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Home > Blogs > Flyer Connection: University of Dayton sports > Archives > 2009 > February > 04
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Flyers keeping cool in crunch time.
I hate to make blanket statements about a team — I’d be a pathetic at sports-talk radio because I don’t have that cocksure attitude that convinces me I’m always right and everyone else is a dolt — but I’ll inch out of my comfort zone a bit and say this about the Dayton basketball team: These guys are winners.
The Flyers don’t shoot with any consistency. There probably are some middle-school teams out there more accurate at the free-throw line. But they play with as much fight as any team in the nation. They also have more athleticism than all but a handful of teams. And that’s a pretty lethal combination.
They proved that again with a 63-61 road win over La Salle on Wednesday. They don’t panic. They play as loose as if they’re squaring off in some shirts-and-skins game during summer workouts.
The Flyers led by 17 with 4:55 to go in the first half after an ally-oop dunk by Chris Wright, but they committed three straight turnovers after that (they had 19 in all) to trigger a comeback from the Explorers, who hit a 3-pointer at the first-half buzzer and took that momentum into the second session, cranking out a 14-1 run.
UD had no answer for bulky guard Rodney Green, a 6-foot-5, 205-pound junior who had 25 points.
“It’s a different system that you don’t see anywhere else. Their guards post up, and those guards can score,” UD coach Brian Gregory said.
The Flyers (21-2, 7-1 Atlantic 10) never trailed in the game and still had a 60-54 lead with 3:32 to go, but the Explorers got a 3-pointer from Green and, after a Rob Lowery turnover, two free throws from Green.
Wright hit one of two foul shots for a 61-59 lead, and the Flyers got a defensive stop. But London Warren committed a palming violation as the shot clock was winding down with 1:00 to go.
Green then hit a turnaround eight-footer on the baseline with 46.4 seconds left. But the Flyers turned one possession into two, forcing a jump ball with 14 seconds left and setting up a play for Wright.
“We just wanted to spread the court and try to let Chris get to the basket to make a play,” Gregory said.
Wright missed another off-balance drive, but Marcus Johnson soared in for a monster tip-dunk with 1.2 seconds to go.
“If you look at it, everybody kind of stretched out and created a driving area for Chris, and the guy, (Yves Mekongo) Mbala, did a good job on him.” Gregory said. “But with everyone stretched out, it gives you rebounding avenues, and Marcus went right down the gap.”
The Flyers keep doing what winners are supposed to do — prevail on the road. They’re 5-2 on foreign courts and 7-2 in all games away from UD Arena.
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Flyers win on Johnson’s dunk
PHILADELPHIA — Marcus Johnson scored on a dunk with 1.2 seconds to go to give Dayton a 63-61 win over La Salle here Wednesday night.
With the game tied, UD’s Chris Wright missed an off-balance drive after starting from the top of the key, but Johnson grabbed the rebound off the rim and jammed it in one motion.
La Salle’s Rodney Green missed a half-court heave at the buzzer as the Flyers improved to 21-2 overall and 7-1 in the Atlantic 10. The Explorers fell to 12-9, 3-4.
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Flyers finally reach Philly for La Salle game
Dayton coach Brian Gregory doesn’t expect the travel troubles on the trip to Philadelphia to be a factor in tonight’s game at La Salle, even though the players had a short night’s stay in a city they never expected to see.
The Flyers (20-2) didn’t arrive in Philly until 11:30 a.m. today for their 7 p.m. game, going straight to Tom Gola Arena for a light practice. The city reportedly was hit with six inches of snow in a two-hour span Tuesday night, forcing the team to divert to Allentown, Pa.
The Flyers, though, didn’t appear to be zapped from their travails during their lively workout, which lasted about an hour. They can bolster their NCAA tournament hopes with a win against La Salle (12-8), which is a one-point favorite.
“We live in the Midwest and travel to the East coast. You’re going to have travel adversity the whole year,” Gregory said. “The most important thing is for the guys to concentrate on what they can control, and the only thing we can control is the energy we play with, the attitude we play with and the toughness we’re going to need. That doesn’t change whether you’re on a bus or plane, in Maui or Philly.”
The Flyers’ charter jet was scheduled to take off from Dayton at about 6 p.m. Tuesday, but it was delayed until 9:30 p.m. because of the snowstorm in Philly. Once in the air, a typical 70-minute flight stretched into two hours as the pilots were instructed to go into a holding pattern because of problems on the ground.
While waiting for clearance to land, the charter became low on fuel and was forced to divert to Allentown, landing at about 11:30 p.m.
After waiting for a favorable report from the Philadelphia airport for nearly one hour, the decision was made to find lodging near the airport in Allentown, which is about an hour north of Philly. The team, UD athletic director Tim Wabler, UD Arena manager Tim O’Connell, other school personnel, media and about a dozen fans finally began checking into a nearby hotel at 1 a.m.
The Flyers had an 8:45 a.m. wake-up call, ate the complimentary breakfast at the Homewood Suites and boarded the bus for the arena. The trip took almost two hours — nearly twice as long as planned — because of traffic.
