UB's win streak comes to an end

By Budd Bailey

It was nice while it lasted.

The University at Buffalo men’s basketball team had won its first eight games – the first time that had happened since the Glory Days of 2018-19. Number nine figured to be a tough assignment. St. Bonaventure was carrying an 8-1 record into Saturday’s game at Alumni Arena, and the Bonnies brought along some alumni and friends to make sure someone would be cheering for them.

Sure enough, the Bonnies of the Atlantic 10 Conference (probably a step up from UB’s Mid-American Conference) were too good this time. They took a 77-69 win from the Bulls before 5,616. And they did it in style, as they scored the first eight points of the game and 14 of the first 16 points.

In other words, if you missed the start of the game, you missed the key moment of the 40-minute contest.

“We didn’t come out with the firepower we needed to, and the confidence offensively we need to,” UB coach George Halcovage said. “That was the difference in the game. We were constantly playing catch-up.”

The Bulls certainly tried hard to come back and make it interesting. They had the game down to a one-possession margin on a few occasions. But the Bonnies always seemed to have an answer at the right time. No wonder Bona never trailed at any point in the contest, despite some close calls.

“It gives you a big advantage,” Halcovage said about the way the Bonnies kept holding off the Bulls and essentially wearing them down. “We look at it one possession at a time. Things happen during a game. We made our runs. Credit to them – they withstood those runs. When we’re in a two-possession or one-possession game, we have to know that we don’t have to make it all back. We just got there. We have to keep doing what we did to get there.”

In a game in which the supplemental statistics were generally even, one definitely stood out. St. Bonaventure had a 36-21 edge in rebounds. Frank Mitchell, who started his college career at Canisius and stopped in Minnesota on his way to Olean and the Bonnies, had 13 of them. Seven of those were on the offensive boards. No one else for either side had more than five rebounds.

“Frank did a really good job,” Bona coach Mark Schmidt said. “He had three assists, some offensive rebounds. … He’s just a tenacious defender and rebounder. He did a really good job on their big guy. He shares the ball. Without those 13 rebounds, we’re in trouble. He brings that toughness to the team.”

“When you have a guy like that, we needed to do a better job getting him off that,” UB’s Daniel Freitag said. “It’s probably pretty easy to be a good rebounding team when you’ve got a guy like that.”

If it’s balanced scoring that you like, Bona put on a worthy show on Saturday. Six players – four starters plus substitutes Ilia Ermakov and Daniel Egbuniwe – all scored between 11 and 15 points. In addition, the Bonnies had 20 assists on 28 field goals in a sign that they were moving the ball well.

“I think Ilya was the difference in the game,” Bona coach Mark Schmidt said. “Ilya came off the bench with 12 points and two assists and really played well.”

As for UB, it shot 54 percent of the field including eight three-pointers. Ryan Sabol led the Bulls in scoring with 21, with 11 of those coming in the final five minutes in a furious attempt to cut Bona’s lead. Freitag added 17. But Buffalo didn’t match St. Bonaventure’s balance, as its bench was outscored by 29-8.

This was the Bulls’ only home game from November 18 to December 22, when Penn State Behrend turns up in Alumni Arena. The conference schedule starts after that.

“A game like that sets the tone for what conference play will be like,” Freitag said about Saturday’s loss. “Going down early is something that you can’t do in conference play either. We’ll learn from it.”

If nothing else, the size of the crowd might have been the most hopeful sign of the day for the Bulls. Admittedly, a good-sized share of those in attendance (UB’s biggest number since 2022) was wearing Bonnie gear. But even so, the seats were still occupied – and that hasn’t been true in the recent past. Halcovage was asked what he was thinking when he looked around the building before the start of the game. He paused for a long moment, while letting some emotions come to the surface.

“This team is going to keep getting better, and we need people to come out, notice and support these guys because they deserve it,” he said. “When I looked around, I said we’re going to keep coming up, because that’s the expectation that we need to have.

“We have really good players. Our guys play hard. They play for each other. They represent the university at a high level. We need to make sure that we give these guys that credit they deserve by being in here and supporting them no matter who is in this building. I think people understand that this team is here to stay, and that’s what it about, and it’s going to say that way.”