Duquesne's coach, players see no need for Dayton loss to start any trends
After Duquesne’s 82-62 loss to Dayton on Tuesday night, coach Dru Joyce III was asked if he was going to have his players study the tape or if he was going to just “burn” it.
“You can burn it. You can take a look at it. We’ll see,” Joyce said.
“Depends on how I sleep. If I sleep.”
It sounds like Joyce must’ve at least counted a few sheep on Tuesday night. By Thursday evening, he had a pretty measured response.
“I didn’t burn (the tape). But I didn’t go in and drill the guys and drag them through the mud,” Joyce said during his radio show on Fox Sports Pittsburgh 970. “I thought it was a good opportunity to learn and figure out some of the mistakes we made. There were some bright spots in there. Not a lot. But there’s definitely some things we can take from that game and build upon.”
One of those things is how the Dukes finished the game. Joyce’s players took a 64-34 deficit and cut it to 16 points with 2 minutes, 34 seconds left.
But junior guard Maximus Edwards says the tape study was still a tough watch.
“It was one of those rougher days,” Edwards said of the team’s film review. “That’s when you’ve got to be coachable. That’s when no cameras are on you. That’s film, and (coach Joyce) is getting on you. That’s when you’ve got to listen to the message and not the tone.”
Duquesne had been playing well heading into the Dayton game. The Dukes entered that contest having won four of their first five games in Atlantic 10 play. But Joyce says that the victories may have come with a little negative residue.
“Even in winning, you can develop some habits that you need to get rid of. And I think some of the habits spilled over that happened in the wins,” Joyce said. “Giving up too much in the second half defensively. Dayton exploded on us. If you think back to the St. Joe’s game and the (St.) Bonaventure game, we controlled those two teams defensively in the first half, and things got a little bit away from us in the second half. The percentages went up. Dayton was clicking on all cylinders, and they took advantage of every mistake we made.”
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Following Tuesday’s loss, point guard Kareem Rozier said the issues were becoming apparent the previous day.
“Bad juice all around. Even (Monday), we couldn’t quite get it in practice,” Rozier said. “From the start, they hit us in the mouth, went on a little run, and we couldn’t recover.”
Whether it is burning the memories of Tuesday’s defeat or using it as a learning experience, Duquesne (9-10, 4-2) is looking to move beyond the result and do much better against Fordham (8-11, 0-6) on Sunday.
The Rams come in as losers in their first six conference games. But they do boast the conference’s second-leading scorer. Jackie Johnson III, who began his collegiate career at Duquesne, transferred to UNLV after one season. He played with the Rebels for two years and is now posting 19.1 points per game at his third stop.
Known for his willingness to extend his range, Johnson has made 52 3-point field goals, fifth most in the conference so far.
“It’s our regular principles,” Edwards said. “If you can shoot, make sure they put it on the ground. Drive them to their off-hand. If he beats us, we have to rely on our other four people to be in the gaps and the rotations.”
In 2023-24, the Dukes won 10 of their last 11 games en route to an A-10 Tournament championship. The only loss in that run was a 79-67 defeat at Fordham on Feb. 23. That was a game when the Rams shot 51% from the floor, the Dukes only shot 34.5%, and Fordham outscored Duquesne, 53-35, in the second half.
In the second half of last year, there weren’t many tapes to burn for the Dukes. That may have been the only one before the 89-63 NCAA Tournament loss to Illinois.
Joyce and his players would like to avoid creating any more smoke in the Bronx this weekend.
Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@triblive.com or via X. All tweets could be reposted. All emails are subject to publication unless specified otherwise.
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