By HUNTER O. LYLE
ST. BONAVENTURE, NY – Through the first ten minutes, there was an eerie air of uncertainty in the Reilly Center. Hosting Cornell for their first night of a three-game home stand, things were not falling St. Bonaventure’s way.
The Bonnies were scoring, and scoring efficiently at 7-for-14, but their defense was springing leaks, especially from beyond the arc, where Cornell had capitalized on five of their opening nine 3-pointers, taking an 18-15 lead. The Bonnies attempted to retaliate, but went 0-3 in the process.
Benjamin Bill had scored eight of St. Bonaventure’s first 15, but was on the bench, regaining his breath as Cornell lashed out from deep. However, upon his return to the court, he quickly moved the needle for the Brown and White.
Dominating from the block and shooting a cool 87 percent from the floor, Bill erupted for a career-tying 28 points, leading the charge for St. Bonaventure as they tallied the first win at home with a 88-64 rout of Cornell.
“I feel like my teammates share the ball really well and if I post up I usually get really high (percentage) shots,” said Bill, whose career high in points was set in 2025 at Daemen. “So if I get into position and my teammates get me the ball, I’ll have a good touch.”
The first step in resetting the table against Cornell was taking away their main weapon. After shooting the lights out in the opening minutes, the Bonnies’ defense regained their composure. Tenaciously fighting over screens or swiftly switching screens and getting into shooters’ airspace, the Bonnies stayed in Cornell’s comfort zone. With no room to breathe, Cornell’s 3-point engine seized. After opening with five makes on nine takes, they would go on to miss their next ten attempts and hit just another five through the remaining 30 minutes of play.
“(Cornell) get a lot of threes off their big men, off of hand-offs and shooting behind them. I think they made their first three off of that,” said St. Bonaventure head coach Mike MacDonald. “Once we kind of controlled them and kept them out of penetration we were able to get out to shooters. I think (Bill) blocked (a 3-pointer) in the first half, and when our big guys are that active it’s harder for them to get their shots off.”
Then came the offense. Returning to the action just above the six minute mark, Bill immediately found a spark in the form of six of the Bonnies’ next ten points, all coming from within the painted area – including a crowd-electrifying put-back dunk – alongside two rebounds and a swat, his second of four on the night.
Spurred by Bill’s efforts underneath despite facing double-teams, St. Bonaventure ignited a 20-8 run in the final six minutes of play that saw five players register tallies in the scoring column on 8-for-11 shooting (72.7 percent). In the same window, Cornell shot just 4-for-13 (36.3 percent), falling behind by 17 heading into the break.
The brief intermission failed to cool off Bill, who snapped back to his dominance with the Bonnies’ first four points and another denial. Again, here came another Brown and White wave.
With defense quickly translating to offense, St. Bonaventure ripped away passes, swarmed drives to the paint and rejected shots at the rim, quickly tacking on eight points in transition as they built a 23-point lead in the opening five minutes.
Meanwhile, Cornell was crumbling. After not earning a trip to the line in the entire first half, Cornell drew fouls and made their way to the charity stripe, but shot a meager 1-for-4 in their first two trips. They then watched as the deficit grew to 29 in the next two minutes as they shot 3-for-11 (27.2 percent) and surrendered four turnovers. The Bonnies, on the other hand, were near perfect from the field, shooting 6-for-9 (66.7 percent) and winning the rebound battle at 6-to-3.
“Last Monday (against Youngstown State) we didn’t take care of the glass and that was a problem. Cornell is one of the best offensive rebounding teams with the way they play. It’s not what you’re used to, it’s not just having two big guys close to the rim trying to outmuscle you,” said MacDonald, whose team won the overall rebound battle 48-28. “Our guys did a good job of going out to meet them to try to stop them.”
As the onslaught continued, St. Bonaventure once again emptied their benches, seeing all 13 players take the court and combining for 21 points as they cruised to their first win in the Reilly Center.
Scoring 16 in the first and 12 in the second, Bill ended with 28 points – on 13-for-15 shooting (86.7 percent) – to go with his four blocks and five rebounds. Ari Fulton added another double-digit day to his resume, finishing with 14 points, eight rebounds and a block while Taj Au-Duke came away with 10 points, five assists and two steals.
Riding their current confidence, St. Bonaventure will return to the Reilly Center on Saturday, facing Lafayette at 4 p.m., before ending the home stand on the following Thursday against Buffalo at 7 p.m.
“You have to understand, people didn’t like that we lost to Youngstown State, but maybe it’s a little bit of, I don’t want to say a wake up call, but it’s a learning environment. We have to remember that. We are still younger,” said MacDonald. “It’s easy when you lose a game to be mad and be upset, but do you learn from it? I think our guys did.”
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