Final Score: Wake Forest 77, St. Bonaventure 62

Location: Winston-Salem, N.C. / Lawrence Joel Memorial Coliseum

Records: St. Bonaventure 7-4 | Wake Forest 9-2

Box Score (PDF) | Final Stats and Play-by-Play

The Short Story: St. Bonaventure played a strong first half but Wake Forest shot 62 percent from the field in the second half to pull away for a 77-62 win over the Bonnies on Tuesday night in Winston-Salem, N.C.
The Bonnies led 36-28 at halftime behind an impressive defensive effort keyed by five steals by Andell Cumberbatch. Wake Forest came back to take the lead by the midpoint of the second half and went on to the win.
Cumberbatch led St. Bonaventure (7-4) with 19 points. Matthew Wright scored nine points while Dion Wright added eight points and Charlon Kloof had eight points and seven assists.

Full Recap and video highlights coming soon.

St. Bonaventure Starters: #3 G Charlon Kloof, #23 G Andell Cumberbatch, #5 G Jordan Gathers, #33 F Marquise Simmons, #35 C Youssou Ndoye

How It Happened:

• Defense keyed the Bonnies to a strong start and a good first half. The Bonnies went ahead 16-8 by the 11:04 mark on a three-point play by Youssou Ndoye.
• St. Bonaventure clogged the Deacons' passing lanes and played aggressively, which led to six first half steals and nine turnovers by Wake Forest. Andell Cumberbatch came up with five of the Bonnies' six steals in the opening half.
• St. Bonaventure's lead grew as large as 11 points at 32-21 on a Cumberbatch three-pointer with 3:00 until halftime.
• The Bonnies' lead at the break was 36-28. St. Bonaventure was 15-37 (40.5 percent) from the field in the opening half while Wake, which did not make a three-pointer in the half, was 10-28 (35.7).
• Charlon Kloof opened the second half with a drive that put the Brown and White ahead by 10, but Wake Forest answered with an 8-1 run that cut the lead down to 39-36.
• St. Bonaventure continued to hold off the Demon Deacons until the 14:54 mark when all-ACC forward Travis McKie tied the game at 43-43.
• The score remained close over the next five minutes until Wake Forest's Coron Williams drained back-to-back three-pointers, the second of which put the home team up 58-51 with 7:46 to go.
• McKie scored five straight points that made it a 63-53 Wake lead with 5:43 left.
• Cumberbatch cut the deficit to 63-56 with his third three-pointer of the night, but Wake again answered, this time with a 12-2 run that effectively ended the Bonnies' hopes.
• Wake Forest outscored the Bonnies 49-26 in the second half. In that frame, the Deacon scored 26 points in the paint and had an 11-2 edge in fastbreak points.
• Marquise Simmons grabbed a career high four steals to go with six points.

• Power forward Devin Thomas scored 15 of his 18 points in the second half for Wake Forest.
• Cumberbatch led the Bonnies with 19 points and set a career high with his six steals – the same number of steals he had all season before Tuesday. He was 8-16 from the field and 3-7 from long range. He also led the Bonnies with seven rebounds.
• Kloof, despite picking up his fourth foul with 12:41 left and spending time on the bench, finished with eight points and seven assists.
• The free throw line was not good to the Bonnies as they went 9-16 there, and saw Wake shoot 11 more free throws (18-27).

• Matthew Wright came back after missing the Iona game to score nine points on 4-12 shooting.
• Dion Wright had a solid game with eight points and six rebounds.

Beyond the Box Score:

• This was the fourth straight season St. Bonaventure played an ACC team. The Bonnies are now 20-57 all-time against current ACC members.
• Tuesday was just the second meeting between St. Bonaventure and Wake Forest; the first came back in 1961 in the NCAA Tournament regional semifinals where Wake Forest prevailed 78-73 despite 29 points by Tom Stith.

Up Next: St. Bonaventure will play at Big 4 rival Niagara on Saturday, Dec. 21. Tipoff will be 5:00.