Bench players have key roles in Davidson’s opening A-10 tournament win over Fordham

Fordham’s strategy against top-seeded Davidson in Friday’s opening quarterfinal of the Atlantic 10 men’s basketball tournament was pretty straight-forward.

The Rams tried to take away the Wildcats’ 3-point shooting threat, hold their own on the inside and take a chance that Davidson’s medium-range shooters wouldn’t hurt them.

It didn’t work.

Starter Sam Mennenga and reserves Grant Huffman and Desmond Watson did plenty of damage from medium range, and the Wildcats rolled to a 74-56 victory at Capital One Arena in Washington.

Davidson (26-5) plays in the semifinals at 1 p.m. Saturday against fifth seed Saint Louis (23-10), which edged fourth seed St. Bonaventure 57-56 in Friday’s second semifinal.

The Wildcats beat Saint Louis, 79-58, last month in a game played at Davidson.

Davidson has reached the A-10 semifinals every time since joining the league in the 2014-15 season — except two years ago, when COVID-19 shut down the tournament.

With A-10 Player of the Year Luka Brajkovic picking up two quick fouls in the first half, Davidson relied on Mennenga for inside play.

A 6-9 sophomore from New Zealand, Mennenga scored 15 points and grabbed nine rebounds. Two of his four field goals came from the 6-to-8 foot range, and he was 7-of-8 from the foul line.

Watson, a freshman, scored a season-high 13 points, and Huffman added nine points.

“Des (Watson) and Grant stepped up today,” Davidson guard Foster Loyer said.

Loyer said Fordham’s strategy is likely to be repeated by other Davidson opponents in the postseason, with the Wildcats ranking among national leaders in several 3-point shooting categories.

“We know there will be games when they try to run us off the 3-point line,” Loyer said. “We have the players to take advantage of whatever we get.”

Junior guard Hyunyung Lee, who, with Loyer, provides Davidson with much of its distance shooting, said the Wildcats showed Friday that they can adapt.

“We look for a way, when we aren’t making the 3-pointers,” Lee said. “We figured out that they weren’t guarding Des and Grant. We took advantage of that.”

With Brajkovic getting into early foul trouble and Davidson adapting to Fordham’s strategy, the Rams kept reasonably close in the early going. Davidson led 27-21 late in the first half but went on a 13-3 run for a 40-24 halftime advantage.

Meanwhile, the Wildcats were doing an outstanding job of defending Fordham’s distance shooting.

The eighth-seeded Rams (18-18) beat ninth seed George Mason on Thursday using the 3-point shot as a key weapon. On Friday, Fordham hit just 4-of-26 from beyond the arc.

“The Atlantic 10 has a tremendous number of good 3-point shooters,” Davidson coach Bob McKillop said. “So we’ve had a lot of rehearsals for this.”

McKillop said assistant coach Will Reigel worked with the Wildcats on defending against Fordham’s distance shooting.

“It’s great to have someone like Will drawing up the plan,” McKillop said.

Davidson didn’t take its foot off the gas in the second half, building the lead to 26 points (66-40) on a Loyer basket with a little less than eight minutes remaining.

Rostyslav Novitskyi kept Fordham in the game in the first half, scoring 13 of his 18 points before intermission.

Lee finished with 11 points, Loyer had eight, and Brajkovic had six.

Davidson shot 48.1 percent from the floor and held Fordham to 33.3 percent.

Steve Lyttle on Twitter: @slyttle