On Tuesday, a three-game win streak for Duquesne Basketball ended in lowly fashion, losing 82-62 at home to Dayton. But they have an excellent chance of bouncing back this Sunday, taking on a Fordham squad who is winless in Atlantic 10 play. Plus, head coach Keith Urgo has been suspended due to recruiting violations.
The Rams have been close to getting a win, coming off both a triple-overtime loss to UMass and falling by four points on the road at Loyola-Chicago. Could Duquesne be the team Fordham beats? Here are some keys to the Dukes avoiding the upset.
1. Jackie Johnson's revenge game
As the team’s leading scorer (19.1 ppg on 43% FG), Johnson was already going to be Duquesne’s main priority on defense. But he’s also a former Duke himself, averaging 9.5 ppg and starting 11 games as a freshman in his lone season with the program. As we saw with Maximus Edwards against GW a couple of weeks ago, players do get up against their old teams. Preventing him from going off is a massive key for the Dukes.
2. Scoring 70+ points
Duquesne isn’t going to get into many shootouts, so when they do score 70+ points, they’ve won. In fact, that’s been the case for the last 26 times they’ve eclipsed that mark. The triple-overtime game against UMass has inflated Fordham’s defense, but it still isn’t very good, giving up 70+ points in all five A-10 losses. If Duquesne can get to 71 and its defense is still good, then they should win.
3. 3-point defense on the road
One issue that has plagued Duquesne all season is defending the 3. They’re 350th nationally at 37% allowed, and it’s even higher in league play at 38%. In the loss to Dayton, the Dukes gave up 13/23 from deep. Fordham is top-5 in attempts but just 13th in percentage at 31%.
Considering that Jackie Johnson takes the most threes compared to the rest of the Rams, you can see how important defending him will be for Duquesne in this matchup.