...I'm going to try as hard as I can to not write this piece as an ecstatic Bulls fan, so here it goes.
On Wednesday night the Buffalo Bulls showed up and played what is probably their best game of the year as they beat the Dayton Flyers out of the A-10 conference 84-55. Dayton was 5-1 heading into last nights game coming off of victories against Wake Forest, Fairfield, and Minnesota, but ran into a hot shooting Bulls team that was ready to play. The Bulls opened the game on a 30-11 run, and only expanded on that 19 point lead once the second half came around. Zach Filzen led the Bulls with 24 points, followed by the forever strong Mitchell Watt and Javon McCrea who added 16 and 17.
The Bulls shot 27-54 from the floor (50%), but more impressively shot 10-23 from outside the Arc. Buffalo shot a fairly average 66% from the charity stripe, but most of those misses came when the game was already wrapped up. Dayton didn't see to have an answer as the....actually enough of this objective writing stuff.
What a game Buffalo played last night!!! or should I say 'Watt a game Buffalo played last night.' Unfortunately I was unable to watch the first half of the game, but I updated the score on my phone every 2 minutes, and honestly thought my phone was lying to me. At 30-11 restarted my Blackberry (which takes at least 5 minutes for those who don't own one) just to make sure it wasn't a glitch in my phone making me happy. When the second half started I thought there was no way the Bulls could play this well in the second half, but yet again I was wrong as Buffalo poured in on in every way. The exclamation alley-oop slam dunk by Watt at the end of the game has taken over my old Bulls favorite of the transition dunk he had against Kent last year.
The Bulls finally showcased how good they can be against really good quality opponents, hopefully enough so that those who doubt the talent on this team can truly see the potential this group has. Buffalo dominated a quality opponent in a facets of the game, in a building where non-conference opponents have slim to no chance of winning. Sure they got a little help from the officials early, and they probably caught the Flyers napping after their early season tournament success, but you can take away 99% of that game as positive. McCrea and Watt further proved that they are high quality mid-major forwards, and Filzen showed how dangerous he can be when he's on. I know it's early in the year, but last nights game already has me thinking about our chances of winning in Philly and in Provo later in December.