Duquesne survives Saint Louis rally to record victory in Atlantic 10 opener

While winning its Atlantic 10 opener against Saint Louis, 73-59, on Thursday night, Duquesne did all the things teams do when they win.

• They shot well.

Marcus Weathers, who is shooting 74% from the field in the past five games, recorded a career-high 26 points while hitting 8 of 10 shots from the field at Robert Morris’ UPMC Events Center. Tavian Dunn-Martin didn’t start, but he added 21 points while making half of his 3-point attempts (5 of 10). “He can fling ‘em up,” coach Keith Dambrot said.

Plus, the Dukes were 20 of 25 from the foul line.

• They blocked nine shots.

Michael Hughes finished with seven blocks, five in the first four minutes of the second half. “Mike Hughes really changed the game in the second half,” Dambrot said. “They couldn’t score around the rim, and those turned into fast-break baskets.”

• And, most importantly, they allowed Dambrot to coach them out of a slump. “You could tell,” he said. “They wanted to be coached.”

The Dukes (11-2, 1-0) met a big, physical Saint Louis team (11-3, 0-1) that played in the NCAA Tournament last year, but they were not dominated on the boards. The Dukes were outrebounded, 39-36, but that was OK with Dambrot.

“I knew if they didn’t crush us on the boards, we’d be right there to win,” Dambrot said.

Dambrot said his team was in the doldrums in recent days after winning 10 in a row to start the season, losing the next two and finding themselves in Akron, St. Petersburg, Fla., and Cleveland over a two-week stretch that ended Sunday in a 83-61 loss to Marshall.

After that game, Dambrot got mad, worked his team hard in practice Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and challenged them to recover.

“Normally, my philosophy is when things go poorly to massage them,” the coach said, “but I couldn’t do it. They didn’t like (losing), either.

“I always get upset because I have unbelievably high expectations and standards. But, then, you have to settle down and understand what the business is.

“The business is some nights you’re not going to be great, and you have to try to win when you’re not great.

“I thought we were emotionally disengaged for about three games, and we just didn’t have it.”

The Dukes didn’t have it for long stretches of the first half, too, and only led 28-25 at intermission after Sincere Carry hit a 3 with 16 seconds left.

Duquesne led 44-31 with 13:33 left in the first half, but Saint Louis trimmed the lead to 54-50 about eight minutes later.

At that point, Dunn-Martin and Baylee Steele hit 3-pointers, Weathers added two free throws and the Dukes coasted to the victory.

“I’m proud of my guys,” Dambrot said. “I thought we showed some resiliency after playing some mediocre basketball. I couldn’t put my finger on it other than the fact that we hadn’t been in Pittsburgh for so long that we just kind of lost our juice.

“We worked really hard for three days, harder than we worked in a long time and looked long term and tried to get back to being a hard-working, fundamental defensive team and we played better tonight.”