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LOCATION: Pittsburgh, PA
CONFERENCE: Atlantic-10 (West Division)
LAST SEASON: 5-23 (.179)
CONFERENCE RECORD: 1-15 (6th)
STARTERS LOST/RETURNING: 3/2
NICKNAME: Dukes
COLORS: Red & Blue
HOMECOURT: A.J. Palumbo Center (6,200)
COACH: Darelle Porter (Pittsburgh '91)
record at school 5-23 (1 year)
career record 5-23 (1 year)
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ASSISTANTS: Kenya Hunter (Duquesne '96)
Josh Oppenheimer (North Arizona '92)
David Adelman (Pittsburgh '94)
TEAM WINS: (last 5 years) 10-9-9-11-5
RPI (last 5 years) 169-200-174-149-269
1998-99 FINISH: Lost in conference first round.
ESPN.com Clubhouse
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Ironically, Duquesne was one of the only Atlantic 10 teams to meet expectations last season. Which is to say the Dukes were every bit as awful as predicted. Here at Blue Ribbon, we missed by just a single game. We thought the Dukes would bottom out at around 5-22; instead, the final tally was 5-23. Oops Rookie coach Darelle Porter had no chance. He began his tenure with the dreaded interim label, inheriting a truly uninspired team from predecessor Scott Edgar. By the time Porter took over, he was pretty much stuck with a shot roster for his debut. So Porter did the only thing he could. He learned to lose with someone else's players. Make that someone else's bad players. The 1998-99 Dukes were historically bad, arguably the worst team in Atlantic 10 history. They certainly rank among the worst, right there with post-Patriot League Fordham and pre-John Calipari Massachusetts.
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Blue Ribbon Analysis |
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BACKCOURT C+ BENCH/DEPTH C
FRONTCOURT C- INTANGIBLES C
It can't be worse, right? And it won't be. Duquesne is still 12th among the one-dozen Atlantic 10 teams, but the gap is closing. Wayne Smith and Courtney Wallace are productive Division I players. Up to seven newcomers could be. Most, if not all, will be in the rotation right away. Head coach Darelle Porter, despite defections and undeserved off-court woes, has indeed upgraded the talent base. It is unlikely a walk-on will appear in 23 games and average 5.5 minutes, which was the case a year ago. To really take a step forward, the Dukes need rookie point guard Devin Montgomery to emerge or for Wallace to play like a true point man. And they need a big body, ideally Ogunlesi, to be ready in the middle. Duquesne is at least serviceable on the wing. Look for the Dukes to cut their woeful scoring deficit roughly in half this year. That should make them competitive in most league and non-conference games, with the exception of trips to Michigan and South Florida. They should also approach a double-digit victory total overall. There is one other certainty. The Dukes will not rank 12th in the conference next season. Virginia Tech is supposed to be leaving, remember? |
After three homecourt victories to start the year (Albany, West Virginia and Buffalo), Duquesne won exactly two more times in its next 25 starts. And it's not like John Chaney concocted the schedule. Also dotting the slate were Akron, Radford, James Madison, Furman and Canisius. The Dukes were outscored by a whopping 10.2 ppg (15.5 ppg in league play). How lopsided is that? Fordham, which was next-to-last in the conference in scoring margin, was out-pointed by only 3.5 ppg. Duquesne lost its first 13 league contests. One losing streak reached 17 straight, including an epic 109-57 defeat at George Washington. Only an equally lackluster effort by La Salle in the Explorers' visit to Pittsburgh kept the Dukes from an 0-16 conference record, which would have been some kind of record indeed. Still, Porter pushed most of the right buttons amidst the carnage. Morale was up, defense was at least attempted and, in 1999-2000, he can lose with mostly his own players. And some of them, finally, have an upside. Porter found at least one keeper in 6-7 swingman Wayne Smith (16.6 ppg, 6.2 rpg). Porter lured the sophomore from Toronto right after his hiring, and it is hard to imagine where the Dukes would have been without the A-10 All-Rookie selection. Smith was 11th in the country among freshmen scorers. He became the first freshman to lead Duquesne in scoring, breaking Tom Pipkins' frosh points record along the way. Whether Smith is a legitimate star or simply a "numbers guy" on a horrible team remains to be seen. He and 6-4 junior Courtney Wallace (14.4 ppg, 5.8 rpg, 3.9 apg) combined for more than half the Duquesne points and way over half the shots. Somebody had to shoot it, after all, even if not very well. Smith was a 37.7 percent marksman; Wallace 37.0 percent. The latter "added" .278 three-point shooting and 126 turnovers (4.5 tpg). But Porter had to start somewhere. Another starting point was the dismissal of 6-10 center Kevin Shand (10.1 ppg, 5.3 rpg) after 15 games. Shand's less than enthusiastic approach was sadly typical of Edgar's players. More significantly, that Porter would boot his leading returning scorer sent a powerful message to the rest of the roster. This year, three more guys with eligibility remaining are "exploring other options" (Jason Rackley-Mann, Chris Richards and Austin Kegerreis). Their combined 2.4 ppg will not be missed. In their place is a six-person recruiting class ranked by Basketball News as the best in the Atlantic 10. Of course, that was before marquee transfer Ron Anderson (North Carolina State) switched his commitment to James Madison, and fellow transfers Jamal Hunter (Loyola College) and Simon Ogunlesi (Villanova) were implicated in a check and credit card scam. Both were suspended over the summer and eventually reinstated; their basketball eligibility begins after the first semester. The class was also to have included high-scoring Philadelphia guard Kevin Forney, who did not qualify. Hey, no one said this would be easy. "We're trying to get the program headed in the right direction," insisted the ever-positive Porter. "I think we've upgraded our talent level from top to bottom." The 30-year-old, still the second-youngest coach in Division I, will attempt to structure a lineup from among whichever newcomers are in uniform and those few returnees who were force-fed a year ago. Smith is the small forward and Wallace one of the guards, probably the point. That much we know. The rest, as they say, is up for grabs. Hunter, a 6-5 junior shooting guard, averaged 9.3 ppg, 2.5 rpg and 2.5 apg in eight games at Loyola before transferring. He is a likely starter once eligible. Same for Ogunlesi, a junior center who played in only eight of his 17 games at Villanova last year (2.9 ppg, 3.9 rpg). Still, at 6-10, 265, the Nigerian is an interesting gamble in the middle. Ogunlesi will be pushed and/or replaced by 6-10 freshman Chris Clark (Cheshire Academy, Conn./Toronto, Can.). Clark was a decent pivot prospect at Cheshire Academy (14.0 ppg, 8.0 rpg) after becoming a first-team All-Metro selection at St. Michael's HS in Toronto (18.9 ppg, 12.4 rpg, 3.8 apg, 3.2 bpg). Hunter may yet have an understudy in the 6-4 Forney, a freshman from Philadelphia Christian Academy who averaged 27.0 ppg, 5.0 rpg and 7.0 apg last winter. One year earlier, at Strawberry Mansion HS in the Philadelphia Public League, he posted 22.8 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 6.0 apg, 2.0 spg and was named first-team All-City by the Philadelphia Daily News. With the necessary test score, Forney could be in uniform after the first term. "His real strength," Porter understated, "is putting the ball in the basket." 6-0 freshman point guard Devin Montgomery (Bishop Alemany HS/Mission Hills, Calif.) could fill an even larger need. Also a star wide receiver in high school, the Dukes need Montgomery (22.3 ppg, 6.5 rpg, 8.2 apg) to throw passes more than catch them. If and when he adjusts from a smaller prep setting to Division I, Montgomery would allow Porter to consider moving Wallace off the ball. Also in the mix at guard is 6-4 junior Shawn Tann (7.0 ppg, 1.7 rpg), who got a dozen starts a year ago, 6-5 junior Aaron Lovelace, who produced 5.9 ppg and 4.9 rpg in four starts, and 6-4 sophomore Charles Stanfield (4.1 ppg, 2.3 rpg). 6-5 freshman Brad Midgely (20.1 ppg, Canevin HS/Pittsburgh) may emerge as a three-point specialist. At forward, Smith could be joined by 6-8 freshman Jack May. The Duquesne staff went west for a second time in the spring, snagging May (23.0 ppg, 13.0 rpg) out of Ruben S. Ayala HS in Chino, Calif. Recruiting SoCal rated May the No. 17 prospect in the state of California. His official visits included Oregon State, Montana State and Gonzaga. May will challenge 6-7 senior Devone Stephenson (4.3 ppg, 3.4 rpg), who started a half-dozen times last year. Stephenson is the only senior on the squad and has appeared in a team-high 82 games. 6-2 junior walk-on Matt Barker (0.6 ppg, 23 appearances) and 6-3 senior walk-on Jeff Radkowski (0.3 ppg, 10 appearances) also return. 6-2 frosh Jeff Carnute (New Hampton School/Elyria, Oh.) joins the Dukes as a third walk-on.
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