Men’s Basketball Travels To Washington To Visit GW Saturday – University of Dayton Athletics

DAYTON — The University of Dayton men’s basketball team travels to Washington, D.C. on Saturday to visit George Washington in Atlantic 10 Conference play.  Game time is 12 noon ET.

This will be UD’s first true road game of the season.  The Flyers played 10 games at UD Arena, and four neutral site games (all against ranked teams).

Dayton is 11-3 overall, and 1-0 in the Atlantic 10.  GW is 11-3 and 0-1 in the A-10.  

UD opened conference play with an 84-70 win at home over La Salle.   Malachi Smith’s 20 points led five Flyers in double digits.  Javon Bennett, Amaël L’Etang and Nate Santos each had 12 points, Enoch Cheeks added 10.   Smith had six assists and Cheeks had four steals. 

The GW game will be broadcast on WHIO Radio, televised on USA Network and streamed on NBCSports.com.  Streaming audio, video and live stats will be at DaytonFlyers.com.

#TRENDING

• Dayton’s three losses have all come to ranked teams by a total of 14 points.

• Those three losses are the only games where the opponent has shot more FTs than UD.

• Nate Santos was named First Team Preseason All-Atlantic 10 after being named to the third team after last season.  

• Santos’ 6-for-6 shooting performance from deep against Lehigh is tied for the best in the nation.  It is also the second-best ever at UD, behind Shawn Haugh’s 8-for-8 in 1993-94.

• Posh Alexander was named Second Team Preseason All-Atlantic 10 and to the Preseason All-Defensive Team.  Alexander is a fifth-year transfer who already has 1,000 career points and 500 career assists (1,423 and 587 respectively).  The fourth recruit from New York City in Anthony Grant‘s tenure at UD, he led the Big East in steals in each of the last four seasons (three at St. John’s and one at Butler).  

• Enoch Cheeks was also named A-10 Preseason All-Defensive Team.  He led the team in steals (40), was second in blocked shots (21), and was third in rebounding (4.7) in his first season at UD after transferring from Robert Morris.  The Providence, R.I. native was the 2023-24 winner of UD’s Steve McElvene Award.  Cheeks was consistently assigned the opponents’ top perimeter player on defense.  In the 25 games (out of 33) where the Flyer foe’s top player was a guard or wing, that player was held under his average 17 times. He started in all 33 games and averaged 8.1 points per game (9.5 in A-10 play).

• The Dayton roster includes five players who have earned all-conference recognition in their past – junior forward Nate Santos (Atlantic 10), junior Enoch Cheeks (Horizon League). junior Javon Bennett (Northeast Conference), redshirt junior Malachi Smith (Atlantic 10) and fifth-year senior Posh Alexander (Big East).

• Amaël L’Etang was named the A-10 Rookie of the Week on Nov. 25.  He scored 11 points (4-6 FG) in 13 minutes against New Mexico State.

• Cheeks was named the A-10 Player of the Week on Dec. 2 after averaging 15.7 points and 7.0 rebounds against North Carolina, Iowa State and UConn in Maui.

• Cheeks is eighth in the A-10 in rebounding (7.2).

• Smith is second in the A-10 in assists (5.9) and fourth in 3-pt. FG% (.467, 16-34).

• Posh Alexander is second in assist-to-turnover ratio (3.4).

• Zed Key is sixth in FG% (.641. 50-78).  He is also fifth in D-I (30) for most dunks .

• As a team, Dayton leads the Atlantic 10 in assist-to-turnover ratio (1.76) and FG% (.487, 379-778) and is fourth in 3-pt. FG% (.352, 111-315).  UD is 13th nationally in A/T ratio.

• UD ranked 20th in average attendance in NCAA Division I last season, averaging a capacity crowd of 13,407 fans a game in 2023-24.  Of schools in the top 25 in attendance, only Kansas, Purdue, Michigan State and UConn also sold out every game of the season.

• Dayton has already announced it has sold out every game for the upcoming 2024-25 season, including both exhibition games that have already been played.  This will be the fourth consecutive year UD has sold out every home game.  That streak is now 68 games.

• This is also the 55th anniversary season of UD Arena.  The Arena underwent a $76.2 million transformation project that was completed in time for the 2019-20 season.

• Dayton’s 26-game homecourt win streak is the fourth-longest in Division I, behind Houston (29), Drake and UConn (27).  Data through 1/1.

• The Flyers are wearing “DJD” on their left shoulder strap in memory of Don Donoher.  Coach Donoher died last April at the age of 92.  He was the first man to coach his alma mater in the NCAA tournament after appearing in it as a player.  A member of the NABC College Basketball Hall of Fame, he is Dayton’s all-time winningest coach (437 wins).  He was the 2017 winner of the USBWA’s Dean Smith Award.

UP NEXT

• The Flyers are at UMass on Wednesday, Jan. 8.  Game time is 7 p.m. ET.

• After a bye weekend, UD’s next home game is on Wednesday, Jan. 15 vs. George Mason.