Bus Caught On Fire With St. Bonaventure Students Inside

St. Bonaventure men’s basketball tipped off against Xavier on Tuesday night for the quarterfinals in NIT, and since the game was played in Madison Square Garden, you could guess that a majority of the fans would be supporting the St. Bonaventure Bonnies. 

Don’t get me wrong – the crowd was massive, and there were fans supporting both teams. However, with Xavier traveling from Ohio for the quarterfinal matchup, most of those fans were in support of the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball, who brought a few buses full of students. 

The university arranged for buses to depart from Allegany with more than 300 students to head down to New York City for Tuesday night’s NIT semifinal game against Xavier University at Madison Square Garden. 

However, more than 50 of the students attending St. Bonaventure University, wanting to see their team play in the NIT, were unable to be in attendance due to a horrific accident. 

About 5 hours before tipoff at NYC, one of the buses carrying St. Bonaventure students to the game had caught on fire just outside of Binghamton. The bus was only about 2 hours into the trip, transporting 52 students and 2 chaperones.  

Luckily, the fire was small and there were no injuries to report, but it was still a scary experience. This bus never got back up and running on the path to Madison Square Garden. 

The passengers of the bus that caught a flame were sent to wait at a McDonald’s until other university vans arrived at their location and took them back to campus. The other buses that departed with over 300 students from the university managed to safely arrive in New York City for the game.

Unfortunately, after quite an impressive run in the NIT, the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team fell to the second seed Xavier by a score of 77-84 in Madison Square Garden. 

Xavier will now advance to the championship game on Thursday with plans to face off against the winner of Texas A&M and Washington State. 

And it was even more impressive considering this was essentially a road game for Xavier. The crowd was massive and most of it was behind the Bonnies, which brought a large contingent of students.