JANUARY

Siena

Another former Mike Deane team came to town — the Siena Saints. Looking to continue their climb up the ladder in the Top-25, a win was all the Flyers were thinking about. Although this was a team that should have been easy pickings for UD, the game started off closely and stayed that way until just before halftime when Stanley and Morris hit back-to-back threes to give the Flyers a seven point lead heading into the locker room.

The second half was pretty much all Flyers as the big men took over with Green leading the way. Playing a little more consistently with the improved playing time in the last four games, he showed his ability to dominate under the boards with seven second half rebounds in 11 minutes of playing time. Finn and Waleskowski shared the rest of the time and threw in 10 points between them. The reserves saw a good deal of time in the second half as the Flyers pulled away to an 81-65 victory. Stanley scored 16 on 6-10 shooting with six rebounds.

Duquesne

The last time the Dukes had a good team, Oliver Purnell was a young man. This year will not change the pattern. Last season the Flyers completely shut down Wayne Smith during his visit to the Arena, but this is a new year. Smith showed why he is one on the better players in the conference, almost single-handedly keeping the Dukes in the game. UD started off shooting very well, with Morris leading the way. Duquesne, behind Smith, was able to stay within five of Dayton for most of the first half. UD went into the locker room up by six, but got both barrels from Purnell due to their lack of effort on the defensive boards. Dayton was outrebounded in the first half by sxi and OP was not pleased.

Apparently, the tongue-lashing did its job as the Flyers controlled the boards on both ends of the court in the second half — led by Sean Finn and his nine rebounds. He added 14 points as the Flyers won easily 81-60. Balanced scoring continued to be the trademark of the Flyers as five players scored in double figures, led by Stanley’s 18

Temple

The 10-3 Flyers had risen to #20 in the USAToday poll, their highest ranking in several decades. The nine-game winning streak showed that they were playing well, but with Temple on the horizon there was some concern that the streak might end. This is a very different Temple team than the one that the Flyers faced last season. Gone are Pepe Sanchez, Mark Karcher, and Lamont Barnes — their all world point guard, leading scorer, and starting center. Of the three, it appears that Sanchez is missed the most. Lynn Greer has taken over at the point, but more often than not looks like the shooting guard that he is. This is a typical Temple team in that the scores are low and the opposing players are black and blue.

For the first time in three weeks the Flyers run into a good defensive team. Not since the Miami game have they had to deal with a team that thinks defense first and offense second. Unlike Miami, Temple generally stays in their trademark zone defense for the length of the game. It is only when the Flyers realize that they cannot consistently hit 23-foot shots that the game actually becomes interesting. In a very low scoring affair, the Owls take a 29-26 lead into the locker room and the Flyers wonder what has happened to their outside scoring.
In the second half, the inside combo of Finn and Green score 14 of the first 18 points that Dayton puts up on the board. Greer and Quincy Wadley keep Temple

close, but the Flyers open a 5-point lead six minutes into the second half. It is at this point that the outside opens up and Stanley and Hall begin dropping threes like a five-year-old goes through Halloween candy. Behind Stanley’s 19 points and Finn’s eight rebounds, the Flyers win number ten in a row, 64-60.

At St. Joseph’s

Since reaching the Sweet Sixteen in 1997, St. Joseph’s has failed to reach the NCAA Tournament. This year should be more of the same, but playing at home always makes the Hawks far more than roadkill. For the first year since 1997, St. Joe’s has a true point guard leading them on the attack. Jameer Nelson was a highly-recruited point guard out of Pennsylvania that overlooked programs such as Temple to sign with Phil Martelli’s team. Much like their point guard, the Hawks have been very up and down, but with four returning starters, the Flyers were going to be hard-pressed to keep the winning streak alive.If Oliver Purnell could have dreamed of a beginning to a game, it would have been this one. Through the first five minutes, the Flyers had missed exactly one shot, committed zero turnovers and played inspired defense. At the 15:00 mark, Dayton held a 19-6 lead and appeared on their way to an easy victory. That was not to be the case, however, as Bill Phillips, Damian Reid, and Alexandre Sazonov had a field day after getting Finn, Green, and Holland in early foul trouble. With Waleskowski playing the majority of minutes in the first half, the 13-point lead shrunk to a mere 42-40 lead at the half.

The second half was extremely close as neither team could stretch the lead to more than four points. The consistent outside marksmanship of Morris and the inside scoring of Holland led the Flyers, while Nelson showed why he was so highly recruited by slashes to the basket and subsequent 10 of 11 shooting from the foul line. With 1:30 left on the clock and the Flyers trailing by one, Morris was fouled on a three-point try and converted two of the three foul shots. Each team then had trouble finding the handle on passes to the interior and committed damaging turnovers. It all came down to one possession and St. Joe’s controlled the ball with 28 seconds left on the clock. Nelson held the ball on the perimeter and made a pass to Reid as the clock wound down to seven seconds. The power forward put a move on Holland and appeared to have an open lay-up when Finn came out of nowhere and swatted the ball to midcourt as time expired. The Flyers had escaped with a 71-70 victory to keep the winning streak alive.

At Massachusetts

After starting the season 1-3, few of the Flyer Faithful would have even dreamed that UD would find themselves at UMass riding an 11-game winning streak and happily in the Top-20. UMass was impressed, but decided to show up anyway. This was a very different team than the one that the Flyers defeated last season. Bruiser Flint reloaded with transfers, a JC player, and a couple of freshmen. Monty Mack is still around through the miracle of an added year of eligibility and Purnell wishes that he wasn’t. The Flyers were due for a bad game and this seemed to be the one. Mack had one of those games that makes you wonder why he wasn’t averaging 25 points a game. He scored 15 points in the first half and actually had more than the entire Flyer team at the 10-minute mark. UMass eventually settled for a 12-point lead at the half and it only got worse after intermission. The Flyers fell to 12-4 after taking an 82-68 pasting.

La Salle

The UD Arena could not have been a more welcome place after the pasting that the Flyers received at the hands of the Minutemen. The Explorers have been struggling this season without Donnie Carr and come to town with a 4-11 record. The rumblings coming out of Philadelphia would make you believe that this will be the last time that Speedy Morris will make his way to Dayton as the head coach of LaSalle.

Tony Stanley continued his drive to be A-10 Player of the Year with another outstanding performance. In a game that never really was one, Stanley scored almost at-will. Hitting six of seven three pointers, Tony finished the game with 28 points and could have had another 10 if Purnell hadn’t taken him out with 10 minutes left in the game. UD scored 56 points in the first half as the press took LaSalle apart during the first 10 minutes of the game and jumped to a 36-15 lead. The bench got a good deal of playing time, but because of the depth it didn’t look like the starters ever sat down. The 101-67 victory showed that Waleskowski was more than a capable backup at both the 4 and 5 positions as he added 13 points and nine rebounds.

At St. Bonaventure

It is never easy to win at St. Bonaventure, but the Bonnies were playing much better than anyone had expected and faced the Flyers with a 10-5 record. Some of that came from a very suspect pre-conference schedule, but few felt that they would have been above .500 at this point in the season. David Morris has improved in virtually every game this season, but this was the one that really showed that he deserves mention as a first team All-Conference player. He not only led the Flyers with 22 point and seven assists, but he almost single-handedly tore the Bonnies apart on the full-court press. His five steals were only the tip of the iceberg as he got his hands on at least five other balls that eventually resulted into turnovers. Nate Green led the big men in scoring with 15 and contributed seven rebounds as he continues to press Holland for additional playing time. The 14-4 Flyers continue to impress the voters in the USAToday Poll by moving up to #18.

Fordham

These are no longer the Fordham Rams that could be counted upon as an easy win for the home team. Bob Hill has been able to upgrade the struggling program almost from the minute he signed his contract. The Rams come to Dayton with an 11-5 record and appear to be ready to play with the big boys. Two of the losses came in a 10-day period to Temple and both of those games were close. This is one game that the Flyers were not going to take lightly.

Fordham has been averaging nearly 80 points per game with a talented senior backcourt of Bevon Robin and Jason Harris. The twosome gave the crowd good reason to be thankful that this will be the last time that they make the trip to Dayton by combining for 20 of the first 28 points that Fordham scored. At that point, Dayton trailed 28-18 and was just trying to stop the bleeding. Purnell was forced to take a full timeout at the nine-minute mark after Fordham had scored the last six points to claim their ten-point lead. The Flyers used the strategy session to their advantage and outscored Fordham 8-2 over the next three minutes to get back in the game. Green led the way in the first half with 10 points and four rebounds. Finn continued to impress with eight points and three rebounds of his own.

The extended bench that Dayton is fortunate enough to have proved to be the undoing of Hill’s Rams in the second half. Using a rotation of 10, the Flyers played their man-to-man defense almost as if they were possessed. Everyone contributed and a balanced scoring attack led the Flyers to an 85-75 victory. Green, Stanley, and Finn all had 15 points and Morris threw in eight assists for good measure. The 15-4 Flyers could now get ready for their upcoming ESPN battle with Xavier.

At Xavier

“You can’t win here,” was everywhere you looked around the Cintas center as UD made their first trip to the Mecca of Xavier followers. With both teams in the Top-20 and a national TV audience tuned in, this was going to be a battle of two teams trying to impress both the nation and the NCAA selection committee. Dayton had played the more difficult schedule, but with only one win over a nationally-ranked opponent, this was almost a must-win. It was not going to be easy to get, but Purnell had a few tricks of his sleeve for the Muskies.This was a game destined to be played in the 90’s. Xavier was #1 in offense in the A-10 and Dayton was a close second. Unlike previous Purnell teams, this was one that where he wasn’t afraid to turn up the volume and let it fly. The first surprise that OP had for X was his starting line-up. Instead of starting Finn as he had the previous 12 games, the lineup consisted of Morris, Stanley, Holland, Hall, and Green. The next surprise came after Dayton’s first basket. Full-court pressure was applied and the Flyers didn’t let up after Xavier got past the halfcourt line. Two quick steals and the Flyers found themselves up 7-0 and Xavier called timeout with 18:30 left in the first half.The rest of the first half was a track meet and Dayton led 55-49 with Stanley and Sato battling each other for scoring honors. Tony had 17 at the half while Sato did his best to keep Xavier in the game with 14 points, five rebounds and two assists. The second half was no less exciting than the first as both teams pressed and bombed from three-point land at will. ESPN seemed to be getting their money worth as the scoreboard lit up like a pinball machine. Win or lose, Purnell was going to have nightmares about this game for years.

With a little under three minutes to go, UD led 102-98 and had the ball when Holland was called for a questionable charging call. McAfee quickly brought the ball down and hit a three from 24 feet as the crowd screamed with delight. Hall answered with a three of his own to restore the four-point lead. Xavier missed on their next attempt and Green rebounded but had the ball stolen and Sato scored on a lay-up. Marshall tried to quickly inbound the ball only to have it stolen by Price who hit a three for a one-point Xavier lead. Purnell called a timeout with 1:03 left and the score 106-105 in favor of Xavier.

UD was able to break the press after the timeout and took 20 seconds off the clock before running a play for Hall on the left wing. True to form, Brooks hit a long three for a 108-106 Dayton lead with 34 seconds left on the clock. After a timeout by both benches, Xavier brought the ball down and tried to set up McAfee for a three with 14 seconds on the clock. Stanley got his hands on the pass but Sato was able to pick it up and launch a three in one motion. As the clock ran down, the crowd held its collective breath. The ball appeared to go three quarters of the way into the net before popping out. Price grabbed the rebound and was able to get a 5-foot jumper off just as the buzzer sounded. To the dismay of the Xavier home crowd the ball fell short and the Flyers walked away with the two-point victory.

FEBRUARY/MARCH

At Duquesne

When the Dukes came to the Arena earlier in the year, Tony Stanley led the Flyers to an easy win with 21 points. He never got the opportunity to even take a shot in this one. During the opening tip Tony took an inadvertent elbow to his left eye, which swelled almost to complete closure within minutes. If it were the NCAA tournament, he probably would have given it a shot, but Purnell didn’t want to take any chances with his star. As a result, Sammy Smith played more than he had in the previous five games combined and showed that he will be a capable replacement next year. After a slow start in which he missed his first four shots, Sammy found the range and ended up with 15 points and five rebounds.

In another game that the Flyers took an early lead, Duquesne never really threatened. UD was up by 12 at the half and after they recovered from a Duke spurt at the beginning of the second half stretched the lead to 25 with eight minutes remaining. With the six freshmen on the floor for the remainder of the game, Duquesne was able to reduce it to the final score of 78-63. Finn again led the Flyers in rebounds with 10 and Green added 12 points and six rebounds as he has taken the starting position from Holland with his recent play. The Flyers are now 17-4 and #15 in the country. They have won 16 of the last 17 games and look forward to a rematch with UMass.

Massachusetts

Unlike the debacle at UMass, the Flyers started this game with fire in their eyes and ready to get a token of revenge for their last defeat. Stanley was back in the starting lineup and showed that his vision wasn’t affected by the injury that he suffered in the Duquesne game. After hitting on six of eight shots in the first half, he continued the onslaught with seven of 10 in the second. Finishing with 32 points and six rebounds, Stanley is second in the league in scoring behind SirValiant Brown and his 32ppg average and 32% shooting. It is becoming obvious that he has a shot at being a first round NBA pick in June. There are few games when there are not at least three or four scouts in attendance.Brooks Hall continued his fine shooting and playmaking abilities by contributing 17 points and six assists. Finn and Waleskowski combined for 20 points and 13 rebounds as the Flyers continue to control the boards. Holland continued to slump from the field and only logged 10 minutes in the game. The Flyers moved to 18-4 with the 85-74 victory.

At Rhode Island

Easily the worst team in the league last season in their first year under Jerry DeGregorio, the Rams continue to be in the rebuilding stage. They now have more weapons in Marbury, Bell, and Daniels, but they still fall far short of the Flyers and it doesn’t matter were they play. Dayton didn’t bring their “A” game but still managed to put out a 76-67 victory. They did not look like a Top-15 team and turned the ball over 23 times in the sloppily game. Dayton led from the opening tip, but they received better play from the reserves than they did the starters. Finn had his worst game of the season, but Waleskowski picked him up with eight points and eight rebounds. Marshall played 18 minutes at the point and contributed seven assists during that time.King continues to struggle with turnovers but has improved his defense and shot selection. Holland looked more like the guy that most thought could dominate at the beginning of the season. His improved play should help him see additional court time. There had been numerous times when Waleskowski and Finn were on the floor at the same time in the last month because of his diminished play.

George Washington

Featuring the top three scorers in the league, this game was sure to keep the scorekeepers busy. Some publications picked SirValiant Brown as the predicted Player of the Year in the A-10 because of what he accomplished last year. How anyone can pick a player that shoots 33% from the field as the Player of the Year is beyond me. He isn’t even the best player on his team. That, however, hasn’t stopped Brown from averaging just over 30ppg this season. The marksmanship has improved slightly, but so have the number of shots taken. Most teams have allowed Brown to bomb away and do their best to shut down the rest of the team — and in particular Chris Monroe. Monroe is the player that really decides if GW wins or not. When he has a bad game, they lose. When he has a good game, they win.

Unfortunately for the Flyers, he picked this day to have a good game. Despite putting fresh legs on the floor at every opportunity to guard Monroe, he still found ways around the defense with good inside moves or well-placed picks. The offense for Dayton did their part to make a game of it, but there was little they could do on the other end of the court. The explosive GW offense put 50 points on the scoreboard in the first half and only slowed down slightly in the second half with 46. Tony Stanley did everything that he could to make a game of it, but his career-high 36 points still left the Flyers on the short end of a 96-92 score. Dayton had an opportunity to tie the game in the closing seconds but Hall missed a long three pointer and Brown was fouled during the scramble for the rebound making one of two free throws for the final margin. UD falls to 19-5 with the defeat.

St. Joseph’s

It was the second time around for the Hawks, but it wasn’t going to be any easier at the Arena. Determined to get back to their winning ways after the unexpected loss to the Colonials, the Flyers hit the court running, literally. Pressing the ball up the court with every possession, they didn’t look like an Oliver Purnell team at all. David Morris and Tony Stanley took every opportunity to push the ball and look for easy scores on the surprised Hawks. Unlike recent games where UD looked for the three-point shot first, either a drive to the basket or a pass to the big men was the first option.This strategy worked to perfection as UD hit nearly 60% of their shots in the first half while holding St. Joe’s to 38%. The 45-29 lead at the half was easily protected by the second team as Purnell rested his starters for the upcoming trio of difficult games leading to the A-10 Tournament. UD was still not assured of a first round bye and the thought of playing four games in four days didn’t sit well with the coaching staff. Stanley led with 14 points, but Smith, Holland, Finn and Morris also hit double figures in the 82-70 victory.

At Temple

Although they had struggled more than expected early in the season, the Owls were doing more of what has made John Chaney famous and that is play aggressive defense. It has been 10 games since anyone has shot above 40% against Temple and as a result they have won nine of those 10. Unlike the previous game when the Flyers did their best to get the ball inside to their big men, they seemed to get easily frustrated and end up throwing up 20-foot bombs. With a zone that easily challenges 22-foot shots, Temple could not have asked for a better situation. As a result, the Flyers struggled early and quickly fell behind 14-6. Purnell used to TV timeout at the 12-minute mark to make some changes and went with a smaller line-up with Smith at the 3 and Hall at the 4 positions. It appeared that he wanted to go small and quick and get people to the line. It seemed to work, as the Flyers got to the line 10 times in the next six minutes — converting on eight freebies. With six minutes left on the clock and the Flyers down by four, the season went on hold.

While grabbing an offensive rebound, Stanley came down on the foot of Temple center Ron Rollerson. He immediately fell to the floor and grabbed his ankle as the ball squirted out of bounds. The UD medical staff rushed to the floor to aid Tony, but there was little to do. He had severely sprained his left ankle and had to be assisted off the court by two of the Flyers. With Stanley out for the rest of the game, the Flyers continued to struggle on offense. The combination of Smith and King did their best to make up for the loss of Stanley, but the closest the Flyers could get in the second half was eight points. Green led the Flyers with 12 points while Waleskowski chipped in five rebounds in the 70-58 loss. It was learned after the game that Stanley would be out at least one week.

At Fordham

The thought of playing the rejuvenated Rams in New York is never pleasant, but the thought of playing them without the best player in the league was even less appetizing. The 20-6 Flyers needed the win to assure themselves of at least a third place finish and a higher seed in the tournament. With Smith starting in the place of Stanley, the Flyers started one junior (Morris), two sophomores (Hall, Green) and two freshmen (Finn, Smith). Although it was a vision of what we would be seeing next year, it’s not exactly what you want to be using with tournament time quickly approaching.

Fordham got the opening tip, hit a three, and took their only lead of the first half. Hall countered with a three of his own and seemed determined to take over. If there has been any complaint about Hall in the past, it has been his lack of desire to take over a game. The consummate team player, he only steps in when needed and prefers to let his teammates be the stars. Without Stanley in the lineup, Brooks realized that someone needed to take over and decided that today would be his day. Hitting four of six threes and adding two other baskets and a free throw, Hall led the Flyers to a six-point lead at the half with 17 points and six rebounds.

The second half wasn’t nearly as kind to the Flyers as the loss of Stanley took its toll. Marshall played a good deal of time at the 2 position in the second half but couldn’t find any scoring magic. Ramod has done well when not expected to score this season, but playing the shooting guard position seemed to put too much pressure on the freshman. The lead quickly dwindled, as Hall could not find the range as he had in the first half and without it, the Flyers were in trouble. By the 10:00 minute mark Fordham had gained the lead and easily withstood two mini Flyer runs to pull out a 77-69 victory. For the second time this season, the Flyers had lost three out of four and had Xavier looming.

Xavier

After playing 27 games and going from cold to hot and back to cold, the Flyers needed this one. Dayton was currently ½ game ahead of George Washington in the race for third place in the conference. A win against Xavier would assure them of the better seeding, but a loss would drop them into a tie with GW and they would lose the tiebreaker because of the loss to the Colonials earlier in the month. Purnell had a decision to make as Tony Stanley was still not 100%. Was it worth risking further injury to secure the better positioning?

By resting Stanley for the final game, Purnell could assure him of five additional days of rest before his next action. If the Flyers could somehow hold off Xavier and still escape with a win, there would be theoretically an easier game to play. Apparently he felt that the seeding was not as important as the additional risk and he elected to move Hall to the shooting guard position and start both Waleskowski and Finn. Needless to say, there were some raised eyebrows in the crowd as Waleskowski was announced, but it wasn’t long before that same crowd was happy with the decision.

Playing a very different game than they had they first time the two teams met, the Flyers slowed the action down almost to a crawl. The only time that they attacked the basket was when they broke the press and had the numbers on offense. With a more patient and relaxed offense, both of the freshmen excelled. The entire starting front line of Xavier quickly found themselves in foul trouble and sitting on the bench. If Finn had been more accurate with his free throws, Dayton might have stretched their lead to a more comfortable margin, but UD still led 39-36 at the half.

The second half either showed great defense or very poor offense. Both teams shot under 40% while controlling their respective defensive boards. Xavier took a quick lead to begin the second half by hitting their first two shots, but then went seven minutes without hitting another field goal. The Flyers on the other hand went five minutes without hitting their first field goal. With eight minutes to go, the score was tied and seesawed back and forth for the remainder of the game. Xavier had an opportunity to win it in regulation, but an 18-foot shot went in and out and the Flyers lived for at least five more minutes. The overtime seemed to give each team a new lease on life as shooting improved dramatically with the Flyers holding the upper hand at the final buzzer 82-76. Ramod Marshall was the hero of the overtime scoring eight of the Flyers 16 points. UD had pulled off the upset and would now receive a bye in the first round of the A-10 Tournament and an opportunity to play the number #6 seed.