Men’s Basketball Falls at St. Bonaventure

St. Bonaventure, N.Y. (March 7, 2015) – St. Bonaventure University's Reilly Center is considered one of the toughest places to play a college basketball game and it's even tougher when you're playing without your leading scorer as Fordham found out today. Without the services of freshman Eric Paschall, who missed his second straight game due to injury, the Rams went cold in the second half, falling to the Bonnies, 66-52, in the Atlantic 10 regular season finale for both squads.
 
With the loss, Fordham falls to 9-20 overall, 4-14 in the Atlantic 10, while St. Bonaventure improves to 17-12 overall, 10-8 in the conference. The Rams placed 12^th during the season and will open the 2015 Atlantic 10 Championship on Wednesday night by facing #13 George Mason University in the Barclays Center at 6:30 p.m.
 

Mandell Thomas, playing in front of a number of family and friends who made the trip to St. Bonaventure from his hometown of Rochester, scored a team-high 20 points for the Rams, his fourth 20-point game of the year. Christian Sengfelder and Antwoine Anderson, another Rochester native who had family in attendance, each finished with seven for Fordham with Sengfelder adding six rebounds.
 
Fordham, who led by five at the half, couldn't rebound from a slow second half start as the Rams hit just three field goals over the first ten minutes, allowing the Bonnies to take a double digit lead over that stretch.
 
The game started out slowly for the Rams, who committed five turnovers over the first 5:30 as St. Bonaventure took a 10-7 lead.
 
The Bonnies got the lead to five, 14-9, with 12:49 remaining when the Rams used a 17-5 run to take a 26-19 lead on a Manny Suarez three-pointer with just over six minutes left in the half. Anderson paced the Fordham run with five points while Sengfelder added four.
 
Four straight St. Bonaventure points curbed the Fordham lead to three, 26-23, but a Bryan Smith jumper with 34 seconds left in the half gave the Rams a 28-23 lead at the break.
 
St. Bonaventure scored six of the first eight points of the second half to cut the Fordham lead to one, 30-29, just over two minutes into the period but the Rams went on a 6-4 spurt to get the lead to three, 36-33, on a Thomas dunk at 15:27.
 
The Fordham offense then went cold as the Bonnies outscored the Rams 19-2 to take a 52-38 lead with 8:16 remaining and the closest the Rams would get from that point was 12, which they did twice, the final time at 59-47 following a Thomas jumper with 2:53 left.
 
Suarez grabbed a season-high ten rebounds for the Rams while Ryan Rhoomes finished with six points and eight rebounds.
 
Notes
Thomas has scored at least 20 points in all three of his career games against St. Bonaventure… Thomas' 20 points brings his career total to 1,039, moving him into 31^st place on the Fordham all-time scoring list… He is averaging 20.3 ppg over the past three contests… Thomas also had three steals in the game, bringing his team-high season total to 68, the fifth best single season total in school history and ten shy of Jason Harris' school record of 78, set in 1999-2000… Thomas has at least one steal in all but two games this year… Rhoomes' eight rebounds bring his career total to 625, good for 18^th on the Fordham all-time rebounding list… Suarez blocked a season-high three shots as the Rams recorded seven blocks in the game… His previous season-high for rebounds was five, which he accomplished twice… The Rams are now 8-5 this year when leading at half.