After dropping their second consecutive home game, 61-59 to the Vermont Catamounts, to start the season the Bonnies are left scratching their heads.
“It’s just good shooters missing pretty good looks and that happens early in the year,” said Vermont Catamounts’ head coach John Becker following his win against the Bonnies. “I am thankful they didn’t shoot well tonight, but I thought they are gonna break out of it.”
The Bonnies shot 4-27 from three and 19-61 overall tonight with starting sophomores Bobby Planutis and Dominick Welch combining to shoot 2-13 from three.
Despite the poor shooting effor by the Bonnies they were able to stay in the game right until the very end. Their defense forced 14 turnovers and held Vermont to 17-48 shooting overall.
“When you shoot 4-for-27 from threes and you lose by a bucket it says that your defense is pretty good” said Schmidt.
After the 42 point explosion by Vermont forward Anthony Lamb in last season’s match the team was sure to key in on him if they were hoping to win. Lamb was held to 15 points on 3-12 shooting by the Bonnies, a shooting night Schmidt hoped would have lead to a victory for Bonnies.
“I thought we played extremely hard,” said Schmidt. “If someone told me Anthony Lamb was gonna get 15 points and go 0-for-7 on threes I would have thought we would have won.”
After a second half run by Vermont put them up 51-40 with 7:44 left to play, the Bonnies began to turn things around, mounting a comeback by getting to the free throw line.
The Bonnies took only 4 free throws in the first half but began attacking the rim late in the second half getting to the line 18 more times in the second half.
The Bonnies finished 17-22 on free throws for the game and cut the Catamount lead down to 4 with 1:08 left to play but ultimately came up short of the comeback.
“Give them credit,” said Schmidt. “They knocked down their free throws when they needed to make them…and I thought that we were right there we just made some dumb plays.”
The Bonnies resume action Tuesday as the team travels to Albany, New York, to faceoff with the Siena College Saints in the annual Brother Ed Coughlin Franciscan Cup at 7:00 p.m. in the Times Union Center.
Despite the less than stellar start by the Bonnies just remember Bonnies’ fans, like sophomore guard Kyle Lofton said postgame, “it’s just basketball, the shots are gonna start falling soon.”
By John Pullano Sports Editor
