RICHMOND, Va. (AP) – For all the highlights during his tenure, Virginia Commonwealth coach Shaka Smart has never won a regular-season conference championship.
Now his Rams face an uphill challenge if they’re going to add a conference title to the Final Four on his resume.
No. 22 VCU attempted to rally from a second-half deficit against Dayton, but couldn’t finish the job in a 59-55 loss Saturday at the Siegel Center.
”We have to get better at mentally responding when the game’s not going exactly the way we want it to,” Smart said. ”Too many times today, guys dropped their heads a little bit when things weren’t going that way. If you’re playing at this level, there are going to be good nights and bad nights, nights when things aren’t going your way. You’ve got to stick to your plan.”
The loss leaves the Rams (21-8, 11-5 Atlantic 10) a game behind Dayton and Rhode Island in the conference standings with two games remaining in the regular season. Davidson, which entered Saturday tied for first place with the Flyers and both sets of Rams, hosted George Washington on Saturday night.
Down by two in the last minute, VCU had two chances to take the lead when Jordan Sibert missed a contested runner. Treveon Graham missed a long 3-pointer and Mo Alie-Cox grabbed the rebound, but couldn’t convert the putback.
”I just missed,” Alie-Cox said. ”I just rushed my shot.”
Sibert, who led the Flyers (22-6, 12-4) with 19 points, secured the rebound and converted two free throws with 2.5 seconds remaining to seal the victory.
”It was a good break for us,” Sibert said. ”They had a great shot at the end, a great look at the basket. It was just one of those breaks that we got.”
Behind in the early going, the Flyers had a 12-3 run late in the first half with the help of Sibert and Kendall Pollard. VCU’s Melvin Johnson ended the streak with a 3-pointer, but Dyshawn Pierre matched him at the other end with a 3 heading into the halftime break, with Dayton ahead 33-29.
Dayton’s lead reached nine points at 45-36 early in the second half before Graham started a steady comeback with a 3-pointer. He had a chance to tie the game at 53 when he was fouled on a made layup, but missed the free throw after the media timeout. Pierre then made a hook shot at the other end.
”I never felt that they hit us with that knockout-blow run where the crowd really just erupted,” Miller said. ”I thought the last five minutes was a little hard, but we were able to stem those off.”
A major part of that success came from taking care of the ball. The Flyers turned the ball over just eight times against a VCU team that forces nearly 17 turnovers per game.
The Rams scored just three points off turnovers and failed to score any fast-break points for the second consecutive game.
”That’s something that we have come to rely on quite a bit,” Smart said. ”Scoring in fast-break situations, scoring on turnovers. Dayton did a good job limiting their turnovers, but even the turnovers we did force, we really weren’t able to convert a lot of those into points.”
Pollard had 16 points before fouling out and Pierre added 13 points and seven rebounds for Dayton.
Graham and Alie-Cox led VCU with 12 points each, while Alie-Cox grabbed a game-high 10 rebounds. The Rams shot just 34.5 percent.
”You can’t fault guys if they shoot the ball the right way and take the right shots,” Smart said. ”But when you shoot that kind of percentage, miss layups and dunks, the margin for error is a lot lower.”
Now the Rams must hope for help from outside sources to get them back to the top of the Atlantic 10 standings. They’ll have a chance to take Davidson out on the road Thursday, and a win would give them a season sweep, and the accompanying tiebreaker, over the Wildcats.
While they also hold the tiebreaker over Rhode Island, it was their only matchup with Dayton, so they’ll need to finish ahead of the Flyers to win the conference title.
”We’re not going to cancel the season,” Smart said. ”Our approach all year long is to try to go 1-0. Today, we weren’t able to do that. Thursday, we get another opportunity. We’re obviously going to have to play better than we did today if we want to go down there and win.”
TIP-INS
Dayton: The Flyers featured two recent inductees into the 1,000-point club. Senior guard Jordan Sibert reached the milestone in the Flyers’ previous outing against George Mason, while junior forward Dyshawn Pierre hit it two games before against Saint Joseph’s. Coach Miller was 57 points short of 1,000 during his career at North Carolina State (1997-2002).
Virginia Commonwealth: Smart began his Division I coaching career as Dayton’s director of basketball operations from 2001-03 under then-coach Oliver Purnell. He had previously spent two years as an assistant at Division II California (Pa.)..Reserve forward Justin Tillman, who missed the Rams’ previous game with an injured shoulder, was back in uniform Saturday. Fellow reserve Michael Gilmore (personal reasons) remained away from the team.
COURTSIDE
Washington Redskins coach Jay Gruden attended the game. His son, Joey, is a sophomore guard for Dayton.
STREAKIN’
At the under-12 minute timeout in the first half, just three players had scored. Sibert had all seven of Dayton’s points, while Alie-Cox scored the first five for the Rams before leaving the game, at which point Doug Brooks scored six in a row.
UP NEXT
Dayton: Hosts Rhode Island on Tuesday.
Virginia Commonwealth: Visits Davidson on Thursday.
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