Location: Bob Lanier Court at the Reilly Center

Box Score (PDF)  |  Statistics With Play-by-Play

St. Bonaventure Starters: #10 Jaylen Adams, #3 G Marcus Posley, #1 Idris Taqqee, #21 F Dion Wright, #20 F Derrick Woods 

The Short Story
Dion Wright scored a career high 28 points and Jaylen Adams had 16 points and 12 assists to lead St. Bonaventure to an 82-68 win over Niagara Wednesday night at the Reilly Center.

Three-point shooting, as it has been for the past several weeks, keyed the victory. St. Bonaventure made a season-best 12 (of 25) shots from behind the arc. Adams went 5-8 and Kaputo was 4-6.

St. Bonaventure led 35-27 at halftime, but the Purple Eagles cut the deficit to two points early in the second half.  From that point on, however, the Bonnies held Niagara to just five points over a span of 8:02 to seize control.  St. Bonaventure outscored the Purple Eagles 26-5 over that stretch.

Kaputo came off the bench to score 14 points and hand out five assists in 30 minutes. 

How It Happened:

• Niagara started out hot, making three of its first six three-point field goals to open a 13-8 early lead.  
• The Bonnies followed suit as Idris Taqqee made a three-pointer and then Jaylen Adams made his first two shots from long range.
• Jordan Tyson tipped in a missed shot, then Nelson Kaputo made a three-pointer to give St. Bonaventure its first lead at 16-15.
• The Bonnies' shooting stayed hot as Kaputo's three-pointer at the 3:23 mark made it a 31-21 lead. St. Bonaventure went 7-14 from behind the arc in the first half.
• Back-to-back scores by Dion Wright and Taqqee gave the Bonnies their largest lead of the game at 35-23 with 1:20 left in the half.
• An 8-0 run to end the first half and start the second by Niagara cut the Bonnies' lead down to two points at 35-33.
• The Bonnies, however, answered the Purple Eagles' surge with an 8-1 spurt to regain control at 43-34. Kaputo and Adams both drained three-point shots to help St. Bonaventure back on track.
• After it had pulled within two, Niagara went cold offensively, scoring just five points over the next 8:02.
• St. Bonaventure pushed the lead to 22 at 61-39 by the 10:18 mark after Derrick Woods scored four straight points.
• Niagara would battle back and cut its deficit down to 10 points two different times, the last at the 4:08 mark, but that was as close as the margin came.
• Wright got his career high on two free throws with 14 seconds remaining. 

Beyond the Box Score:

• Adams' 12 assists were two shy of his career high and the most by an Atlantic 10 player this season.
• St. Bonaventure's previous season high for three-pointers in a game was 11 set in the Syracuse and Vermont games.
• The Bonnies also set a season high with their 24 assists.
• Over his last four games, Adams made 19 of his 29 three-point shots.
• St. Bonaventure's .727 winning percentage (8-3) in this year's non-conference is the best during Mark Schmidt's nine seasons as head coach.
• Schmidt now has 132 wins at St. Bonaventure, tying him with Jim Baron for fifth place on the program's all-time coaching wins list. Schmidt also is in position to pass Mike Reilly, who is fourth with 133. 
• St. Bonaventure has now swept the Big 4 back-to-back seasons and three of the last five years.
• Wright now has 934 career points and 495 career rebounds.

Quotes From Head Coach Mark Schmidt:
"Niagara put us on our heels. I thought we gathered ourselves and played better defense after that. In the second half, we came out a bit soft again. We caught ourselves, got it up to 21 and then got soft again. Give them credit, they fought back. With the teams we're about to play, we can't afford to do that. When you have a team down you have to knock them out."

"We have unselfish players, guys who are sharing the ball. We have guys that understand what it takes to score points. We have to continue to do it on both ends."

"Winning Big 4 games is something we take pride in. We're still a work in progress. You want to be a team that's continuing to improve. We have stretches where we play really well, but we haven't done it consistently. That's the challenge."

Up Next:
St. Bonaventure opens Atlantic 10 Conference play this Saturday, Jan. 2, at home against last season's regular season A-10 champion, Davidson.  The game will be televised by American Sports Network and will tip off at 8 p.m.