ST. BONAVENTURE (9-9, 3-2) vs. DUQUESNE (13-5, 3-2)
Wednesday, Jan. 18 – 7:00 p.m.
Reilly Center
TV: ESPN+

OPENING TIP

• St. Bonaventure wraps a back-to-back home stretch inside the Reilly Center Wednesday night vs. Duquesne. The Bonnies are 8-1 at home this season and 3-0 in Atlantic 10 play at The RC.
• No Bonnie has enjoyed playing at The RC more than Daryl Banks III. The redshirt junior guard is averaging 20.7 ppg in nine home games, shooting 43% overall from the floor and over 47% from 3-point land (37-78) where he has hit 37 of his 53 treys on the year.
• Banks ranks seventh among all A-10 players in season scoring at 16.3 ppg, but he's fourth in conference scoring as he's averaging 18.2 ppg in A-10 games, behind only James Bishop of GW (24.8 ppg), DaRon Holmes of Dayton (23.8 ppg) and Tyler Burton of Richmond (20.4 ppg).
• Redshirt junior Moses Flowers was named to this week's Atlantic 10 Weekly Honor Roll after another outstanding pair of games. Flowers continues to get better and better as the season goes on, averaging 17.5 points per game last week, shooting 68% from the floor (13-19) and 50% from deep (4-8). In A-10 games, Flowers is averaging 14.2 ppg while shooting 61% overall from the floor and 47% from long range. He posted 5.8 ppg during non-conference action.
• Banks, Flowers and Kyrell Luc combined for 57 points out of the Bonnies backcourt in Saturday's win over Richmond. Banks and Flowers each had 20 points apiece while Luc added 17.
• Wednesday's game will vault the winner up the A-10 standings. Both Bona and Duquesne enter this week at 3-2 in conference play, just a game behind VCU, Dayton and Saint Louis who are all tied atop the league standings at 4-1.
• The Bonnies were able to erase a halftime deficit in Saturday's victory, battling back from eight points down after halftime. Bona had previously been 1-7 when trailing at half this year, also winning vs. Middle Tennessee in November after trailing 35-29 at half.
• St. Bonaventure is 29-4 at the Reilly Center in the past three seasons, good for the best home winning percentage of any Atlantic 10 program during that span.

BONA BITES

• Daryl Banks III has scored in double figures in 16 of 18 games in a Bonnies uniform. Prior to this season, he recorded four 20-point games in his first three collegiate seasons. He has already reached that mark five times this year.
• Moses Flowers continues to see his role in the Bonnies lineup grow. In Atlantic 10 games, he's averaged 14.2 ppg while shooting better than 61% overall and 47% from beyond the arc. For the season, Flowers accounts for 55% of Bona's total bench scoring.
• Chad Venning's 54.2% field goal percentage ranks eighth in the A-10. Venning is also sixth in the A-10 in blocks (25).
• Kyrell Luc is tied for the A-10 lead in steals per game at 2.0 spg with Duquesne's Jimmy Clark III.
• Luc had a remarkable statistical performance last Wednesday at Rhode Island: He is the first Bonnies player to record at least 20 points with five or more steals in the same game since Jaylen Adams posted 25 points and six steals in a win over Yale Dec. 9, 2017. Adams also had nine assists that day, just like Luc at Rhody, though Luc also had seven rebounds while Adams had just one.
• Anquan Hill had perhaps his best week with the Bonnies last week. In the Jan. 14 win over Richmond, Hill hauled in a season-best 10 rebounds and was a team-best +13. In fact, his +/- rating has been the best on the roster as of late: He was +15 at Rhode Island Jan. 11 and also +15 vs. George Mason Jan. 4.
• All of Bona's A-10 wins thus far have come against teams picked to finish ahead of them in the preseason poll - George Mason (5), Richmond (7) and UMass (8).
• Entering Saturday's game vs. Richmond, Bona had been outscored 265-182 at the foul line this year (an average of nearly 5 ppg) while opponents had taken nearly 100 more foul shots than SBU (372-265). The tide turned against the Spiders, though, as the Bonnies were 19-23 at the line while Richmond was 17-21. Prior to Saturday, it had been a span of six games since the Bonnies had more than 10 points at the foul line.
   

TRENDING NUMBERS
7 – St. Bonaventure and Duquesne each average over seven steals per game defensively, ranking third and fourth in the conference respectively in swipes.
25 – The Bonnies posted 25 bench points in their Jan. 14 win over Richmond, the most bench points for the program since equaling that mark in a win over GW Feb. 26, 2021.
53 – Daryl Banks III ranks third among all A-10 players with 53 3-pointers this year. Only Duquesne's Dae Dae Grant (56) and Saint Joseph's Cameron Brown (54) have more. Banks has multiple 3s in 15 of 18 games this year and at least one in 15 contests, with two road games (at SLU, at Buffalo) the lone exceptions.
150 – St. Bonaventure has an active streak of 150 consecutive games with at least one 3-pointer made dating to Nov. 25, 2017. The last time Bona finished a game without a trey was the day before, a win over Maryland on a neutral court Nov. 24, 2017.
996 – Moses Flowers enters Wednesday with 996 career points in his fourth collegiate season. He aims to join fellow redshirt junior guard Daryl Banks III in the 1,000-point club.
 
SERIES HISTORY
St. Bonaventure leads, 69-60
This will be the 130th meeting between the longtime A-10 rivals. St. Bonaventure has won 13 of the last 14, and 19 of 22, but nine of the last 14 games have been decided by six or fewer points, making last year's blowout at home a rarity in the series.

In 103 seasons of basketball, the Bonnies have only played Western New York rivals Canisius (170 meetings) and Niagara (160) more than Duquesne.

St. Bonaventure is 10-1 vs. the Dukes since Keith Dambrot took over in 2017-18, with the one loss being an overtime defeat in 2020 at the Reilly Center.

ABOUT DUQUESNE

• Duquesne went 10-3 during non-conference play and has opened A-10 action 3-2 with wins over Rhode Island (72-61), VCU (79-70) and Saint Joseph's (92-80). The Dukes have had a week between games following a win at Saint Joe's last Wednesday.
• Junior guard Dae Dae Grant leads the team with 16.0 ppg. Grant is in his first A-10 season but scored over 1,100 points in three seasons at Miami (OH). Backcourt mate Jimmy Clark III came to Duquesne from VCU where he played the 2020 and 2021 seasons before leading Northwest Florida to the junior college national title last year. He averages 12.4 ppg this season.
• Duquesne was picked 15^th in the A-10 preseason poll, but pollsters had little to go on in their predictions – the Dukes brought in 10 newcomers including five transfers and they needed just eight games to surpass last year's season win total of six (6-24).
• The Dukes rank second in A-10 scoring with 76.0 ppg, behind only Saint Louis. Defensively, they're 10^th, allowing nearly 71 ppg.

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