Game 15: GMU (8-6 / 4-4) at St. Bonaventure (8-1 / 6-1) on Saturday, January 30, at 2PM.

Covid continues to cause havoc with the schedule.
UMass on the 30th is postponed.
St. Bonaventure will play us this Saturday the 30th instead of Saturday, February 6.
Saturday, February 6 is now open. It may be used for UMass or GW. Stay tuned.

St. Bonaventure is currently 8 - 1 on the season and 6 - 1 in A10 play.

History: Including tournament play DP is 1 - 7 against St. Bonaventure.

Wins: Akron, Hofstra, Richmond, St. Joe’s, Fordham, Duquesne (x2), VCU
Losses: Rhode Island

Schedule: https://gobonnies.sbu.edu/sports/m-baskbl/2020-21/schedule
Roster: https://gobonnies.sbu.edu/sports/m-baskbl/2020-21/roster
Stats: https://gobonnies.sbu.edu/sports/m-baskbl/2020-21/files/Season_Combined.pdf

St. Bonaventure is led by Kyle Lofton (15.2 ppg), Jaren Holmes (15.0 ppg & 6.2 reb), Jalen Adaway (10.8 ppg & 6.2 reb), Dominick Welch (10.7 ppg & 6.9 reb), and Sun Osunniyi (9.7 ppg & 9.0 reb). Alejandro Vasquez is the only reserve to play an average of more than 10 minutes per game.

St. Bonaventure averages 70.2 points per game while giving up 60.7. The Bonnies shoot 42.9% from the floor and 30.0% from 3. Opponents are shooting 38.7% from the field and 27.8% from 3. The Bonnies shoot 70.8% from the free throw line. The Bonnies are currently out rebounding by their opponents by 4.3 boards per game. They average 12.0 turnovers per game.

The game is on CBS Sports Network.

My prediction: I don’t expect this to be much of a game. They are a very good defensive team. Given our offensive woes, liabilities, and deficiencies I don’t see how we are going to score against them. Bonnies win in a rout 75 - 54.

Discuss.

Their fans post to the A10talk.com forums - https://www.a10talk.com/forums/threads/bonnies-vs-gmu-sat-01-29-21-at-2-00-pm.857/

6 man rotation with Vasquez coming off the bench after Robert’s left the team. Still good enough to beat us with 6. Mason loses by 9 and OSUN puts Josh on a poster. Our defense cannot guard Lofton at all. Matchup of the game will be Jordan vs Adaway. Bona 69-60

Thanks. Missed Roberts leaving. Corrected.

Sounds about right...no answer for Lofton...Osun will eat our players up on the inside.

The only hope is to use Oduro like a decoy, sealing off Osun in the post and let AJ go to work against whoever is guarding him. Most likely Osun will take AJ and just casually slide over to block Oduro whenever he feels like it.

St. Bonaventure will probably play the sagging zone like they did before, because why not...they held us to 18 second half points the last time they deployed it and it's not like much has changed with our offense since then. So our second hope is both Oduro sealing off Osun in the post AND Kolek and Greene both being hot from 3 and finding the spots in the defense to hit.

We'll have no answer for Lofton on defense, so might as well put Kolek on him and let him score all he wants and try our best to limit the touches for the other Bonnies, but we aren't going to do that.

I got us losing somewhere between 12-18 points.

Bonnies are LEGIT this year. I will be surprised if we keep this short notice game under 15. Shame it's on CBS sports, will have to find a bar that carries it.

Schmidt is the best coach in the A-10, with all due respect to McKillop. He would be a great fit at Boston College.

I wouldn't be surprised if Schmidt gets the Boston College job. It's his alma mater. But, I'm hoping that he coaches at my alma mater (Penn State), where he was an assistant.

BTW, Schmidt's son Nick is on Aaron Kelly's staff at Catholic.

Ain't it good to be the coach?

https://www.si.com/college/2021/01/25/baylor-fsu-villanova-stanford-five-stars-ncaa:

"St. Bonaventure
It feels like an annual ritual at this point to look up in late January and see a Mark Schmidt team surprisingly hanging around the top of the Atlantic 10. In a league that has seen teams like Richmond, St. Louis and VCU get most of the attention, the Bonnies are quietly in first place atop the A-10 and are starting to collect the type of wins necessary to have a shot at an at-large bid come March. Wednesday’s win over VCU in Olean was quite the grinder: The Bonnies trailed by 15 at halftime but fought back by holding the Rams to just 14 second-half points and outscoring them by 31 in the second to earn a big win over an A-10 contender. The Bonnies then found a way to win a tough road contest at Duquesne, scoring the game’s next six points after being tied at 55 with 2:39 to go to pull away.

St. Bonaventure didn’t do much of substance in nonconference play thanks to a COVID-19 pause that delayed its start to the season until Dec. 15. Still, this is the type of experienced, well-coached group that will be a problem for opposing teams come March."

Might be tuning into audio with Bill Rohland or the Big Pig 95.7 out of Olean for this one. Spectrum wants me to purchase a $30 "Silver Package" just to get CBSSN. Don't feel like a bar for this one, maybe if this were a battle for a top 4...

Maybe time to make that move to Youtube TV.....I've got more sports channels with Youtube than I had with Verizon.

I can't believe St. Bonaventure fans haven't come up with a "Schmidt's Creek" shirt yet. Hello?!!!

They haven’t gotten Netflix up there yet man

Kenpom: Bonnies favored by 11.

From A10 talk: description of the NCAA payouts and a detailed overview of the Bonnies-Mason game.

https://www.a10talk.com/covid-19-alters-schedule-again-bonnies-to-host-george-mason-saturday/

"......Coach Paulsen does a great job with them.." he couldn't possible of said that with a straight face.

Thia offense looks pedestrian against bad defenses. I don't know how to describe what it is going to look like today.