2026 Atlantic 10 Tournament: Round 1 Recap

On Wednesday, the 2026 Atlantic 10 Tournament tipped off in Pittsburgh with 2 afternoon first-round matchups. In its 50th season, the Atlantic 10 may be the most poised it’s been this decade to send three teams to the NCAA Tournament. While co-Regular Season Champs Saint Louis and VCU are strong picks to clinch the A10’s auto-bid, teams like St. Joe’s, Dayton, and George Mason are in prime position to steal it. Considering that 5 of the last 8 Atlantic 10 quarterfinal games have been won by the lower seed, the teams fans will see across days 1 and 2 of the tourney aren’t totally out of the mix either.

Here are the biggest moments from Day 1 of the Atlantic 10 Tournament, a round lovingly dubbed “the Pillow Fight” by A10 fans in recent years.

Game 1: St. Bonaventure 99, La Salle 80

Last Saturday, St. Bonaventure athletics confirmed that head coach Mark Schmidt will retire at the end of this season after leading the Bonnies for 19 years. With over 400 wins, 2 A10 Coach of the Year Awards, and 2 A10 Tournament Titles, Schmidt leaves the program with little else to accomplish. However, based on how his Bonnies played against La Salle, they may not be ready to say goodbye just yet.

The opening game of the tournament between the Bonnies and the Explorers got off to a fast-paced start, tied 10-10 by the under-16 media timeout. La Salle’s Rob Dockery had 6 of those first 10 La Salle points. Establishing a powerful paint presence, Dockery scored 19 points to go along with 5 rebounds in the first half alone. He would finish with 33 and 10. However, Bona’s clampdown defense held every other Explorer to no more than 4 points in the half. After breaking out into a 9-0 run midway through the first to take a 22-14 lead, the Bonnies held La Salle scoreless for the final 3 minutes and 46 seconds before halftime.

“When you look at the stats, it’s probably one of our better defensive performances,” Schmidt said after the game. “They shot 43% [from the field], 25% from three. They only made 4 threes. Our offense was good, but I thought our defense picked up as the game went along.”

Bona’s defense kept the heat on to start the second half. They took their first 20-point lead of the game on a wide open Buddy Simmons three from the right corner just before the under-16 timeout. The Bonnies’ lead would not dip below 17 for the rest of the game. Simmons finished the game with 21 points, one of 5 Bonnies to score in double digits.

With a 19-point victory, the Bonnies extended coach Schmidt’s tenure by at least one more game. However, players such as Frank Mitchell emphasized postgame that looming offseason changes have taken a backseat to pursuing another conference tournament title for SBU.

“This is win or go home,” Mitchell said. “So there’s a level of urgency, and we understand how important it is through the program and the guys who did it before. We’re trying to go out with a bang, [to] go out there and play hard. How the chips fall, that’s how they fall.”

Mitchell, the conference’s leading rebounder, finished the game with 18 points and 9 boards.

With the win, St. Bonaventure advances to the second round to take on 5-seed George Mason. Their game tips off this afternoon at 2:00 PM.

Game 2: Loyola Chicago 75, Richmond 67

For Richmond, the gameplan against the bottom-seeded Ramblers was simple; get up early and get up big. 11 of Richmond’s 18 games in A10 play were decided by single digits. Their record in those 11 games? 3-8. The Spiders finished the regular season on three straight single-digit losses, including one against eventual tournament opponents Loyola Chicago.

“We’ve been in maybe five or six one-possession games here in the last month, and I feel like we’ve been on the wrong side of it,” Mooney said after the game, an 8-point Loyola win. “We used to have a graphic that we shared [of] how good we were in close games, so that’s something that’s been frustrating.”

The first half of the second pillow fight game was tight, with Richmond holding a 6-point lead at the break. Both teams hit early threes to notch the game at 6-6, but the Spiders outpaced Loyola from deep in the first half, shooting 7-16 heading into halftime. Will Johnston and Collin Tanner each hit 2 threes for the Spiders in the first half, entering the break with 10 points apiece.

The Spiders looked solid to start the second half, hitting 2 more threes before the under-12. Aidan Argabright, named Wednesday morning to the A10’s All-Rookie Team, also snagged a nice transition bucket off of a steal to put the Spiders up 10 with 14:29 to play. Just ahead of the 13-minute mark, Richmond led 53-38, their largest of the game.

Then, the Ramblers went to work.

From the 13:03 mark to the 10:44 mark, Loyola scored 7 unanswered, 6 from Miles Rubin. Rubin was explosive in the paint for Loyola, making powerful drives and catching quick passes ending in emphatic jams. Dishing to Rubin on at least one of those dunks was Joshua Ola-Joseph, who went 3-3 from deep in the second half.

“I feel like our response to adversity is a big thing for us,” Rubin said after the game. “I feel like sometimes when we start down, we want to come back and still compete and still win in moments like that.”

Rubin finished the game with 14 points, while Ola-Joseph led all scorers with 26.

By the final media timeout, Loyola Chicago were down 61-58. With just under 4 minutes remaining, Miles Rubin made a quick pass to Xavier Amos. Amos drove in from the right wing for a layup, but the ball rattled in and out of the rim. Ola-Joseph picked up the offensive board and chucked it across the court to Kayde Dotson right outside the left wing. Dotson drained a three-point jumper to tie the game at 61, completing the Ramblers comeback.

After a back-and-forth sequence that featured a lot of free throws for both teams, Loyola took a 69-67 lead that they’d never relinquish. Richmond was held without a field goal for the final 3 minutes and 16 seconds of the game.

“I think that this just goes to show, winning three of our last four, there's a lot of teams that wouldn't do what these guys did to end the year,” Ramblers head coach Drew Valentine said. “There was no confidence lost in their abilities, from our coaching staff and our offices.”

Loyola moves on to the second round to take on the 6-seed Davidson Wildcats. That game tips off at 7:30 PM.