Box Score

KINGSTON, R.I - Rhode Island's Symone Bullard's layup with 5.5 seconds remaining lifted the Rams to a 62-61 victory over Duquesne on Saturday afternoon at the Ryan Center in the Atlantic 10 Conference opener. With the win, URI improves to 9-5, 1-0 A-10 while the Dukes fall to 8-6 and 0-1.

The Dukes were led by Amadea Szamosi, who recorded her second career double-double with 14 points and a career-high 11 rebounds. Belma Nurkic also scored 14 for the Dukes. April Robinson and Deva'Nyar Workman each had 11 points. Stasia King pulled down eight rebounds in 14 minutes of play.

Rhode Island's Charise Wilson scored a game-high 17, with Bullard adding 16 and Dominique Ward 13. Bullard recorded six assists in the victory.

The action started off slow, with the teams shooting a combined 3-for-12 heading into the under 16 media timeout with Rhode Island ahead 4-3. A Robinson 3-pointer coming out of the break started a 14-4 run that gave the Dukes a 17-8 advantage, forcing a Rams timeout at 9:34. A 3-pointer from Emilie Gronas gave Duquesne its first double-digit lead of the game - 20-8 with 8:44 left. The Dukes would maintain a double-figure lead until Bullard's basket made the score 22-14 with 4:50 remaining. A driving layup into traffic by Nurkic put Duquesne up by 10 points at 26-16. Robinson followed with a 3-pointer that forced a URI timeout with the Dukes leading 29-16 at 2:30. Rhode Island scored the final three points of the half on foul shots, making the score 29-19 heading into halftime.

Nurkic became the first player to score 10 points when she opened up the 2nd half with a layup. Szamosi's layup at 12:50 was her 10th point of the game and increased Duquesne's game-high lead to 16 at 43-27. The Rams came back with six straight baskets and a pair of foul shots to cut the deficit to two points at 43-41 with 8:08 to play. The 14-0 run ended on an Olivia Bresnahan foul shot at 7:25. With the score 47-46 in Duquesne's favor, Robinson missed the front end of the 1-and-1, but Szamosi was there to grab the rebound and the putback to make the score 49-46 with 5:57 left. Szamosi followed with a jumper 17 seconds later to make it a 2-possession contest at 51-46.

The teams would exchange baskets to keep it a five point game with 4:12 remaining. Ward would make a jumper followed by a pair of Bullard foul shots and a Ward foul shot to tie the game at 53-53 at the 1:43 mark. Nurkic was fouled on the next Duquesne possession and made both ends of the 1-and-1. Rhode Island's Sydney Lewis came back with a jumper to tie the game at 55-55 with 1:24 left. URI went ahead 58-55 on Wilson's 3-pointer with 34 seconds to play. With Rhode Island still up by three, Robinson converted a layup and was fouled with 15.4 seconds remaining. She missed the foul shot, but Workman was there to gather the offensive rebound and putback to give Duquesne a 61-60 advantage with 14.8 seconds left. However, Bullard took the inbounds pass and converted the game-winner in the paint. Ward recorded a steal on the in-bounds pass and was fouled with 4.5 seconds remaining. She missed the front end of the 1-and-1 with Bresnahan grabbing the rebound. She passed to Robinson, whose desperation shot did not fall as time expired.

"We played well in spurts, but at the end of the day, you have to put the ball in the basket and we didn't do that well, even with the quality shot attempts we had," said head coach Dan Burt. "More than half of their points came off our turnovers. That is completely unacceptable."

Rhode Island scored 34 of their 62 points (54.8 percent) off 22 Duquesne turnovers.

"Other than Stasia King, our post play was soft in the paint. We didn't go up strong and didn't get a lot of put backs from our posts. They only got to the line four times against a smaller team."

Jose-Ann Johnson was the only forward to go to the foul line, making 3-of-4 attempts.

"This is a wake-up call for our team that we must get in the gym more on our own and shoot the ball. We will bounce back, but this one stings a lot."

Up next, the Dukes host George Mason on Jan. 8th. Last season, Duquesne was a 64-45 winner over Mason in Fairfax, Va. The Dukes and Patriots tipoff at 7:00 p.m. at the Palumbo Center. The game will be the first-ever Washington Country night promotion.

GAME NOTES

• Szamosi 11 rebounds ties a team season-best - Workman (Syracuse, Robert Morris)

• Her previous career-high was 10 rebounds against St. Bonaventure on Jan. 1, 2014

• Nurkic surpassed the 600 career point mark

• Duquesne's 8-game winning streak over Rhode Island dating back to Jan. 12, 2007 comes to an end

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