April 9, 2009

2009 Men's Basketball Season Review

2008-09 SEASON REVIEW: Duquesne, which began the season as one of the youngest teams in the nation with eight freshmen and one scholarship upperclassman on the opening day roster, posted the school's most wins since 1971 and first 20-win season since 1981 in going 21-13. The `09 Dukes, picked to finish 12th in a preseason poll of league coaches, advanced to the A-10 Championship final where they came up six points shy of the school's first NCAA tournament appearance since 1977. Duquesne was rewarded with a National Invitation Tournament berth - marking the school's first post-season appearance since the 1994 NIT.

MAKING STRIDES: Duquesne was 3-24 with an RPI of 308 the year before Ron Everhart's arrival on the Bluff. In his first season, Everhart took a team that had two returning players (one of whom was senior Aaron Jackson) and was rocked by a preseason campus shooting to a 10-19 record including five consecutive A-10 regular season wins. In 2007-08, he led the Dukes to the school's first winning record since 1994 at 17-13 as DU's RPI improved to 130. This year, despite losing his top five scorers from the 17-win team, Everhart guided one of the nation's youngest teams to 21 wins and a 75 RPI. DU has improved by a total of 14.5 games in the win-loss column in three seasons under Ron Everhart:

Year       W/L    ATLANTIC 10    RPI IMP.2005-06   3-24    1-15, 14th    308 N/A2006-07  10-19    6-10, 10th    219 +6.02007-08  17-13    7-9, T9th          130    +6.52008-09  21-13    9-7, T5th           75    +2.0

DUQUESNE LATELY: Duquesne was one of the youngest teams in the nation with seven scholarship freshmen and one scholarship upperclassman on the season-ending 12-man roster (freshman Rodrigo Peggau was lost for the year due to Dec. 18 knee surgery) ... despite their youth, the Dukes posted the school's most wins since the 1971 NCAA team went 21-4 ... DU clinched the school's second consecutive winning season with its Feb. 22 victory at La Salle ... the last time that happened was in 1979-80 & 1980-81 ... DU also posted a winning record in league play for just the fourth time in 32 seasons as a conference member (9-7) ... senior Aaron Jackson (19.3 ppg.), a school record four-time conference Player of the Week in `09, was named NABC All-District 4 First Team on Mar. 5 ... he was the 11th player in school history to earn first team NABC district honors ... Jackson finished the year ranked among the Top 5 in seven A-10 categories: scoring (2nd), assists (3rd), field goal pct. (3rd), free throw pct. (3rd), assist/turnover ratio (4th), minutes (4th) and steals (5th) ... Jackson, who was DU's first first team All-A-10 player since 1998, handed out a school record 194 assists - easily surpassing the old record of 178 set by Norm Nixon in 1977 ... 6-7 soph. F Damian Saunders, who led the A-10 in steals per game (2.1), set a new school single-season steals record with 71 eclipsing the old mark of 70 set by Clayton Adams in 1988 ... the Dukes defeated six teams that went on to play in either the NCAA tournament or NIT.

DUKES DOWN SIX NCAA/NIT TEAMS: The Dukes defeated six schools who advanced to either the 2009 NCAA tournament or NIT. Of the six wins, two came on the road and two were at neutral sites. DU defeated NCAA teams Radford (94-75) and Robert Morris (88-62) on the road and also posted a 76-65 home win over NIT participant Bowling Green in non-league play. Duquesne ended an 11-game Xavier win streak with a 72-68 victory over the then-No. 9 (AP) Musketeers in Pittsburgh on Feb. 7. In the Atlantic 10 Championship DU defeated NCAA tournament-bound Dayton (77-66) and NIT Rhode Island (78-74) on a neutral floor at Atlantic City. DU never trailed in handing Robert Morris its worst loss of the season and led Radford from the 19:31 mark of the first half. DU only trailed Xavier at 2-0 and led from the 17:43 mark on. The Dukes rallied from a 10-point second half deficit to defeat Bowling Green and led by as many as 18 in the A-10 tournament win over Dayton.

21 WINS: Duquesne's 21 wins in 2008-09 were its most since the 1971 NCAA team went 21-4. The `71 Dukes, who lost in the first round of the East Regional to Penn, finished the season ranked 15th by AP and 18th by UPI. This was also the first time since 1981 (20-10) and second time since 1972 (20-5) that Duquesne won 20 games in a season.

LEAGUE FINISH: DU, picked to finish 12th in a preseason poll of league coaches, ended the Atlantic 10 regular season in a three-way tie for 5th with a 9-7 record. The Dukes went 5-3 at home and 4-4 on the road in conference play. The fifth place finish was the best since 1994 (T3rd). DU, seeded No. 7 at the A-10 Championship advanced to the title game for the first time since 1981.

DUQUESNE'S RPI: Duquesne, whose final RPI improved by 89 spots in each of the first two seasons under Ron Everhart, jumped 55 more points in 2009. Here is a list of Duquesne's final RPI ratings for the past seven years:

YEAR      RPI    W-L SOURCE2001-02   177   9-19    The RPI Report2002-03   246   10-20   The RPI Report2003-04   168   12-17   The RPI Report2004-05   257   8-21    NCAA RPI2005-06   308   3-24    NCAA RPI2006-07   219   10-19   NCAA RPI2007-08   130   17-13   NCAA RPI2008-09    75   21-13   NCAA RPI

Duquesne finished non-conference play with an RPI of 127 and Sagarin rating of 97 (rankings based on realtimerpi.com & Sagarin polls through Jan. 4).

NCAA'S TOP THREE-SEASON RPI IMPROVEMENT: Duquesne's final RPI has improved by 233 spots since Ron Everhart took over as head coach. It is the biggest improvment among all NCAA Division I programs over the past three seasons:

SCHOOL           2006    2009    +/-DUQUESNE            308 75  +233Morgan State     329    130 +199Cleveland St.    245    52  +193VMI         317 128 +189Illinois St.     235    47  +188Jacksonville     331    144 +187Morehead St.     321    141 +180Idaho           302 135 +167SFA                 240 74  +166Liberty         316 151 +165
ATLANTIC 10 RPI IMPROVEMENT SINCE 2005-06
A-10 SCHOOL   2006    2009    +/-DUQUESNE             308    75  +233Dayton           184    27  +157St. Bonaventure 290 193 +97Rhode Island    152 68  +84Richmond             205    129 +76Xavier           82 17  +65Temple           81 30  +51La Salle             104    112 -8Saint Louis 103 123 -20Massachusetts   128 152 -24Saint Joseph's  48  105 -57Charlotte            99 209 -110Fordham          133    291 -158Geo Washington  33  202 -169