Duquesne defeats Delaware, earns 2nd win in past 3 games

A week-and-a-half ago, he secured his first college coaching victory at the Cayman Islands Classic. On Friday, Duquesne’s Dru Joyce III won his first game in the United States.

Tre Dinkins III scored 18 points to lead five Duquesne players in double figures, and the Dukes, playing for the second game in a row without leading scorer Jake DiMichele, won for just the second time in the Joyce era, beating Delaware, 80-66, at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse.

“Until you guys brought it up, I didn’t know we hadn’t won on U.S. soil yet,” Joyce said with a laugh. “It feels good. You always want to be able to secure wins at home. That’s your support, so that people will appreciate you and show up. You want to do well for them, put on your best performance. You want to win.”

It is the second victory in the past three games for Duquesne (2-7), which opened the year with six losses in Joyce’s first season as coach.

Duquesne posted back-to-back records of at least 20 wins in each of the past two seasons under former coach Keith Dambrot — with Joyce, then the associate head coach, by his side — including 25-12 in 2023-24.

This year’s edition of the Dukes — with seven transfers — has been trying to build back some of that momentum, and Friday’s victory, which evened the series with Delaware at a game apiece, is a start.

“It was exciting for myself, the staff, the team to finally look up in the stands and not see everybody walking with their heads down, but clapping and cheering,” Joyce said.

Kareem Rozier added 14 points and Chabi Barre, Maximus Edwards and Cam Crawford finished with 10 apiece for Duquesne.

“This is what we’ve been working towards. We put it all together today for 40 minutes,” Rozier said. “Just to put a smile on (Joyce’s) face and be able to make him proud, it was amazing. It feels great.”

The Dukes, who’ve struggled in the early season at the free-throw line (59.0%), made 22 of 28, including 10 of 12 in the second half, when they pulled away after trailing by a point at halftime.

With DiMichele (10.9 ppg) again sitting in street clothes with a boot on his left foot, Duquesne played catch-up for nearly the entire first half, falling behind by as many as seven points before inching within 37-36.

The 6-foot-4 DiMichele, a sophomore from Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, has been nursing the same foot inflicted with plantar fasciitis during the preseason. He also missed Duquesne’s 62-59 home loss to St. Peter’s on Tuesday.

“He’s working his way back to getting healthy,” Joyce said. “It’s going to take some time.”

Also, Joyce said 6-8 sophomore Eli Wilborn, who has not played in the Dukes’ past two games, was available Friday after recovering from a nagging high ankle sprain but the coach felt he didn’t match up well against the Blue Hens.

“It was a tough game for all of our 5s if you look at the matchups with (6-8 John) Camden (Delaware’s leading scorer) on the floor and then them going small at times. I was ready to play Eli, but the matchups I didn’t think allowed it.”

A pair of ally-oop dunks by Barre on passes from Dinkins were sandwiched around Barre’s traditional three-point play with 16 minutes, 47 seconds left that put Duquesne ahead for good and kicked off a 7-0 run to make it 50-44.

After Delaware got within 50-48, Edwards’ 3-point shot ignited a 9-3 Duquesne run.

A Dinkins 3-pointer with 4:28 remaining swelled the Dukes’ margin for the first time to double digits (64-53).

“I’m obviously around talented guys who come to work every day,” said Dinkins, a senior transfer from Canisius, who came into the game averaging 10.5 points per game. “Kareem (Rozier) has done a good job of being in that leadership role, pushing me every day. We’ve got high standards, and me being one of the older guys, I’m just trying to keep pushing every day. I thought we did a good job today.”

Camden’s driving layup with 1:16 to go go Delaware within nine before Duquesne closed out the contest with 5 of 6 free throws — three by Rozier and two by Dinkins.

Niels Lane led Delaware (5-4) with 20 points on 8-of-10 shooting. Freshman Izaiah Pasha added 10 for the Blue Hens, who defeated Robert Morris, 81-77, on Nov. 7 in Newark, Del.

Duquesne’s only other victory this season also was by double digits, a 67-54 triumph over Old Dominion on Nov. 26 in the final game of three at the Cayman Islands Classic, giving Joyce his first victory as a head coach.

Duquesne entered the game having lost five games by seven points or less, including three by five points or less.

Joyce’s wide grin in the aftermath of Duquesne’s latest outcome needed no words, but the first-year coach was willing to offer some insight just the same.

‘A possession here, a possession there, from Game 1, we could’ve turned the tide if we do a little bit better here, pay attention to details, if we sprint harder on this possession, if we go crash the boards, if we communicate better and not have a mistake,” Joyce said. “Because I believe since Game 1, our build-up has been steadily improving from a consistency level throughout the games.

“To beat good teams, you’ve got to play good basketball. You need a 40-minute performance that’s at a pretty high level. We haven’t done that in the early part of season, but I do think we’re trending and getting better at handling and managing runs throughout the game.

“Just gotta commend our guys tonight.”