MORGANTOWN, WV – Eron Harris scored 33 points and Juwan Staten added 28 as West Virginia (2-1) pulled away late to defeat Duquesne 96-83 at WVU Coliseum.
Duquesne (1-2) moved to within four on a Tra’Vaughn White free throw with 7:30 left before Harris, hit the fifth of his six 3-pointers from the left corner to up the lead to seven. Nineteen seconds later, Terry Henderson hit another three from the exact same spot to give the Mountaineers a double digit lead they would not relinquish.
“Our kids played really hard,” said Duquesne coach Jim Ferry. “We grinded it back in the second half to get close but couldn’t sustain it. They had some great shot-making.”
Ovie Soko led Duquesne with 19 points and 12 rebounds in posting his second double-double in three games. Micah Mason came off the bench to add 18 points on 5-of-7 3-point shooting. Dominique McKoyadded 15 points for the Dukes who shot 45.5 percent.
Harris went 6-of-8 from the arc and Staten was 14-of-19 from the line for the Mountaineers who shot 58.9 percent.
“The biggest key to this game was Juwan Staten,” said Ferry. “I know Harris scored all of those points, but we just couldn’t keep the kid in front of us. We tried multiple different things – we tried zone, we tried trapping him, we tried stepping off and playing in the paint to make him make other decisions – I thought he just dominated this basketball game.”
There were four ties and three lead changes before a Harris jumper gave the Mountaineers an 18-16 lead. WVU upped the lead to 14 on a Staten layup with 2:08 left, before the Dukes cut it to 49-43 on a four-point play by Mason with 01.4 left in the half.
Six Dukes scored in the first five-plus minutes of the second half. The last being Mason who tied it at 59-59 on a pull-up 3-pointer. WVU’s lead never reached more than seven before the backbreaking back-to-back 3-pointers by Harris and Henderson.
Duquesne outrebounded WVU 39-30 and outscored the Mountaineers 43-32 in the paint. It was from outside where WVU did its damage, shooting 55.6 percent (10-of-18) from the 3-point arc.
Duquesne returns home to face Albany (2-1) on Wednesday, Nov. 20 at 7:00 p.m.
NOTES
• Micah Mason hit his first six field goal attempts – including five 3-pointers – on his way to scoring 18 points in 30 minutes off the bench. Mason, who finished 6-of-8 from the field and 5-of-7 from the arc was one point shy of his career high set last year against Eastern Illinois. It was the his third career game – and first at Duquesne – with five 3-pointers.
• Dominique McKoy eclipsed his career scoring high for the second time in as many games with 15 points. He also tied his career best with nine rebounds. He had 13 and nine in Wednesday’s game vs. New Hampshire.
• Duquesne’s starting backcourt of Derrick Colter and Tra’Vaughn White, which entered the game averaging a combined 36.5 ppg. on .578 shooting, went 5-of-16 in finishing with 12 points (Colter 1-of-6, 2 points & White 4-of-10, 10 points).
• The win was WVU’s 48th in its past 49 non-conference home games (the Mountaineers are 67-3 in non-conference home games over the last 11 years)
