Thursday, March 14, 2024 4:00 p.m.
Barclays Center, Brooklyn, N.Y.

The Ramblers arrive in Brooklyn for their second ever A-10 Men’s Basketball Tournament as the #2 seed, which allows them to watch teams battle it out for the right to play Loyola on Thursday.

On Wednesday afternoon, the LaSalle Explorers—coming off a stress, come-from-behind 61-60 win over George Washington on Tuesday—came out on the losing end of another impossibly close game to St. Bonaventure, 75-73. St. Bonaventure and La Salle traded leads throughout the last third of the game, and when a put-back dunk to force overtime sailed over the rim at the buzzer, the Bonnies earned the right to move on.

St. Bonaventure beat Loyola 79-64 in Olean on Feb. 27, and looked to challenge UMass and VCU for the last double bye in the A-10 Tournament. But the Bonnies lost their next two games against George Washington and Saint Louis (the bottom two teams in the league) to finish as the 7th seed. Their performance on Wednesday against La Salle on a neutral court was just barely good enough to eke out a stressful win, with three Bonnies starters playing 30 minutes or more.

On Thursday, the Bonnies are likely to start 6’3” senior guard Mika Adams-Woods, 6’3” senior guard Moses Flowers, 6’4” senior guard Charles Pride, 6’6” sophomore forward Assa Essamvous, and 6’10” redshirt junior center Chad Venning. Adams-Woods is transfer from Cincinnati who runs the point and averages 13.3 points, 3.7 assists. Adams-Woods leads the team in three-point shooting at 46.4% and is one of three Bonnies that shoots over 80% at the line. Pride, a Bryant grad transfer, averages 11.6 points, leads the team in rebounding at 6.1 per game, and leads the team in steals at 1.2 per contest. Flowers averages 9.5 points, and is tied for the team lead in made threes with Adams-Woods. Essamvous averages 7.4 points and 5.3 rebounds.

Chad Venning, is the Bonnies' leading scorer at 13.9 ppg. He's listed at 6'10", 255, but last year he was listed at 270 after transferring from Morgan State, where he was listed at 295. When Venning scores more than his average, SBU is 10-3. Playing back-to-back games might be a factor—Venning averages 24 minutes per game and played 21 on Wednesday.

On the bench the Bonnies feature 6’3” senior guard Daryl Banks, 6’11” junior center Noel Brown, 6’8” sophomore forward Barry Evans, and 5’10” junior point guard Kyrell Luc. Banks has been in and out of the starting lineup; he averages 8.3 points, 2.6 assists, and 1.9 rebounds and scored 26 points against Loyola Feb. 27. Brown gives Venning recovery time on the bench and plays about 13 minutes per game; he shoots 72% from the field while averaging 6.0 points and 2.2 rebounds. Evans averages 3.3 points per game, and is a good rebounder. Last year’s starting point guard Kyrell Luc has fallen way off in minutes, but still contributes 2.4 ppg.

In the game on Feb. 27 in Olean, Loyola led 9-2 early, but the wheels came off midway through the first half. The Ramblers committed 19 turnovers, many of them on lazy passes where Bonnies players were staking out the passing lanes. Miles Rubin had four fouls, and managed only two points from the line in six minutes of playing time. The Bonnies led 41-26 at halftime and had a 21-point lead with eight minutes left. It was pretty much a rout, with very few bright spots.

St. Bonaventure played back-to-back games earlier this season on Nov. 16-17, ironically at Barclays Center. They beat Oklahoma State by four in the first game and lost to Auburn by 17 points the next day. The Ramblers won the second game of their back-to-back games against Creighton and Boston College with a nice comeback late in the game against BC. Fatigue may be a factor in Thursday’s game, but with an off day scheduled for Friday, both teams will be pushing their players to their limits if necessary.

Loyola has yet to win a game in the A-10 Tournament; SBU won the A-10 Tournament in 2021 and 2012.



Loyola game notes: https://loyolaramblers.com/documents/20 ... finals.pdf

Saint Bonaventure game notes: https://gobonnies.com/news/2024/3/13/me ... t-win.aspx

TV/Streaming video: USA Network https://www.usanetwork.com/live?brand=usa

Radio/Streaming audio: https://loyolaramblers.com/watch/?Live=183&type=Live

Live stats: https://www.statbroadcast.com/events/ce ... id=214&t=1

Vegas odds: St. Bonaventure by 2.5

Keep the passes sharp. Collapse on Venning occasionally to give him something to think about. Keep the legs fresh to wear them out. Get the win.

Rubin going in to the 2nd Half with no more than one foul can really make a difference. Hoping he can pull that off.

Their guards blitzed us up there. See how we adjust.

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I think Loyola, not St. Bonaventure, is favored by 2.5, at least they are now on the betting sites I checked..

This is where I got is from. I expected something like Loyola by 1, which is what KenPom estimates it to finish. But I checked it at 7 p.m., and again closer to the time I published the preview at 8 pm. Yes, it now shows Loyola favored. But when I got the odds at 7 pm on Wednesday night and re-checked three times over the next hour, it was the other way. As far as I'm concerned, that's the opening odds and I'm not changing it.

https://www.vegasinsider.com/college-ba ... naventure/

Totally different situation than when we played them before. That game looked like a loss weeks in advance for many reasons.

Bonnies isn't very good away from home and they are playing consecutive nights after a tough one yesterday. Love the revenge factor as well. I think we win this one handily.

Blers at -2.5

Rubin is my X factor for today. He stays out of foul trouble for an entire first half, and most of the game, we’ve got this. I expect him to have a good performance and having learned from his mistakes the first time he went against Venning.

Secondly, we need one or two of our wings to be on fire starting this game. Des - Sheldon - Jayden in any combo scoring in bunches should give everyone comfort.

Down goes Richmond

And down goes UMass. VCU was a 1 point favorite at tip-off so technically not an "upset". But hopefully the run of upsets by seeding ends there...