BY ANDREW HALE, SPORTS EDITOR
The St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team fell 77-60 to Auburn in the Legend Classic Championship game Friday night in the Barclays Center.
Brooklyn native and redshirt junior forward Chad Venning got the Bonnies on the board early, scoring the team’s first four points.
The Bonnies saw shades of their opening-round matchup against Oklahoma State as Auburn quickly took a 15-6 lead.
The Bonnies slowly crept back after an Assa Essamvous and-1 got the Bonnies to within five, 18-13.
The Tigers started to pull away after a pair of threes from guards Aden Holloway and K.D. Johnson put the Tigers up 30-17 with eight minutes to go in the first half.
Auburn’s offense continued to roll as an emphatic Jaylin Williams windmill dunk with 33 seconds left put Auburn up 45-28.
Junior guard Denver Jones put the icing on the cake for the Tigers in the first half as his three-pointer, with four seconds left, gave Auburn a 20-point lead going into halftime.
While the Bonnies shot 41.4% from the field in the first half, they didn’t help themselves, turning the ball over 11 times.
Auburn shot lights out in the opening frame. The Tigers were 55% from the field and shot 7-14 from the three in the first half.
“At halftime, we try to find some small victories,” said Bonaventure head coach Mark Schmidt. “Give our guys credit, I thought down 20 of the halftime, they could have folded. We fought back and we had some opportunities to cut it to single digits.”
Like in the first half, Venning was hot early, scoring four of the Bonnies’ first six points in the second half. Venning started his night 6-6 from the field before missing his first shot.
Venning’s offensive efficiency would be overshadowed as the Bonnies big man turned the ball over five times.
The Tigers made the Bonnies pay as Auburn scored 24 points off turnovers.
“There’s a lot of things we got to work on,” said Schmidt. “That’s going to be the focus for the next two or three days getting ready for Bucknell.”
Trailing 54-34, redshirt senior guard Moses Flowers, who missed game one with an injury, gave the Bonnies life, scoring five consecutive points.
Charles Pride, who has struggled offensively throughout Bonaventure’s two games in Brooklyn, scored his first points near the 10-minute mark in the second half. The graduate student guard finished the game with four points, shooting 1-7 from the field.
While Bonaventure got the score to within 13 with two minutes left, the Tiger’s offense was too much to handle. Johni Broome and his 18 points led Auburn to a 77-60 victory, crowning the Tigers as champions of the Legends Classic.
“[Broome] is tough and they’ve got a good system,” said Schmidt. “They have really good players around him. He’s got a good skill. He’s got a good size and good touch. He’s a handful.”
While Bonaventure lost by double digits, Auburn only outscored the Bonnies by three in the second half.
Venning led the Bonnies in scoring at 14 before fouling out with six minutes left.
“It’s only the fourth game of the season,” said Schmidt. “We’ve got a long way to go. Coming here and beating Oklahoma State was a positive for us. What we did in the second half, hopefully that can give us some energy going forward.”
Bonaventure returns home to play Bucknell Wednesday at 7 p.m. in the Reilly Center.
halea22@bonaventure.edu
