March 18, 2011
Alan Robinson, who spent the past 28 years covering Pittsburgh sports for The Associated Press, will be contributing to GoDuquesne.com for the remainder of the basketball season. Look for his columns here every Monday and Thursday.
By Alan Robinson GoDuquesne.com
After his team's disappointing loss to Saint Joseph's in the Atlantic 10 Conference tournament, Duquesne coach Ron Everhart had a single thought: This team needs to play another game.
Maybe there was no circumstantial evidence to support Everhart's conclusion. The Dukes, after being 16-5 and leading the A-10 with an 8-0 record, had dropped seven of nine games. Not only did they fall out of consideration for the NCAA Tournament, their chances of being chosen for the NIT also vanished.
That left two alternatives: the College Basketball Invitational, a tournament that receives relatively little attention but has proven to be a proving ground for prospective NCAA Tournament teams, and the CollegeInsider.com tournament, which has begun limiting itself to mid-major teams.
Some schools, unhappy at being passed over for the NIT, chose not to seek a bid to the CBI, which Duquesne also played in a season ago. Duquesne was willing to take part, but the comparatively high cost to host a game all but ruled out the Dukes as a home team.
So, in order to get into a tournament, Duquesne agreed to be placed in what essentially was the tournament's Western Regional, along with Montana, Oregon and Weber State. The Dukes' initial game was at Montana, a Big Sky Conference team that had lost only one home game all season, and, if they won, they would have to travel West again a few days later.
An enviable situation? Hardly. An unwinnable situation? Not quite.
The Dukes, dissatisfied with their 18-12 record and motivated by their late-season slide, effectively said, "Let's just go play a game. Somewhere. Anywhere."
"The fact that we were able to have a chance to go play again, that was something that was motivating for our kids," Everhart said. "We were very excited to play again after having such a disappointing conference tournament. The kids wanted to play. We practiced on Sunday afternoon (March 13, before tournament bids were extended) and the kids showed me they wanted to play. We had a great practice."
Even after the CBI brackets were announced, the Dukes' players showed no discernible disappointment with their draw. Although both Damian Saunders and Sean Johnson had flu-like symptoms -- Saunders was taken to a hospital out of fear he might have appendicitis -- the Dukes had a long and productive practice that began at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday, the day they left for Missoula, Mont.
Even after a delay at the airport -- what else was new -- the extended trip to Montana didn't prove an obstacle, and the Dukes responded with an 87-76 victory -- only their third since Feb. 2. Maybe traveling more than 1,500 miles from Pittsburgh and getting out of their comfort zone was what they needed to put together their most complete effort in weeks.
They played defense with a passion, getting 14 steals, and they led 36-31 in rebounding. They shot well -- 54.2 percent from the floor and 76.2 percent from the foul line -- and, most importantly, Everhart got contributions from up and down his bench.
Concerned that Saunders couldn't play his usual 35 minutes or so, Everhart used a version of his 10-40 rotation system that he used three seasons ago to speed opponents up. He substituted as many as four players at a time, meaning the taller Grizzlies repeatedly had to work the ball up the floor against fresh players at nearly all times.
Andre Marhold, stuck on the bench much of the season, responded with 7 points and some key rebounds in the second half while playing 12 minutes. Jerry Jones had five rebounds in 17 minutes. his best game since early in the season.
As a result, Montana's guards almost always had a hand in their face and a couple of defenders around them while they were trying to work the ball inside.
"We've played well enough and hard enough to win some of the games we lost," Everhart said. "I'm happy for our guys that they went out and executed and made some shots at crucial times, made some free throws. We did some things real well that we hadn't done for a while, and we had played with a lot of effort and energy."
And they get a chance to play again Monday night, at Oregon's new $260 million Matthew Knight Arena, a showcase building that is being called an even fancier version of Pitt's Petersen Events Center.
"Our guys now feel a heck of a lot better about who they are, what kind of team we have," Everhart said. "We got an opportunity to play in a post-conference tournament and we took advantage of it."
Of the eight first-round games in the CBI. there was only one road winner: Duquesne. And it traveled by far, the longest, of any team. ___ The Duquesne women's team also was coming off a discouraging tournament loss, to Dayton, that likely prevented the Dukes from landing an NCAA tournament at-large bid. Despite having a 22-8 record and a nation's-leading 13 road wins, the Dukes settled for a WNIT bid.
But if coach Suzie McConnell-Serio had trouble motivating her team to play Kent State on Thursday night at the Palumbo Center, it didn't show. With Vanessa Abel scoring 18 points, and Alex Gensler helping out with 16 points and five steals, the Dukes won 64-56 for the first post-season victory in school history.
The victory, their 23rd, earned the Dukes a trip to Kansas on Saturday night.
"We're excited to be moving on," McConnell-Serio said. "We knew if we executed, defended and played with a lot of confidence, we could win the game."
Or exactly what the men's team did the night before. ___ After beating Montana, the Dukes awoke to some sad news. Only hours after longtime Duquesne announcer Ray Goss described the games to the fans back home, he learned his wife of 50 years, Dee Goss, died overnight.
University of Montana officials immediately made one of the school's planes available so Goss could fly to nearby Helena, Mont., and catch a commercial flight home. The school wanted to fly Goss directly to Pittsburgh, but its jet aircraft was not available that morning.
"They couldn't have been more accommodating, everyone from the school president on down," Everhart said. "They were tremendous. It really meant a lot to us."
Duquesne's traveling party, at the same time, made an abrupt change of plans after consulting with athletic director Greg Amodio and receiving a travel waiver from the NCAA. Rather than making an arduous, two-stop trip back home in which they wouldn't have arrived in Pittsburgh until after midnight, due to the two-hour difference in time zones and the various layovers, the Dukes decided to make an 11-hour bus trip to Eugene, Ore.
By doing so, the Dukes avoided spending the entire day Thursday on airplanes and airports. They also eliminated a nearly full travel day on Sunday returning West, and the move meant they would have three full practice days in Eugene ahead of Monday night's game against the Ducks.
While the bus ride was long and tedious, crossing parts of four states (Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon), it was preferable to two extended days on planes.
"It could have been a tremendous disadvantage for us (being in the Western regional), but that's not the type of kids we have," Everhart said. "We had no prospects for having a home game, and we have to go to hostile environments and produce. But I'm excited about that. It unifies us. We're traveling as a team, our unity as a team is very, very good. There was nobody in that (Montana) gym cheering for us except the guys on the bench, and that was a great, great thing."
Beating Oregon (17-17), of the Pac-10 Conference, will be harder still.
The Ducks' students turned out for their 68-59 victory over Weber State, so there should be a home-court advantage. And Oregon possess an inside player, Joevan Catron, who could prove to be a real challenge for the Dukes to handle at both ends of the court.
The 6-foot-6, 245-pound Catron had 24 points and 12 rebounds against Weber State and was a dominating presence much of the game. He's also a player who shouldn't be fouled; he made 12 of 13 free throws.
E.J. Singler, who also is 6-6, contributed 16 points.
But while the Ducks are taller than Duquesne, they prefer to play a half-court game. No doubt the Dukes will try to speed up the tempo, force turnovers and push the pace to one that Oregon prefers not to play.
"I expect our practices to be very good, very sprinted between now and Monday, and for that to continue over into the game," Everhart said.
One the Dukes are, despite their laborious travel schedule, very happy to play.
Consider this: OF the 16 teams to play in last year's CBI, six made it to the NCAA field this season, including champion Virginia Commonwealth. That's a far higher percentage than for either the NIT or CIT.
That might be something to remember at this time next season, especially if the Dukes win at least one more game. A game that, only last weekend, they weren't sure if they would get to play.
