GAME 31
CHUCK COOPER CLASSIC
Richmond (15-15 | 5-12 Atlantic 10) vs. Duquesne (16-14 | 8-9 Atlantic 10)
Saturday, March 7, 2026 | 2:00 p.m.
Pittsburgh, Pa. | UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse (3,500)
 
TV: SportsNet Pittsburgh (SNP) | ESPN+ with Tim Benz (pxp) & Ellis Cannon (color)
Radio: 104.7 HD2 | iHeartRadio with Ray Goss ('58) (pxp) & Darren Zaslau (color)
   
Opening Tip
 
- The Duquesne University men's basketball team wraps up the 2025-26 regular season Saturday with a 2:00 p.m. tip against Richmond for the Chuck Cooper Classic at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse.
 
- Prior to the game, the Dukes will honor six student-athletes as part of Senior Day festivities, including guards Cam Crawford, Maximus Edwards and Tarence Guinyard and forwards David Dixon, John Hugley IV and Alex Williams.
 
- Duquesne enters its regular-season finale having dropped four consecutive games after a 64-52 loss at Rhode Island (March 4) that concluded the road portion of its schedule. Tied, 37-37, with 10 minutes go, URI used a 9-2 burst to open up a 46-39 edge with 5:47 remaining. Jimmie Williams would stem the tide with a three-pointer for Duquesne, but seven straight points extended the lead for Rhode Island to 53-42.
 
- Guinyard paced the Dukes against the Rams with 18 points and also added four rebounds and three assists, while Jimmie Williams scored 10 points and grabbed three rebounds.
 
- The Dukes will enter the 2026 Atlantic 10 Championship at PPG Paints Arena as either the No. 7, No. 8 or No. 9 seed, with a win over the Spiders securing the No. 7 seed.
 
- Duquesne enters the game Saturday ranked fourth in the Atlantic 10 in scoring offense (79.1 ppg) and fifth in both field goal percentage (.463) and assists per game (15.43).
 
- Individually, Guinyard is second in the conference in scoring (16.9 ppg) while ranking third in assists per game (4.86) and sixth in assist-to-turnover ratio (2.14).
 
- The 2025-26 season marks the 110th year of Duquesne basketball. The Dukes started play in 1913-14 (DU did not field a team in 1944-45-46 due to World War II). Thanks to an 83-63 victory over Niagara (Nov. 3) in its 2025-26 season opener, Duquesne earned program victory No. 1,500.
 
- In today's day and age of college basketball with the NCAA Transfer Portal, Duquesne offers senior forward David Dixon, who will play his final season with the Dukes in 2025-26 and has spent his entire career on the Bluff. Dixon, 6'9" and 230 pounds, owns career totals of 810 points and 579 rebounds and is just the second player in program history to eclipse career totals of both 100 blocks and 100 dunks.
 
- Dixon is one of just four players in the Atlantic 10 this season that have spent their entire career with one program, joining 6'10" forward Sean Logan of Davidson, 6'10" forward Christian Fermin of VCU and 6'11" center Mike Walz of Richmond. Ironically, each of the four student-athletes to have played their entire career at one institution are post players.
 
- Redshirt senior guard Maximus Edwards scored 10 points in a 92-80 win over Sacred Heart (Nov. 7) to reach exactly 1,000 points for his career. Named the 2023 Atlantic 10 Rookie of the Year, Edwards scored 722 in two seasons at George Washington before transferring to the Bluff and has scored 402 points in his time at Duquesne. He owns a career scoring average of 9.8 points in 115 games at the NCAA Division I level thanks to 1,124 points.
 
At The Helm – Dru Joyce III was named the 18th head coach in the 110-year history of Duquesne basketball March 28, 2024, and in his second year at the helm in 2025-26. He owns an overall record of 29-33 (.468) in his first head coaching job. Joyce III, a native of Akron, Ohio, spent two seasons as associate head coach for the Dukes under Keith Dambrot from 2022 to 2024, helping guide Duquesne to an overall record of 45-25 (.643), including a 20-16 (.556) mark in the Atlantic 10, during that span. The Dukes made an appearance in the 2023 College Basketball Invitational (CBI) before earning the automatic bid for the A-10 in the 2024 NCAA Championship by winning four games in five days en route to the 2024 Atlantic 10 Championship crown in Brooklyn, N.Y., at the Barclays Center. Duquesne, as a No. 11 seed, made its first appearance in the NCAA Tournament since 1977 and earned its first victory in the championship since 1969 thanks to a 71-67 win over No. 6 seed BYU in Omaha, Neb., at CHI Health Center Arena. 
 
Scouting the Spiders – The Dukes and Spiders tip for the 40th time Saturday in an all-time series that began Jan. 12, 1937, with the Spiders owning a 28-11 (.718) advantage … Duquesne led the all-time series, 8-0, when Richmond joined the Atlantic 10 in 2001-02 … The Spiders promptly reeled off 14 consecutive wins before the Dukes ended the streak with an 81-72 victory at the Palumbo Center in 2012 … Richmond then won eight more in a row before Duquesne halted the streak with a 74-68 win in Richmond in 2019, the first for DU at UR since 1993 … During the regular season in the Atlantic 10, the Spiders hold a 26-2 cushion … Four of the last five meetings between the two programs have been decided by five points or less, including a 73-68 victory for Richmond last season at the Robins Center … Trailing, 67-54, with 3:27 left, the Dukes used a 14-4 run to trim their deficit to 71-68 with just over 18 seconds to play, but the Spiders sealed the win at the free-throw line … Guard Maximus Edwards led Duquesne with 21 points, while former guard Tre Dinkins III scored 17 on the strength of a 5-for-11 showing from deep.
 
Rhode Island Leftovers – The Dukes had a four-game winning streak against the Rams snapped with the loss ... The 19 points Duquesne allowed are the fewest an opponent has scored in the opening 20 minutes in two years under head coach Dru Joyce III … The Dukes also held Old Dominion to 19 points in the first half of a 67-54 win as part of the Cayman Islands Classic (Nov. 26, 2024) and again in the opening 20 minutes of a 65-47 triumph over Towson (Dec 14, 2024) in a game played at St. Vincent-St. Mary High School in Akron, Ohio ... URI finished with 15 steals ... Duquesne set season lows for points (52), field goals (16) and field goal percentage (.340) ... The Rams were just 2-for-17 (11.8%) from deep, a season low by an opponent in three-point field goal percentage and matching a season low in three-point field goals (Niagara) ... ODU also finished 2-for-17 from beyond the arc last season at the Cayman Islands Classic.
 
Climbing The Charts – It's fitting senior forward David Dixon will tie the Duquesne career record for games played on Senior Day when the Dukes host Richmond at the UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse. Dixon appeared in his 126th career game at Rhode Island (March 4), moving into a tie for second place all-time on the Bluff with former guard Bill Clark (2007-11). Clark's teammate, forward Damian Saunders (2007-11), owns the program standard for games played with 127, a mark Dixon will tie after checking into the game Saturday against the Spiders. Dixon posted a pair of blocks in his 126th career game against the Rams, extending his career total in the category to 178 and moving into fourth place in the record book. Former center Michael Hughes finished with 177 blocks in three seasons with the Dukes from 2018 to 2021.
 
Front and Center – Senior forward David Dixon is playing some of the best basketball of his career as Duquesne hits the stretch run of the 2025-26 regular season. Dixon has reached double figures in six of the last eight games and at Rhode Island (March 4) established a career high with five steals while also posting six points, three rebounds, two assists and a pair of blocks. Over the last eight games, Dixon is averaging 11.6 points, 6.3 rebounds and 2.1 blocks per game while shooting 60 percent (33-for-55) from the field. Over the last four years, Duquesne owns a record of 21-13 (.618) when Dixon scores in double figures. Dixon has also blocked at least one shot in 16 of Duquesne's 17 games in Atlantic 10 play this year. Among those games are 13 with multiple blocks, including nine with three or more. Dixon owns 39 rejections in 17 games in Atlantic 10 action, an average of 2.29 per contest.
 
Get A Bucket – Senior guard Tarence Guinyard paced the Dukes at Rhode Island (March 4) with a 18 points, stretching his streak for double-figure scoring games to 12. He's the second member of the Dukes to score at least 10 points in 10 consecutive games this season, joining junior guard Jimmie Williams, who had a 20-game streak earlier this season. Guinyard also added four rebounds and three assists against the Rams and over his last 12 games has produced averages 17.6 points, 3.6 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 1.6 steals per game. Included in that stretch is his first double-double on the Bluff and second of his career thanks to 12 points and a career-high 12 assists against St. Bonaventure (Jan. 28). Against the Bonnies, Guinyard tied a Duquesne single-game record for dimes (12), becoming the fifth member of the Dukes in program history to finish with at least 12 assists in a game. Duquesne is 8-2 (.800) this season when Guinyard finishes with six or more assists in a game. When Guinyard finishes with five assists or less, Duquesne is 8-12 (.400).
 
Heat Check – Very few members of the Dukes can heat up the way senior guard Tarence Guinyard owns the ability to. Against Davidson (Feb. 25), Guinyard scored 18 of his game-high 20 points in the second half, marking the sixth time this season he has scored at least 15 points after halftime, including the fifth time in Atlantic 10 play. Guinyard's most impressive streak came in an 88-86 win over George Washington (Feb. 7), when he scored 23 of his 27 points after the break, including 16 consecutive points that powered the Dukes to victory. Guinyard also scored 19 of his game-high 23 points in the second half of a 71-59 triumph at Loyola Chicago (Jan. 24) as well as 18 of his season-high 30 points in the second half at Villanova (Nov. 15).
 
Call Uno – Senior Tarence Guinyard provided the late heroics in a 62-61 victory over La Salle (Feb. 17) that extended Duquesne's winning streak to five, scoring on a layup with 0.3 seconds left to give the Dukes the win. The last time Duquesne was victorious in a one-point game also featured a buzzer beater. Former guard Jimmy Clark III (2022-24) buried an off-balance three-pointer as the buzzer sounded to give the Dukes a 78-77 victory over Ball State (Dec. 3, 2022) at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse. That marked the second game-winner late in four games for Duquesne, as former guard Tevin Brewer (2022-23) connected for a floater in the lane with one second left that gave the Dukes an 83-82 triumph over North Florida (Nov. 21, 2022), also at home. Guinyard also helped Duquesne earn its first one-point victory in Atlantic 10 play since Feb. 23, 2019, a 79-78 triumph at George Mason.
 
Duquesne Dave – Senior forward David Dixon contributed his second double-double of the 2025-26 season and third of his career in a 62-61 victory over La Salle (Feb. 17), logging 13 points and 10 rebounds in the win. It marked the 74th win for Dixon on the Bluff since the beginning of the 2022-23 season, the most wins by a player in program history. The Dukes won 92 games from 1951-55, the most wins in a four-year span, but freshmen weren't eligible to play in varsity games until Jan. 8, 1972. From 2007 to 2011, former guard Bill Clark and former forwards Damian Saunders and Bill Theis helped guide Duquesne to 73 wins and appearances in the 2009 National Invitation Tournament (NIT) as well as back-to-back spots in the College Basketball Invitational (CBI) in 2010 and 2011. Since the beginning of the 2022-23 season, Duquesne has amassed an overall record of 74-58 (.561), including a mark of 36-35 (.507) in the Atlantic 10, with Dixon a member of the active roster.
 
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