Atlantic 10 Tournament: St. Joseph’s Advances To Championship Game After Win Over Dayton

(Photo by Jeff Auger – Double G Media)

Semifinal Saturday at the Atlantic 10 Tournament featured three teams that were supposed to there and one team who crashed the party on Friday night. For those top three teams, winning the A-10 crown could be a make or break proposition in regards to where they are placed for Selection Sunday and the urgency was no less than in the first game of the day.

Both Dayton and Saint Joseph’s were both attempting to do the same thing, impress the NCAA Selection Committee by having a good showing in the A-10 Tournament. Saint Joseph’s was coming off of a come from behind win over George Washington while Dayton cruised to a big win over Richmond. The last game time these two teams played was back in February where the Hawks came away with a nine-point victory so Dayton was looking for revenge and more importantly a berth in the A-10 Final on Sunday afternoon.

The first half featured both the Flyers and Hawks capitalizing on the mistakes of their opponents as SJU scored 14 points off six Dayton turnovers while Dayton scored eight points off of five SJU turnovers. While both shot the same percentage from the field (36 percent), the Hawks were getting to the line with ease shooting 7-of-10 from the charity stripe and winning the rebounding battle by four on their way to a 37-30 halftime lead.

Saint Joseph’s started the second half with three long range baskets to extend the lead to 46-35 at the 15:57 mark of the half. All the success that the Hawks were experienced was despite Atlantic 10 Player of the Year DeAndre Bembry having only three points up to this point as the Flyers were doing everything they can to take him out of the game. While Bembry was out of the scoring equation, Isiah Miles hit two of the aforementioned three-point baskets.

“Yeah, keep going. Keep going,” said Saint Joseph’s head coach Phil Martelli about Bembry’s tough game. “The two point guards for the first time all year, like one didn’t have it going, and we were just trying to put tape on it until the end. He (Bembry) can play better than that, and we will need him to play better than that.”

Dayton was able to cut the lead down to seven after Bembry picked up a Flagrant Foul after tripping Charles Cooke. Cooke hit the two foul shots and Dayton scored on the subsequent possession after the FT’s. Kyle Davis hit an acrobatic lay-up to make the game 55-52 before Papa Ndao hit a three-pointer to extend the back to six points. As the second half went on, it seemed that no matter what Dayton did, St. Joseph’s were able to counter attack by hitting a long range shot or forcing a turnover on the Flyers.

A Shavar Newkirk lay-up with 90 seconds to go put the Saint Joseph’s lead at 74-64 and put the game out of reach for Dayton as St. Joseph’s came out victorious 82-79. Although Dayton was able to bring the lead down, poor long range shooting hurt Dayton as they shot just 6-of-21 from three-point land and was unable get any pressure on the shooters of SJU as the Hawks shot over 40 percent from the field and 37 percent from three. St. Joseph’s were led by Miles who scored 26 points and Aaron Brown who hit big shots down the stretch to finish with 16 points.

Dayton was led by Dyshawn Pierre who scored 22 for the Flyers who are all but a lock for the NCAA Tournament next week.

St. Joseph’s advances on to the Atlantic 10 Championship game on Sunday to face the winner of the Davidson/VCU matchup.