Pittsburgh, Pa. – A blistering start by the Flyers sent the Duquesne women's basketball team to a 75-58 setback against Dayton on Wednesday night inside UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse. With the loss, the Dukes fell to 7-12 (.368) overall and 0-8 in conference play.

POINT OF EMPHASIS
Trailing 39-18 at the break, Duquesne found a rhythm to open the second half, putting together a 15-7 run while knocking down all four field-goal attempts and knocking down a pair from behind the arc. Freshman Alexis Bordas ignited the surge with a pull-up jumper, followed by a triple from junior Dunja Zecevic. After free throws from Dayton, Zecevic converted a layup, and following another Flyers trip to the line, sophomore Maja Rohkohl answered with a basket. Fatima Ibrahim briefly halted the momentum for Dayton, but Bordas responded by going 3-for-3 from the stripe before junior Reina Green capped the run with a triple. Later in the quarter, Green completed a three-point play to cut the deficit to 54–41 before Dayton carried a 60–46 advantage into the fourth. Duquesne pieced together its strongest quarter of the game, shooting 64.3 percent (9-of-14) from the field, 57.1 percent (4-of-7) from beyond the arc, and a perfect 6-for-6 at the line. A two-minute scoring drought opened the final period before Dayton answered with a 6-2 burst to extend its lead to 66-48. Later in the quarter, sophomore Mackenzie Blackford recorded a driving layup, and after another Flyers basket, Bordas drained consecutive pull-ups to trim the deficit to 73-58.

QUOTABLE
"I give a lot of credit to Dayton for coming out and shooting the ball exceptionally well to start the game," head coach Dan Burt said. "Anytime you get blitzed 15-0 on maybe eight shots in the first three minutes, while you generate seven open looks off pretty good action, it's tough. They hit theirs, six for eight, and we go 0 for 7, that makes for a long night of catch-up. That's certainly what we did, is tried to play catch-up throughout the entire game and that's pretty much the ball game. I've found that we've turned our rate of turning it over in this game was much lower. Instead of turning it over 20, times, we only turned it over 13 and we had 10 assists. That's a positive. We still had multiple times when we dribbled it off our foot or threw it to the other team, and you cannot have those. Those are really bad turnovers, and we shot really well from the free throw line, but we shot poorly from the field. We shot poorly from the three-point line and Dayton was clearly the better team tonight."

DOUBLE-FIGURE DUO
A pair of Dukes finished in double figures Wednesday night, led by Alexis Bordas and Reina Green. Bordas posted a game-high 16 points to go along with a team-high six rebounds and two steals. She knocked down one triple and was a perfect 7-of-7 from the free-throw line. The freshman scored 13 of her 16 points in the second half, shooting 3-of-7 from the field while converting all seven of her free-throw attempts. The outing marked her 16th double-figure scoring performance of the season and the ninth time she has led the Dukes in scoring. Green added a career-high 14 points, connecting on a pair of triples. She also grabbed three rebounds and dished out two assists. The junior scored 11 of her 14 points in the third quarter alone, finishing 3-of-4 from the field, a perfect 3-of-3 from the line, and 2-of-3 from beyond the arc. It marked the sixth double-figure game of the season and the fifth time she has led the team in assists.

NOTES
Mackenzie Blackford finished with eight points on 3-of-5 shooting, including two triples … Dunja Zecevic ended with eight points, four rebounds, and two blocks … Maja Rohkohl finished with six points, five rebounds, and three coming on the offensive … Dayton featured three in double figures, led by Olivia Leung with 15 points, eight rebounds, and six assists … Ajok Madol netted 13 points on 4-of-7 shooting while Fatima Ibrahim rounded out the trio with 10 points, six rebounds, and three blocks … Dayton shot over 44.3 percent (27-of-61) for the game, including opening the game on a 15-0 run … The Flyers held an edge in points off turnovers, 17-11 … Duquesne forced 15 Dayton miscues … The Flyers held a 46-34 lead on the glass

UP NEXT
Duquesne wraps up its two-game homestand Saturday, Jan. 24, welcoming Saint Joseph's to UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse for a 2:00 p.m. tipoff.