Final Score: George Washington 79, St. Bonaventure 71

Location: Bob Lanier Court at the Reilly Center – St. Bonaventure, N.Y.

Records: St. Bonaventure 11-7 (1-3) | George Washington 15-3 (3-1)

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

Social Media Recap

The Short Story:
St. Bonaventure lost its first home game of the season on Saturday, falling 79-71 to George Washington at the Reilly Center.
The Bonnies entered halftime with a one point lead, but an 8-0 run midway through the second half gave the Colonials an eight-point cushion.  GW extended its lead to as many as 14 as it continually made shots to fend off the Bonnies' comeback attempts.

St. Bonaventure, which dropped its third straight, was led by Andell Cumberbatch with 15 points. Senior Youssou Ndoye had 14 points, eight rebounds and two blocks. Jordan Gathers added 12 points and four rebounds for the Brown and White. 

The Bonnies' last three losses have come to teams with a combined record of 48-6.

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

How It Happened:

• The Bonnies started well and had a 7-3 lead early before GW came back to take an 18-12 lead by the 10:50 mark of the first half.
• GW guard Maurice Creek hit a dribble drive lay up to give George Washington a 26-18 lead with 5:02 left in the first half, forcing an SBU timeout.
• Andell Cumberbatch's put-back layup cut the Bonnies' deficit to 26-20, and then Jordan Gathers converted 2 of 3 free throws to shrink GW's lead to 26-22 with 3:47 to go until halftime.
• Matthew Wright hit a transition three-pointer to give the Bonnies a 30-29 lead with 59.5 seconds left in the first half. It was the Bonnies' first lead since it was 12-10, and the Bonnies entered halftime with the one-point edge after a closely contested first 20 minutes.
• The first eight minutes of the second half were much the same as the first half, as there were eight lead changes and two ties in that span.
• Charlon Kloof slammed home a fast break dunk with 17:30 left in the second half to give the Bonnies a 34-33 lead.  At the 13:50 mark Kloof made two free throws to make it 40-37 favor St. Bonaventure; that would turn out to be the Bonnies' last lead of the night.
• Creek hit a three-pointer that tied the game at 40-40.
• The game was tied at 42-42 when Creek hit another three that ignited an 8-0 GW run.  Patricio Garino's layup capped the spurt as GW led 50-42 with 9:41 left.
• GW extended its lead to as many as 14 as it continually made shots to fend off the Bonnies' comeback attempts.
• Jordan Gathers hit a baseline three with 6:33 left to cut the Colonials' lead to 55-49.
• Dion Wright converted an and-1 layup with 6:05 left that brought the Bonnies within five points at 57-52, but that was as close as they could pull.
• After Andell Cumberbatch drilled a baseline three-pointer with 3:06 left it was a 64-57 GW lead, but the Colonials then scored nine of the next 11 points in the game to make it 73-59 with 1:47 left and end any hopes of a Bona comeback.
• Three-point shooting was a key for GW; led by Creek's 5-10 performance, the Colonials went 9-19 (.474) on the night.  St. Bonaventure made just 7-27 (.269) from long range including 4-14 in the second half.
• Cumberbatch led the Bonnies with 15 points. Ndoye had 14 points, eight rebounds and two blocks. Gathers added 12 points and four rebounds and Dion Wright finished with 11 points.
• Keyed on by GW, Matthew Wright was held to six points on 2-9 shooting.  Charlon Kloof also had a tough night, picking up two early fouls and finishing with eight points and three assists.
  The Bonnies had a strong game at the free throw line, making 20 of their 23 shots there.

Beyond the Box Score:

• The loss was St. Bonaventure's third straight; the three losses have come to teams with a combined record of 48-6.  It was also the Bonnies' first home loss this season; they are now 7-1 at the Reilly Center.
• The attendance was 5,160 – the largest Reilly Center crowd of the year. Saturday's game was the first with the Bona students back and over 750 crammed the student section.
• Bona legend Fred Crawford '64, whose #54 is retired, was honored on the court during a first half timeout.

Quotes from St. Bonaventure coach Mark Schmidt:

• "I thought the biggest thing coming out of this game was the turnovers. We had them at the wrong time. And secondly, I thought that in the second half, they made some big shots; when we needed that big shot, we didn't make it." 
• "We just couldn't get over the hump. They had 22 points off turnovers and that just can't happen." 
• "I thought in the second half we didn't play well defensively and rebound the ball like we needed to. Give them credit, they're a hard team to guard." 
• "The margin for error in this league is not too big . . . you've got to knock down those big ones, and we didn't do that tonight and that was the difference."

Up Next: St. Bonaventure will host La Salle on Wednesday, Jan. 22 at the Reilly Center in a 9:00 p.m. tipoff that will air on CBS College Sports Network.

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