G1 | MONTANA (0-0) at DUQUESNE (0-0)
Tues., Nov. 8, 2022 • 7:00 pm ET • Pittsburgh, Pa. • UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse (3,500)

LIVE STREAM: ESPN+ with Tim Benz & Josh Taylor
RADIO: 104.7 HD2 / iHeartRadio with Ray Goss ('58) & Jarrett Durham ('71)

Duquesne, with a roster featuring 10 first-year players, opens the 2022-23 season at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse on Tues., Nov. 8 at 7:00 p.m. vs. Montana on ESPN+.

DU, which is beginning its 107th season, is 88-18 in openers, including an 83-4 record when opening at home. Sixth-year Duquesne head Coach Keith Dambrot is 18-6 in season openers, including a 4-1 mark at DU. This is Duquesne's second season opener at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse, which opened on Feb. 2, 2021 (a 69-64 win over Dayton).

Montana, which returns four starters from last year's 18-win team, was picked to finish third in the Big Sky preseason coaches' and media polls.

The Montana game is the first of 11 non-conference home games for the Dukes who will leave city limits just twice prior to Atlantic 10 play (Nov. 11 at Kentucky and Nov. 18 vs. Colgate in a neutral-site game in Akron, Ohio).

Duquesne is 45-28 in non-conference home games under Dambrot, including a 24-7 mark in non-league home games.


DUKES VS. GRIZZLIES

• This is the second meeting between Duquesne and Big Sky Conference member Montana.
• Ron Everhart guided DU to an 87-76 win over Wayne Tinkle's Grizzlies in a CBI first round game in Missoula on Mar. 16, 2011. The win was Duquesne's first in post-season play since the 1994 NIT (75-72 over Charlotte). It was also DU's first post-season win on the road or at a neutral site since a 75-72 NCAA Tournament East Regional consolation game victory over St. John's at Cole Field House in College Park, Md. on March 15, 1969.
• Montana returns four starters from last year's 18-14 Big Sky Conference fifth-place team (11-9).
• The Griz, picked to finish third in the Big Sky preseason poll, return one of the top players in the conference in 6-10 junior forward Josh Bannan (15.1, 8.2, 11 double-doubles). The Melbourne, Australia native was named to the Big Sky Preseason All-Conference team.
• Ninth-year Montana coach Travis DeCuire has led the Griz to three Big Sky regular season titles (2015, 2018, 2019) and two NCAA berths (2018 & 2019).
• This is Duquesne head coach Keith Dambrot's first meeting with Montana.

WORTH NOTING

• Duquesne has added 10 newcomers as it looks to bounce back from last year's 6-24 season.
• Sixth-year head coach Keith Dambrot, who enters the season with the second-most career wins among Atlantic 10 coaches, welcomes back a pair of starters in 6-7 junior forwards Kevin Easley Jr. (10.7, 6.6) and Tre Williams (10.8, 5.7). Easley Jr., a second-year transfer from TCU, scored in double digits a team-high 21 times including a season-best 20 points in DU's season-ending loss to Rhode Island in the first round of the Atlantic 10 Championship. Williams, who came to Duquesne last year from Indiana State, ranked 39th nationally in blocks/g. (2.08) despite missing DU's final four games following a knee injury suffered in the Feb. 23 game vs. Davidson. Both Easley Jr. and Williams averaged over 31 minutes per game in a thin Duquesne frontcourt.
• Dambrot will be looking for a pair of returning grad students, both of whom had their 2021-22 seasons cut short by injury, to contribute in the frontcourt. F Austin Rotroff (2.9, 3.8), who has played in 65 career games with eight starts, shook off a preseason foot injury to play the best basketball of his DU career prior to re-injuring his foot in early January. The injury forced him to the sidelines for the remainder of the season and led to off-season surgery. DU went 0-16 following Rotroff's departure. F R.J. Gunn, a 1,183-point career scorer at D-II Lenoir-Rhyne, missed last season following a preseason ankle injury.
• Duquesne has added four transfers with Division I experience in junior G Dae Dae Grant (1,171 points in three seasons at Miami, Ohio), grad student G Tevin Brewer (760 points in three seasons at FIU), senior F Joe Reece (631 points in three seasons at Old Dominion and one at Bowling Green) and junior G Jimmy "Tre" Clark III who scored 130 points in two seasons at VCU, prior to leading Northwest Florida to a NJCAA National Championship last season. The foursome has 2,692 points in 269 combined games (including 201 starts) of D-I experience.
• In addition to the four D-1 transfers, Dambrot has also brought in Second Team All-American JUCO guard Quincy McGriff. McGriff, a sophomore, led his Salt Lake Community College team to the NJCAA championship game where it lost to fellow newcomer Tre Clark's Northwest Florida team. McGriff, a Los Angeles native, and Clark both earned spots on the NJCAA All-Tournament Team.
• Dambrot also added five freshmen including 5-9 PG Kareem Rozier, who was one of five finalists for Michigan Mr. Basketball and fellow guard Devin Carney, who was a 2,000-point scorer at nearby Butler Area High School. Fellow freshman 6-8 wing Matus Hronsky, who hails from Poruba, Slovakia, comes to the Bluff as a polished 3-point shooter. Six-nine forwards Halil Barre and David Dixon are expected to provide depth in the frontcourt. Barre, who spent time this summer playing with the Benin National Team, played at Scotland (Pa.) Campus last season, while Dixon, who hails from Memphis, Tenn., played for Speights (Fla.) Academy in 2021-22.
• Duquesne's 10.0 assists per game last season was the second-lowest average in school history, and ranked 342nd of 350 NCAA D-I programs. That lack of ball movement led to a .403 shooting percentage (the team's lowest since 2000), 65.2 points per game (lowest since 2002) and Keith Dambrot's first losing season since 1992-93. Dambrot took steps to improve that mark with the addition of veteran transfer guards Tevin Brewer (324 career assists at FIU) and Dae Dae Grant (248 career assists at Miami, Ohio), who bring 572 career assists to the Dukes roster. Brewer, who has a 2.1-to-1 career assist-to-turnover ratio (4.9 apg. career), ranked 10th nationally in assist rate (KenPom) and 15th in NCAA assists/g. (5.6) last season. The 5-8 point guard averaged 15.2 ppg. and 5.6 apg. in earning third team All-Conference USA honors last season and is one of just six Division I returnees who averaged over 15 & 5 last season. Grant (17.2 ppg. 4.1 apg.), who was one of 19 players to average over 17.0 points and 4.0 assists/g. last season, led the MAC with a 2.24-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio. Grant's 561 points last season (1,171 career) were the 10th-highest total in Miami history. Brewer (169) and Grant (132) combined for one more assist than the Duquesne TEAM in 2021-22 (301-to-300).   
• Duquesne's frontcourt lost a total of 50 games due to injury last season: R.J. Gunn Jr. (29) Austin Rotroff (17) and Tre Williams (4). Gunn Jr., suffered a preseason ankle injury and managed to play four minutes in the third game of the season before shutting it down. Rotroff had a preseason foot injury that slowed him in the early season and forced him to the sidelines permanently in mid-January with the Dukes sitting at 6-7. Williams (knee) was lost for the last four games of the season.
• DU, which will open the season with a pair of 1,000-point scorers in R.J. Gunn Jr. (1,183 at D-II Lenoir-Rhyne) and Dae Dae Grant (1,171 at Miami, Ohio), could finish the year with as many as five 1,000-point scorers as Kevin Easley Jr. (needs 152), Tevin Brewer (needs 240) and Tre Williams (needs 277) all have a realistic shot at reaching 1,000 in 2022-23. The last time DU had three players with 1,000 points on the floor at the same time was in 1998 (Kevin Price, Mike James and Nick Bosnic). Duquesne has never had four players with 1,000 points on the floor at the same time.

A PROVEN WINNER
Keith Dambrot enters his 25th season ranked second among Atlantic 10 head coaches in career wins and fourth in career winning percentage.

A-10 COACHES BY CAREER WINS
entering 2022-23 season

Wins	Coach	Season	School
580	Fran Dunphy	31st	La Salle
484	KEITH DAMBROT	25th	Duquesne
448	Travis Ford	26th	Saint Louis
354	Chris Mooney	21st	Richmond
350	Mark Schmidt	22nd	St. Bonaventure
346	Mike Rhoades	19th	VCU
295	Anthony Grant	15th	Dayton
288	Frank Martin	16th	Massachusetts