Dayton at VCU

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Dayton starters

Kevin Dillard, 6-0, Sr., G, 15.0 ppg.
Vee Sanford, 6-3, Jr., G, 12.9
Josh Benson, 6-9, Sr., F, 11.6
Devin Oliver, 6-7, Jr., F, 10.1
Dyshawn Pierre, 6-6, Fr., F, 6.7

VCU starters

Darius Theus, 6-3, Sr., G, 6.2
Briante Weber, 6-2, So., G, 6.0
Troy Daniels, 6-4, Sr., G, 13.9
Treveon Graham, 6-5, So., F, 14.8
Juvonte Reddic, 6-9, Jr., F, 13.6

About Dayton

The Flyers are opening the Atlantic 10 against two ranked teams, No. 24 VCU and No. 17 Butler. They?ve faced ranked foes in back-to-back games one other time in the last 19 years, beating Georgia Tech and losing to Villanova in the 2009 Puerto Rico Tipoff Classic. ? The Flyers have been out-rebounded in their last four games. ? They?re shooting fewer 3-pointers this season (16.8) than last year (22.7) but are making them at a higher clip (35.7 percent to 34.3). ? Oliver is first in the A-10 in rebounding (8.6), Dillard is third in assists (4.9) and foul shooting (86.7), Sanford is fifth in free-throw accuracy (85.4) and Benson is eighth in field-goal percentage (54.9).

About VCU

The Rams are making the program?s first appearance in the USA Today coaches poll, which began in 1991. They beat Memphis in the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament and then lost close games with No. 1 Duke (67-58) and No. 12 Missouri (68-65). ? They lead the country in steals per game (13.5) and turnover margin (plus-8.8) and also are hoisting nearly 25 three-pointers per game. ? They?re 8-1 at home, losing by two to Wichita State, which is ranked 23rd in the Associated Press poll. ? In a win over East Tennessee State on Wednesday, Daniels set an A-10 record with 11 three-pointers. He had 20 attempts and finished with 33 points.

Miller time

?I think this is probably about as excited as people have felt about an Atlantic 10 season in a long time ?and rightfully so,? UD coach Archie Miller said. ?Playing our opener on the road with VCU is a difficult challenge. But at the same time, you want to be on this stage. I?ve always said that?s where our program wants to be ? big games (where) big plays are going to be needed. It should be the most hostile environment we?ve seen so far. That place is going to be jacked.?

 

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Miller challenges Flyer seniors



Dayton coach Archie Miler knows the Flyers will only go as far as their seniors take them. And he?s been giving point guard Kevin Dillard and forward Josh Benson a pep talk about seizing the moment with their careers nearing an end.

?Seniors this time of year are either locked in or they?re not. I like the mindset of Josh and Kevin,? Miller said. ?I?ve talked to those guys about having a guaranteed 16 games left in their careers. To talk about all the hard work for these two guys and for them to get to where they?ve gotten, to have 16 left, why not get every drip out of the day you can before it?s over? And it will come fast.

?I like those two guys kind of leading us into this new season, and it is a new season. Everyone is 0-0, and I think our team has a good bounce about it right now.?

Benson apparently has gotten the message.

?It?s going to be a really tough ? TOUGH ? conference schedule,? he said. ? But there?s no team we can?t beat, and there?s no team that we can?t lose to. We just have to come every day, whether it?s rain, sleet, snow or hail, ready to practice. Because how you practice is how you play. We have to produce in practice so we can produce in games.?

 

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For VCU, ?moment?s here? in A-10





Shortly after Virginia Commonwealth announced in May that it was joining the Atlantic 10 Conference, the Rams? basketball coaching staff made videos for the players.

VCU?s guards received highlights of the guards in the A-10. The big men received highlights of their counterparts.

The Rams have been familiarizing themselves with their new opponents for the better part of seven months. Study hall increased in earnest this week.

VCU (12-3), newly anointed No. 24 in the USA Today Coaches Poll, introduces itself to the A-10 tonight when it takes on Dayton (10-4) at the Siegel Center.

?The moment?s here now,? senior point guard Darius Theus said. ?It?s time to play. We?re just excited to get it rolling.?

VCU coach Shaka Smart said even if you?ve been in a league for a long time, ?you?re excited about that transition from nonconference play to conference play.?

?The excitement is even doubled because it?s a new league,? he said. ?Anytime there is something new and fresh and unknown, there?s always going to be a higher level of excitement.?

VCU spent the past 17 years in the Colonial Athletic Association. Outside of Richmond and Charlotte, the Rams don?t have a lot of history with the schools in the 16-team A-10.

They haven?t played four of the teams at all. Nine others they have played four times or fewer, with some of the most recent meetings in the 1970s, ?80s and ?90s.

Smart split the teams among his coaching staff to study during the summer.

?We?re going into a league where we don?t know the teams as well as we did in the CAA, but it works both ways,? he said. ?They haven?t played us in the past. It?ll be interesting because it?s such a big league that you only play one team twice.?

The schedule-maker didn?t give the Rams an easy starting point in what Smart says is maybe ?the second-deepest league in the country? behind the Big Ten.

Dayton, which hasn?t played VCU since 1986, has been one of the anchors in the A-10 since joining in 1995. The Flyers have been to the NCAA tournament four times and the NIT seven times.

They feature guards Kevin Dillard and Georgetown transfer Vee Sanford. Dillard is on the watch list for the Cousy Award, which goes to the nation?s top point guard.

Dillard ?is perhaps the best player in the league,? Smart said. ?He?s their do-it-all guard. They?ve got some other great players, but he definitely is their head.?

VCU is expected to sell out the Siegel Center for the 28th consecutive time. Fans in different sections will receive either black or gold T-shirts to create a ?Stripe the Stu? effect to commemorate the first game in the A-10.

?I?m sure it will be a great environment,? second-year Dayton coach Archie Miller said. ?It?s going to be great for the A-10.?

 

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VCU trying not to get caught up in ranking




Darius Theus finished practice about 1 p.m. Monday and headed back to his apartment on Virginia Commonwealth?s campus to rest before a film session.

That was about the same time the Rams were making their first regular-season appearance in the USA Today/ESPN Coaches Top 25 Poll.


While texts and tweets undoubtedly were flying, Theus didn?t find out VCU was ranked 24th for almost two hours. The senior point guard hopes his teammates take the same chilled-out approach to their new platform.

This is just the 11th time VCU has been ranked in either The Associated Press poll or the coaches? poll. While the attention is nice and gives fans something to crow about, Theus doesn?t want to get caught up in it, especially with the Rams (12-3) making their debut in the Atlantic 10 Conference Wednesday against Dayton (10-4) at the Siegel Center.

?As the season has gone along, we?ve been getting a lot better,? Theus said. ?I think that?s been our goal. We haven?t really been concerned about polls and all that. The more we win I guess things like that will happen for us.

?When you?re in college, everybody wants to be ranked. We see the top 25 all the time. Everybody wants to have that ranking by their name. But you can?t fall for the hype. You?ve got to come out and play. ? We?ve just got to continue to do what we?ve been doing.?

VCU is one spot out of the AP top 25 with 94 points. No. 25 New Mexico has 102.

The Rams haven?t been ranked in the AP Top 25 since the 1984-1985 season, when they spent eight weeks in the rankings and finished 11th. They were ranked 20th for a week during the 1983-84 season.

VCU was ranked sixth in the final coaches? poll after its Final Four run in 2011.

?Just because (the coaches poll) says we?re in the top 25 has nothing to do with what we?re trying to do as a team or where we want to go,? VCU coach Shaka Smart said.

?If anything, it should heighten our awareness to the fact that teams are trying to come at us. ? I don?t care who you are, everybody wants to knock off a ranked opponent. We played Memphis in the Bahamas, and they were ranked. ?Let?s knock these guys off.? I?m sure Dayton will look at that and say, ?Hey, they just got in the rankings. Let?s knock them out.??

Smart has a vote on the coaches? poll but declined to say how he voted. He said the Rams ?will definitely take the exposure that comes? with the ranking because it helps with recruiting, but it?s not that significant to him and has not been a goal.

?At the end of the year,? he said. ?We?d love to be ranked as high as we can at the end of the year because that?s all based on your finish.?