That’s typically a phrase used in March as teams try to keep their season alive in the postseason, but it fits Dayton’s current situation.
The Flyers (12-4, 3-0) survived Fordham (9-7, 0-3) and then Loyola (5-11, 1-2) and finally George Washington (11-5, 2-1) on Tuesday to stay perfect in Atlantic 10 Conference play without two key big men: Amaël L’Etang and Malcolm Thomas, who have been sidelined by injuries since the start of conference play.
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The Flyers advance into January with A-10 championship hopes still alive. One loss in the first three games wouldn’t have doomed Dayton, but one loss would have made its job much more difficult later this season because its seven toughest games remain: two vs. Saint Louis (14-1, 2-0); two vs. Virginia Commonwealth (11-5, 2-1); and road games at George Mason (15-1, 3-0), George Washington and Richmond (12-4, 2-1).
The way Saint Louis is playing — it beat VCU 71-62 on Wednesday and ended a 10-game losing streak at the Siegel Center — it’s hard to imagine the A-10 champion having more than three losses. KenPom.com predicts Saint Louis will finish 15-3, two games ahead of VCU and three ahead of Dayton, George Mason and George Washington.
Dayton is fortunate it doesn’t play Saint Louis until Jan. 30. The rest of its most challenging games follow in February and March.
Dayton gets a week break at the perfect time. Maybe L’Etang and/or Thomas will be able to return to action Tuesday at Duquesne in Dayton’s next game.
Simon is next man up for Dayton
Credit: David Jablonski
Credit: David Jablonski
My 7-year-old son Chase served as my soccer team’s water boy at an indoor game Wednesday night. We stink, so there was no chance Chase’s contributions would make a difference, but maybe it played a small part in me scoring a garbage-time goal.
Every team needs role players, whether they’re helping on the court or off. Dayton has seen several players step up in reserve roles this season, most notably Bryce Heard at the ESPN Events Invitational and Thomas at several points in the non-conference season.
The latest bench player to emerge is Jaiun Simon. He redshirted as a freshman in the 2023-24 season but decided to stick with Dayton and stay out of the transfer portal. He played a small role last season but again stayed loyal to Dayton.
Even this season, Simon’s minutes have been inconsistent. He’s averaging 14.2 minutes but didn’t see any action in five games.
The injuries to L’Etang and Thomas provided another opportunity for Simon, and he has taken advantage. He scored a career-high 11 points against Fordham and topped that total by one point against George Washington.
Simon had six points against Loyola, including a 3-pointer in the second half, and he also blocked a shot with 16 seconds to play and Dayton leading by one.
Simon got the Tom Archdeacon treatment after the George Washington game:
Arch wrote:
He joined the ranks of Scoochie Smith, Obi Toppin and Daron Holmes II Tuesday night.
With just under six minutes left — in front of a roaring, sold-out crowd that was caught up in the physical, give-no-quarter game against a very good George Washington team — Jaiun Simon transformed himself from a Dayton Flyers’ forward into Leonard Bernstein.
With his arms raised and the euphoria of the moment filling him too, Simon came down the court at UD Arena — and like those charismatic crowd orchestrators of the recent Flyers’ past — he began conducting the cheering throng.
He wanted more energy. More decibels. More realization, as he would explain later, that “We’re here! And we can compete with anybody!”
In a battle of conference unbeatens, UD defeated the Revolutionaries, 79-72.
Simon was a big reason.
Simon liked the story. He sent me a message on Instagram that simply had the fire emoji. He thought I wrote it, but I told him it was Tom’s story and he’s been writing about the Flyers for nearly 40 years. If you’ve had any big moment at all in a Dayton uniform, Arch has written about you.
Simon was already on that list. Arch wrote about him in November, too.
Fast Break
Here’s other news that might interest Flyer fans:
🏀 Former Dayton forward DaRon Holmes II has made the first four starts of his NBA career in the last four games for the injury-plagued Denver Nuggets. He’s still not getting starter minutes or producing like a starter. He’s averaging 4.3 points in 18.3 minutes.
🏀 Dayton is in a happier place at the moment than the three other big names in Ohio college basketball.
Cincinnati (8-7 overall) is 0-2 in the Big 12. It hasn’t beaten anyone in the top 100 of the Ken Pomeroy ratings other than Dayton.
• Xavier (9-7 overall) shares last place in the Big East with Marquette after losing at Marquette, where Dayton won in November, on Wednesday.
• Ohio State (10-4 overall) is 2-2 in the Big Ten after losing at home to Nebraska, which won once in its first 13 trips to Columbus.
🏀 The Ohio program having the best season, by far, is the Miami RedHawks, who have won 16 straight games.
🏀 Speaking of Mid-American Conference teams, Massachusetts left the A-10 for the MAC for football reasons but surely expected its basketball team, which hadn’t been an A-10 contender for years, to get a boost. Instead, UMass (9-7, 0-4) shares last place with Central Michigan.
🏀 What do you want to know about the Flyers?
I want to hear from you. Reach out to me directly at david.jablonski@coxinc.com with your questions and feedback on the team or this newsletter.
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