The Dayton women's basketball team will look to build on their strong start to the season when they play host to St. Bonaventure this Saturday afternoon at UD Arena.

The Flyers are coming off a 59-55 road win in the nation's capital over the George Washington Colonials at the Smith Center. For an average bystander, Dayton's win over a George Washington team with only three wins does not look like much. For the UD program and seventh year coach Jim Jabir, it was quite the opposite.

"It's big because it's historic. To be the best team in the A-10, we have to start beating people," Jabir said after the game. "Beating the Colonials is something that Dayton had never done in 24 tries in the program's history. Not only was it great to win against GW, it was great to start off the A-10 campaign with a win."

Behind 16 points from leading scorer Justine Raterman, the Flyers improved to 13-3 overall and 1-0 in A-10 play, setting up a battle of teams with identical records when they take on the Bonnies. Not surprisingly, St. Bonaventure and Dayton find themselves atop the conference standings.

The Bonnies are led by pre-season 1st Team All-Conference Selection Dana Mitchell who comes in averaging 17.4 points and 5.2 rebounds per contest, leading the team in both categories. The Flyers will look to contain Mitchell with their "5-on-1" defense, which gives opponents fits because instead of worrying about one defender, UD makes it a point to throw different looks at a player to prevent them from getting in any sort of rhythm.

Dayton, who comes in a winner of three straight, will look to their sophomore star Raterman to lead the way, but according to her, it's a team effort.

"We have so many different weapons and threats," Raterman said.

The Flyers have exceptional team depth with 11 players who score at least four points per game and average double figures in minutes.

"That's one of the major differences from last year, we're very hard to scout," Raterman said. Dayton will look to wear down St. Bonaventure, especially at UD Arena where the Flyers are 6-1 on the season, with their only loss coming to a ranked Louisville Cardinals team.

One other thing to note for UD is the rest they will get this week. The Flyers have a full week off between games, giving them added time to not only come up with a game plan to shut down Mitchell and the Bonnies, but to rest up and be 100 percent healthy going into Saturday's contest.

"It gives us a lot of time to focus and relax," Raterman said.

The Flyers are entering a tough stretch of games as the Atlantic 10 schedule heats up. Three of the next four games are on the road, with all four games coming against teams that won their conference opener. Needless to say, these are important games for UD as they vie for the top spot in the early stages of conference play. They got the needed non-conference wins against ranked opponents and opponents on neutral floors. This will help Dayton as they battle through their A-10 schedule.

Tipoff is scheduled for 4 p.m. at UD Arena. The game will be carried by 1660 Info Radio and televised nationally by CBS College Sports. This is the second time this season that the Flyers will be on national television.