#7 ST. BONAVENTURE (18-12, 9-9 A-10) vs. #10 LA SALLE (16-16, 6-12 A-10)
Wednesday, March 13 - 5:00 p.m.
Atlantic 10 Second Round
Brooklyn, N.Y. - Barclays Center
TV: USA Network
Radio: Bonnies Online Network

OPENING TIP

• St. Bonaventure will play La Salle in the second round of the Atlantic 10 Tournament Wednesday at Barclays Center. The Bonnies earned a first round bye as the No. 7 seed while 10th-seeded La Salle defeated George Washington, 61-60, Tuesday in the first round.
• St. Bonaventure is 14-11 in A-10 Tournament play under head coach Mark Schmidt. 
• The Bonnies have reached at least the quarterfinals in eight of the last nine seasons the tournament has been completed. The Bonnies have won at least one A-10 Tournament game in eight of the 13 seasons they have qualified under Coach Schmidt, but are seeking their first A-10 Tournament win since winning the Championship Game in 2021. 
• Schmidt's Bonnies teams have been to the semifinals five times and the title game three times (2012, 2019, 2021; winning in '12 and '21). 
• The last time the Bonnies were a No. 7 seed: 2011 when the Bonnies lost a heartbreaker, 75-73, in double overtime vs. 10th-seeded La Salle. Prior to that, the Bonnies had only been the No. 7 seed twice, winning first round games in both 1984 and 1985. In 1984, the Bonnies were a Cinderella story as they beat Penn State, Saint Joseph's and George Washington to reach the A-10 Championship Game for the first time in program history before falling to West Virginia.
• Bona represents the potential wide-open nature of this year's A-10 Tournament: St. Bonaventure went 5-2 this season vs. the bracket's top five seeds, scoring two wins each over (4) UMass and (5) VCU while also winning the only matchup vs. (2) Loyola Chicago. Conversely, the Bonnies finished 3-4 against seeds 10-15 during the regular season.
• The Bonnies have played twice at Barclays Center already this year, taking part in the Legends Classic back in November. St. Bonaventure reached the Championship Game after beating Oklahoma State, but fell to nationally-ranked Auburn in the title game.

SERIES HISTORY VS. LA SALLE
The teams have met 38 times in a series that saw La Salle take a 20-18 all-time lead with wins in each of the past two seasons. 

The Bonnies had won five of the last six meetings prior to last year's loss at home and SBU fell to 6-10 all-time at La Salle's Tom Gola Arena with a late February setback there. The teams last met in the A-10 Tournament a decade ago when the Bonnies held off La Salle in Barclays Center, 82-70, in a second round matchup. Three years earlier, La Salle scored a double overtime thriller at Reilly Center. 

In this year's matchup, Chad Venning scored a team-high 22 points on 8-13 shooting while Moses Flowers added 14 points. La Salle shot 51% from the floor however and outrebounded the Bonnies, 30-24. Daeshon Shepherd poured in a game-high 23 points for La Salle with Jhamir Brickus posting 15 points and five assists in a 72-59 Explorers win that saw La Salle sink 10 three-pointers.

A-10 Tournament History (1-1)
3-13-14: W (2nd rd)    82-70 (LAS 8 seed, SBU 9)  
3-8-11:  L (1st rd)        75-73 (2 OT/ SBU 7 seed, LAS 10)

BONNIES AT BARCLAYS
St. Bonaventure is 6-7 all-time at Barclays Center including 1-1 this season. Bona defeated Oklahoma State, 66-64, before falling to Auburn, 77-60, in this year's Legends Classic. The Oklahoma State win was Bona's first in the building since the 2019 Atlantic 10 semifinals and snapped a three-game skid at Barclays. In Atlantic 10 Tournament games played inside Barclays Center, the Bonnies are 5-5. 

BACK IN THE CITY
The trip to the Big Apple is a homecoming of sorts for multiple Bonnies: Chad Venning is back in his hometown of Brooklyn while Daryl Banks III hails from Somerset, N.J., a little more than 50 miles from Barclays Center. For Venning, playing in Barclays Center is the fulfillment of a dream he had as a teenager often walking past the arena during his high school days. Venning has made the most of the opportunity to play back home as he's scored in double figures in each of the four games he's played in Barclays Center the past two years, averaging 13.5 ppg in his home building including a double-double of 14 points and 10 boards vs. Iona in last year's Basketball Hall of Fame Invitational.

TAKE WHAT'S FREE
St. Bonaventure ranks 23rd in the nation this year by shooting 76.9% from thre free throw line. Among Atlantic 10 teams, only VCU has a better success rate. The Bonnies don't get to the line a ton, though, as their 13.8 free throws made per game rank just 175th in the nation.  Daryl Banks III leads the team, ranking fifth in the A-10 at 86.8%.

TRENDS & NOTABLES

• Charles Pride is one of 31 active Division I players with 900+ career rebounds. Only three active guards in the country - Baylor Schierman (Creighton), Christian Ray (Delaware) and Tanner Holden (Wright State) - have more career rebounds than Pride.
• Pride has committed 18 turnovers this season in over 800 minutes of game action, ranking 36th nationally in turnover rate according to KenPom. He has committed multiple turnovers in a game just twice this year, that coming back-to-back at Fordham (3) and vs. Davidson in an overtime game (2) in mid-February. 
• Moses Flowers filled the stat sheet with 12 points, 8 rebounds, 5 steals and 4 assists in the win over Loyola Chicago Feb. 27. He set a season high for boards in the win while his five steals tied a career-best and his four helpers also matched a season-high. Flowers finished the regular season by scoring in double figures in five straight games, the first time he's done that in more than three straight games as a starter this season and ties a five-game stretch off the bench Dec. 2-22 in non-conference play.
• SBU is second among all A-10 teams in turnover margin for the year (+2.3), behind only first-place Richmond (+3.1). The Bonnies also stand 49th nationally in turnover margin.
• Chad Venning has 97 blocks the past two seasons with the Bonnies, already moving into the program's top-10 list. He currently stands tied for eighth in school history with Jerome Spellman, '96. 
• Venning played in his 100th career game Feb. 21. In career game 101, he surpassed 1,000 points - over 800 of which have been scored in a Bonnies uniform. 
• Venning posted his second double-double of the season vs. UMass (16 pts, 10 reb). It was his second effort of double-figure rebounding this year and the fourth double-double of his career. 
• Venning had scored in double figures in 15 of the first 16 A-10 games of the year, but went without scoring 10+ in back-to-back games for the first time during the entire year in the final two contests of the season (at GW, vs. SLU). 
• Noel Brown came to SBU after transferring from George Washington where he played the first three seasons of his collegiate career. Brown averaged no higher than 3.0 ppg at GW, but has been a valuable piece of the Bonnies rotation this year, posting nearly 6 ppg. For the season, he has connected on over 72% of his field goal attempts. Bona's season record is Osun Osunniyi's 61.5% in 2019-20, but the program record book minimum (and that for national rankings) is 2.5 field goals made per game - Brown is currently at 2.2 FG/game. The current national leader in field goal percentage, AJ Braun of Wright State, is at 68.9%.
• Daryl Banks III has 127 3-pointers as a Bonnie the past two years – that total ranks 14th in program history. Banks has made 82 of those 3-pointers in games played at the Reilly Center. 
• Banks failed to score a point in the regular season finale vs. Saint Louis after scoring 26 and 23 points back-to-back off the bench in the previous two contests. The SLU game was his first time in the starting lineup since January. It is the only time in 62 games with the Bonnies that he has not cracked into the scoring column and was the first time he had not scored in a game since Feb. 27, 2021 vs. Rider while with Saint Peter's,
• Barry Evans had a career-high four blocks vs. Loyola Chicago Feb. 27. He also tallied a season-high nine points vs. Saint Louis in the regular season finale.
• Assa Essamvous came off the bench for the first time in his career in the regular season finale vs. SLU. He had started 61 consecutive games.

TRENDING NUMBERS 
3 – St. Bonaventure has done a good job both shooting the trey and defending it for most of this season. Among A-10 teams, the Bonnies entered the final week of the regular season ranking second in 3-point percentage (37.2%) and also fourth in 3-point percentage defense (32.0%). Last Wednesday night at GW in the penultimate game of the season, however, the Bonnies allowed a season-high 15 3-pointers to the Revolutionaries who shot 52% from deep (15-29). 

11 – The Bonnies are 11-2 this season when hitting 10 or more 3-pointers - though they hit 11 at GW March 6 and lost.

15 – St. Bonaventure handed Loyola Chicago its largest margin of defeat in an A-10 game this year Feb. 27, beating the Ramblers by 15 (79-64). Loyola Chicago has lost just three times in A-10 games with the game at SBU being their only double-digit setback. 

16-4 – Bona is 16-4 when winning the turnover battle this year.

18 – This season is the 10th time that a Mark Schmidt Bonnies team has won at least 18 games in a campaign.

28 – Chad Venning had a streak of 28 straight games with a block dating back to last year snapped at UMass on Feb. 24. He had posted at least one swat in 37 of the previous 38 contests. He had a career-high six blocks Jan. 17 vs. Rhode Island, the most by a Bonnies player since Osun Osunniyi's seven vs. Siena in November 2021. Venning did not have a block in three of the regular season's final four games after having his streak halted.

37.3% – Bona shot 37.3% from beyond the arc during the regular season, ranking second in the A-10 and 25th in Division I. Only Dayton ranked higher among A-10 teams.

86  – The Bonnies allowed 86 points to George Washington March 6, the most by an A-10 opponent in regulation in four years. Since the 2020-21 season, the Bonnies have allowed 80+ points in regulation to an A-10 opponent just three times, though it has happened twice this year - Fordham also scored 80 in a January matchup.

99  – St. Bonaventure's offense produced 99 points in a 99-64 win over Rhode Island, which entered the day 3-0 in the A-10, on Jan. 17 at home. It was Bona's highest scoring game in regulation vs. an Atlantic 10 opponent since Jan. 5, 1981 in a 104-80 win vs. UMass and the most points for Bona in any regulation game since scoring a 102-71 win over Central Michigan Nov. 22, 2016. 

150 –  Two Bonnies players have played in 150 career games - Daryl Banks III and Mika Adams-Woods.

200 – Moses Flowers surpassed 200 career 3-pointers March 6 at GW (204). He is joined by Daryl Banks III (254) and Charles Pride (209) in having more than 200 career triples.

300  – St. Bonaventure head coach Mark Schmidt reached another career milestone Feb. 27 when he scored his 300th win with the program. Schmidt, who has 382 coaching wins overall, is Bona's all-time wins leader. Schmidt joins an elite coaching group as only five other coaches have scored 300 wins while with an Atlantic 10 school: John Chaney (516), Phil Martelli (444), Chris Mooney (347), Gale Catlett (333) and Jim Baron (315), who scored his wins both with St. Bonaventure and Rhode Island.  

400 – Mika Adams-Woods surpassed 400 career assists during the win at UMass on Feb. 24. That total ranks fourth among all active Atlantic 10 players behind only Braden Norris of Loyola Chicago, James Bishop of GW and Jhamir Brickus of La Salle.

1,030  – The Bonnies have a number of perimeter threats on the roster. Bona's active players have combined for a total of 1,030 career 3-pointers.

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