By Nick Konotopskyj
Sports Editor
After starting the season with four straight conference wins, the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team dropped its third consecutive conference game on Sunday. This time, it was to the only undefeated team left in the Atlantic 10, the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Rams by a score of 84-76.
After starting the game with a five minute-30 second scoring drought, the Bonnies settled in and went into the locker room up by one. Then it was Marcus Posley time. Posley scored 22 of his 30 points after the break to help push the Bonnies’ lead to nine points midway through the second half.
Foul trouble and a lack of size contributed to VCU’s comeback. Dion Wright was next in line for scoring with 18 points and 13 rebounds for the brown and white. Meanwhile, the Rams were led by JeQuan Lewis who scored 26 points on just 15 shots and dished out seven assists on the night.
Despite the loss, coach Mark Schmidt liked the way his team battled on the road against a formidable opponent.
“I’m really proud of our team’s effort,” Schmidt said. “We got off to a shaky start, but I thought we composed ourselves, played extremely hard and competed. VCU just made the plays at the end of the game, and we didn’t get enough stops.”
The Bonnies are now 4-3 in the A-10, which is tied with the Davidson Wildcats for fifth in the conference with 11 conference games still to go. VCU is a perfect 7-0 and 15-5 overall.
“VCU has a good defensive team,” Schmidt said. “We got in foul trouble and had to go small, and that hurt us a little bit. We didn’t play a perfect game, but I thought our effort was there, and it was enough to give us a chance.”
Forwards Jordan Tyson and Derrick Woods both fouled out of the game with under six minutes remaining, and Schmidt expressed how much the team missed both of them down the stretch.
“In a perfect world, you want at least one of your guys in there,” Schmidt said. “They have Alie-Cox and Tillman down low and we had two six-foot-six guys, so that hurt us.”
The road does not get any easier for the Bonnies as they host the Richmond Spiders Sunday afternoon at the Reilly Center for a 3 p.m. tip, the second game of the doubleheader. Last year, Richmond came into the RC and won handily by a score of 71-56.
St. Bonaventure was the number one team in the country in free throw percentage earlier in the season, but against VCU, the team only made 14 out of 20 (70 percent). That along with shooting just 30 percent from three-point range was a big reason the Bonnies could not keep up with the Rams late in the game.
konotonr12@bonaventure.edu
