“Energy and aggressiveness.”
Those are the words that Duquesne’s junior guard Jeremiah Jones used to describe his team’s 78-62 wire-to-wire win Wednesday night against George Washington (17-7, 7-4) at the A.J. Palumbo Center.
The Dukes are now 8-14 and 3-8 in conference play. Junior guard Micah Mason led the court with a career-high 24 points, followed by junior guard Derrick Colter with 18 points. Also contributing for the Dukes was Jones with 10 points, seven rebounds and seven assists; sophomore forward L.G. Gill with 10 points, all of which were scored in the second half; sophomore center Darius Lewis added seven points and 12 rebounds; and freshman forward Jordan Robinson with six points and six rebounds. Senior forward Dominique McKoy and sophomore guard Desmond Ridenour had two points and one point, respectively.
Duquesne was 7-of-11 from the three-point arc in the second half and 10-of-21 for the game, led by Mason and Colter who were a combined 8-of-13 from the arc, each making four three-pointers.
“I’ve been struggling a little bit with my shot but coach was telling me to stay aggressive and shoot the next one,” Mason said. “That’s what I did tonight and I thought we played really unselfish. I was aggressive and it ended up good tonight.”
The Dukes finished with 18 assists and a mere eight turnovers for the game. Duquesne is now 7-6 at home.
“I think it’s home court advantage obviously, but we’ve got to stay tough on away games too,” Mason said. “We’re going to [University of Massachusetts] right now. This is a good win, but we can’t be too happy about this because we’ve got to go on the road and play hard and try to get another win.”
Junior forward Kevin Larsen and junior guard Kethan Savage led George Washington with 16 points each. The Colonials hit only two of their first 20 shots, finishing the first half with a 20.5 percent field goal percentage and the game with 31.9 percent from the field.
“If they were going to come in here and beat us here, we were going to make them do it uncomfortably,” head coach Jim Ferry said of his team. “They were going to have to beat us from the outside because that’s not their comfort zone. They’re a great team—they can make shots—these aren’t bad players, they just don’t shoot them. They’re very patient. But we were going to make them still have to beat us over the top.”
Jones contributed the team’s win to aggressiveness.
“I think last time we played at [George Washington] they came in and they punched us in the mouth [74-59 George Washington],” Jones said. “Today I thought we were the aggressor and that’s a big turnaround from losing [by] 30 and winning by 16. I just thought that was the difference today. We were the aggressor.”
Freshman forward TySean Powell and junior guard Jordan Stevens did not dress due to a team rules violation.
As the end of the season approaches, Duquesne looks to continue their aggressive play. Ferry praised his team’s effort.
“It’s February now, so everybody’s fighting for something and I thought our guys showed that tonight.”
Duquesne faces UMass (15-9, 8-3) today at 4:00 pm ET in Amherst, Massachusetts.
