that’s nice to talk about, when you lose,” Miller said then, “(the media) can flip it all around and say, ‘Here it comes. They have no depth. They’re tired. They can’t do it. They can’t do this. They can’t do that.’ Judge us on how we finish the season.”

Most disappointing loss: Dayton lost 55-53 at La Salle on March 7 in the final game of the regular season. The defeat prevented Dayton from sharing the regular-season championship with Davidson. The Flyers finished 13-5, a game back of the Wildcats, who won the title in their first season in the league.

“They were fired up,” Pierre said after the game of La Salle. “They can be a really tough team to beat. They have really good big men. They wanted to get a win for their seniors.”

A-10 tournament summary: Dayton earned the No. 2 seed in the A-10 tournament, which was played in the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., for the third straight year.

• In the quarterfinals, Pollard scored a career-high 26 points and helped clinch a 75-71 victory against No. 7 seed St. Bonaventure with a steal as Dayton tried to protect a 2-point lead in the final seconds.

• In the semifinals, Kyle Davis made two free throws with 18 seconds remaining to seal a 56-52 victory against No. 3 seed Rhode Island.

• In the championship game, Dayton lost 71-65 to No. 5 seed VCU. The Flyers trailed 33-26 at halftime and fell behind by 11 early in the second half. They trailed throughout the second half and never led but tied it three times in the final minutes. Each time the Rams, who had lost in the championship game the last two years, scored to take the lead again.

Biggest postseason surprise: After the A-10 title game, Dayton stopped to watch the NCAA tournament Selection Show at Burke’s Restaurant and Bar in Yonkers, N.Y., on the drive from the Barclays Center to the airport. The Flyers expected to hear their name but were stunned to earn a No. 11 seed and a game against Boise State in the First Four at UD Arena, where they had not lost all season.

“Everybody was quiet,” Pierre said. “There was no celebration. We definitely didn’t think we’d get such a low seed.”

NCAA tournament summary: The seeding proved to be a blessing in disguise because it resulted in one of the most memorable victories in school history and one of the most famous shots. Dayton beat Boise State 56-55 thanks to a go-ahead 3-pointer by Sibert with 35 seconds to play.

“Coach (Archie Miller) called the play,” Sibert said. “He believed in me. When you’ve got a group of people like this around you who — no matter if you have foul trouble or shots are not going in — just keep telling you to shoot the ball and believe in yourself, it’s easy to go out there and catch a good rhythm and shoot it.”

• Dayton’s reward for beating Boise State was a game close to home at Nationwide Arena in Columbus two days later. The Flyers delivered one of their best performances of the season against No. 6 seed Providence, winning 66-53 in a game that started at 10:53 p.m. and finished at 1:09 a.m.

The Flyers led 44-41 with 6:43 to go and went on a 12-1 run over the next four-plus minutes. Pierre had six of his game-high 20 points during the run.

The late start didn’t bother the Flyers at all.

”If you can’t get up for moments like this, then I don’t know why you’re here,” Smith said. “These are the three most competitive weeks of your life unless you play in the NBA finals or the Super Bowl or something like that.”

• Dayton then nearly advanced to the Sweet 16 for the second straight season but lost 72-66 to No. 3 seed Oklahoma. The Sooners trailed 56-49 at the 10:23 mark and scored the next 13 points. A turnover by Darrell Davis led to a layup by Buddy Hield at the 5:56 mark. Oklahoma took a 57-56 lead and never trailed again.

The Flyers (27-9) fell one victory short of tying the school record for victories. Their quest to become the first Dayton team to reach the Sweet 16 in consecutive seasons since the Don Donoher era in the 1960s ended when they missed seven straight shots during the key stretch and committed five turnovers.

Credit: DaytonDailyNews

Postscript: Smith, Pollard, Kyle Davis and Darrell Davis played key roles the following two seasons as Dayton climbed to the top of the A-10 standings, tying for the regular-season championship in 2016 and winning the title outright for the first time in 2017.

With help from Cooke, who played two seasons with the Flyers, Smith, Pollard and Davis finished their careers as the winningest senior class in school history. Their 102nd and final victory came against VCU on Senior Night in 2017. They also became the first players in school history to play in the NCAA tournament four straight seasons.

The NCAA tournament victory against Providence was Dayton’s last victory in the tournament until it rallied from a 17-point deficit to beat Nevada in 2024.

“I’ll remember this season for as long as I live, regardless of how long I coach,” Miller said after the final game in 2015. “There will never be a team of seven people duplicating what we did: win 27 games with six scholarship players, a freshman, three sophomores. It will never be done again.”