Keith Dambrot’s immediate concern is recovering from what he called an embarrassing performance in Duquesne’s 20-point loss to La Salle on Wednesday night.

A loss in the next game — Saturday night against Rhode Island at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse — might shove the Dukes (7-8, 6-7) among the Atlantic 10’s bottom four teams for tournament seeding purposes. In that case, Duquesne would have to win four games in four days, starting Wednesday, to reach the conference championship game March 14.

But he mostly has ignored the tournament minutiae. His team’s mental, physical and emotional readiness in the wake of a 17-day covid pause, followed by two rough road losses, is more important. Among everything else that has happened this season, the team’s bus from Philadelphia didn’t pull into campus until 5 o’clock Thursday morning.

“It’s been such a strange year. I can’t put my finger on (the team’s) pulse, really,” he said. “It’s taken every team that’s been on the covid list time to play well. There have been very few who have played well.

“We just have to play. We need to win to get a little momentum.”

Meanwhile, Rhode island (10-13, 7-9) has been free of covid shutdowns all season and will come into Saturday’s game having played eight more game than its hosts. Duquesne defeated Rhode Island on Jan. 20 at La Roche, 71-69, after trailing by 15 points in the second half.

But Dambrot is happy to be back home for a game for the first time in more than three weeks. It’s Duquesne’s sixth home game overall and second at Cooper Fieldhouse. He called his team’s disjointed schedule “a recipe for disaster.”

“Not playing at home is a big deal,” he said.

Despite the obstacles, he said he feels good about his players’ mindset.

“Sometimes, certain guys aren’t ready and some guys cash it in,” he said, recalling past experiences in his 23 years as a college coach. “You don’t know.

“We’ve never shown that here, so I’m assuming we’re not going to cash it in.”

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