In Friday's NCAA tournament game, St. Bonaventure lose to Florida State. But the 14-th seeded Bonnies became the spotlight after a great performance that nearly sent Seminoles home in their first game of NCAA tournament.
St. Bonaventure never trailed the game for the first 35 minutes until Florida State got first lead with 5:19 remaining. Their Canadian import Andrew Nicholson, who scored 20 points and 7 rebounds, was the hottest player in the team. He had an excellent 5-for5 start and helped the team get an early lead of 22-12.
But the Seminoles turned it on in the final section with 3-pointers and slowed down Nicholson, making him away from any baskets.
St. Bonaventure eventually lose the game at 66-63 but with no negative comments left. As their coach Mark Schmidt said in the press conference "We wanted to win. I am as proud of our guys as I've ever been with the team that I've coached. They've done everything we've asked. They fought. We just came up a bucket short."
The Bonnies just won their first Atlantic 10 tournament title and they made a pretty expressive appearance in the second all-out day of the NCAA Tournament.
For the Seminoles, they were more scared than hurt. They had beat Duke and North Carolina two times this season and won the ACC tournament championship. Florida State's senior forward Bernard James scored 19 points with 8 of 11 from the field and contributed nine rebounds. His dunk after Loucks missed a layup helped the team tie at 52. With a 16-2 run the Seminoles take its first lead when the game had 5:15 to go.
