OLEAN, N.Y. – St. Bonaventure guard Marcus Posley scored 20 points, highlighted by a key 3-pointer field goal with 1:36 left in regulation time and senior center Youssou Ndoye had eight points, 12 rebounds and four blocked shots as the host Bonnies defeated Canisius 59-53 in front of 4,489 fans in the Reilly Center Saturday afternoon. The win move St. Bonaventure to 2-1 on the season, while the Golden Griffins slipped to 2-1 with their first loss of the year.
Canisius senior Jeremiah Williams scored a team-high 14 points to go with two assists off the bench for the Griffs, who knocked down a season-high 10 3-point field goals in the losing effort. Sophomore Zach Lewis and redshirt-freshman Adam Weir were good for nine points each, while sophomore forward Phil Valenti had five points, a career-high 11 rebounds, two assists, a steal and a block. As a team, Canisius shot just 31.7 percent from the field, but ended the night shooting 40 percent (10-for-25) from behind the 3-point line.
Late in the game, Canisius trailed St. Bonaventure by four at 51-47, but Valenti grabbed an offensive rebound and laid one off the glass to cut that lead in half and make the score 51-49 in favor of the Bonnies with 2:44 left to play. After both teams came up empty on their next possessions, St. Bonaventure took a 30-second timeout with 2:01 left in regulation time. As the shot clock ticked under five seconds, Ndoye found Posley on the left wing, and the junior from Rockford, Ill., let a 3-point attempt fly that hit nothing-but-net as the shot clock horn sounded to put St. Bonaventure up 54-49 with 1:36 left to play. Canisius cut the Bonnies' cushion to five points at 54-51 on a driving lay-up by Lewis with 1:18 left on the clock, but that would end up being as close as the Griffs would get down the stretch.
The Bonnies jumped out to an early 10-0 lead just 3:45 into the contest as the Griffs missed their first 13 shots from the field. After a 30-second timeout, Canisius settled down and Blue and Gold ripped off the game's next 11 points to take an 11-10 lead with 12:27 left before the halftime break thanks to two makes from the free-throw line from Williams. Canisius stretched its lead to as many as eight points at 28-20 with 3:33 left before the intermission on a 3-pointer by Weir from the right corner, but the Bonnies whittled that lead down to just two at 30-28 at halftime thanks to a 3-pointer from Posley from the top of the key with 7.4 seconds left in the opening 20 minutes.
"I give our guys a lot of credit, they didn't back down and showed a lot of composure early in the game when they [St. Bonaventure] jumped us to start," Canisius head coach Jim Baron said. "We knew this was going to be a battle, it's a rivalry game. They were coming off a home loss, so we knew they'd be ready to go. We worked really hard to get back into the game, but they hit big shots at the end of the game and we didn't. Had good looks, just didn't score when we needed to. We'll look at the tape and keep working hard. I thought we guarded them and turned them over a bunch, we just need to turn those turnovers into points."
Eight of the 10 Canisius players that saw playing time in Saturday's game scored at least two points, and all 10 players for Canisius had a rebound. The Bonnies out rebounded Canisius by a 39-38 clip, but the Griffs ended the night with 15 offensive rebounds, led by senior Josiah Heath, who had five offensive boards.
Canisius will return to action Wednesday, Nov. 26, when the team travels to play at Cornell. Tipoff time in Ithaca, N.Y., is set for 7 p.m.
Game Notes: This was the 163rd all-time meeting between these two schools, with St. Bonaventure holding a 99-64 lead in the series… Canisius has now dropped six-straight in the Reilly Center… Canisius has held its first three opponents of the season to 60 points or fewer for the first time since 1950-51… Williams' 14 points is a new career high, besting his previous career high of six, scored in two different games last season… Canisius outscored St. Bonaventure's bench by a 26-0 clip… The Canisius defense drew three offensive charges on Saturday, now giving the team 10 drawn charges through the first three games of the season.
