There were more than a few Duquesne championship T-shirts rocking Friday’s crowd at PPG Paints Arena for the Dukes’ Atlantic 10 Tournament quarterfinal against VCU.
The Uptown school’s basketball fans remember 2024 well, a year when their men’s team finally returned to the top of the Atlantic 10.
Duquesne’s opponent in the final? VCU.
Two years later, the Dukes and Rams were at it again — this time, in the quarterfinals — and Duquesne gave No. 2-seeded VCU a battle before succumbing in the final minute.
Terrence Hill Jr. scored 20 points to go with six assists, and VCU held off Duquesne’s late rally for a 71-66 victory to advance.
“Congrats to (Duquesne). They played a hell of a game yesterday (against Rhode Island). They played a hell of a game tonight,” VCU coach Phil Martelli Jr. said. “They gave us everything we could handle, for sure.”
VCU (25-7), which shared the A-10’s regular-season championship with top-seeded Saint Louis, will play in Saturday’s semifinals at 3:30 p.m. against No. 3 Saint Joseph’s.
“It’s March, right? These games are going to be like this,” Martelli said. “It’s not going to be pretty.”
Michael Belle added 14 points on 7-of-10 shooting and grabbed seven rebounds, and Lazar Djokovic scored 13 for VCU, which beat Duquesne, 93-80, in the only regular-season meeting this season.
Alex Williams led No. 7 Duquesne (18-15) with 20 points and eight rebounds. Jimmie Williams added 13 points for the Dukes, who rebounded from a 19-loss season in Dru Joyce III’s first year as coach following 2024’s team that went 25-12 and netted the Dukes their first NCAA Tournament appearance in nearly 50 years.
Barring an invite from either the National Invitation Tournament or the College Basketball Crown, Duquesne’s season is over.
It didn’t happen without a fight.
“What we strive to get better at is to get better,” Joyce said. “The players talked about it. We had to become a better defensive team. You’ve seen it on the floor today, just how we were able to defend. They scored 93 points against us in Game 1. That game was still played at a good pace today. It wasn’t like it was slowed down to a halt.”
Duquesne trailed for the entire second half after falling behind by 10 points at the break. But they nearly came all the way back, getting within 66-64 on a driving layup by Jimmie Williams with 37 seconds remaining.
Hill made 1 of 2 free throws to give VCU a three-point lead before Duquesne’s Tarence Guinyard turned the ball over and the VCU’s Nyk Lewis followed with a pair from the line to give the Rams a 69-64 lead with 23 seconds to go.
Alex Williams’ basket made it a 3-point margin, but Brandon Jennings hit two free throws for VCU with 11 seconds left and the Rams held on.
“We just tried to fight, tried to fight, fight, fight and came up short,” Alex Williams said. “But I can’t really be too upset about it, because I know everybody did everything in their power. Everybody played hard. Everybody gave everything they had. So, if we do that, then I’m cool with the result.”
Duquesne senior forward David Dixon, who was playing in his school-record 129th career game, finished with eight points, seven rebounds and two blocks, despite injuring his shoulder in the second half and fouling out late.
Dixon, one of just two Duquesne players to reach 100 blocks and dunks each, was in visible pain in the second half when he returned to the court.
Afterwards, Duquesne’s fans began chanting his name.
“It was very emotional for me,” Dixon said.
While VCU appeared fresh-legged after entering the tournament with a double-bye, Duquesne was back at the building adjacent to its campus some 24 hours after advancing to the quarterfinals with a 67-61 second-round victory over Rhode Island on Thursday.
Yet, the Dukes started fast.
Guinyard drilled a 3-pointer to get things going, and Duquesne eventually led by as many as seven points. The Dukes stayed in front until 3:59 remained before halftime, when Hill converted two free throws to give VCU a 27-26 lead.
The Rams didn’t give it back.
When Hill’s long and high-arcing 3-pointer found nothing but net at the halftime buzzer, VCU enjoyed a 39-29 bulge, its largest of the half.
Duquesne capped that electrifying run in 2024 to just its second A-10 Tournament title — the Dukes won the league’s very first in 1977 — by turning away VCU in the championship game.
If the Rams were thinking about it this time around in the quarterfinals, they sure didn’t show it.
“Nobody talked about it,” Hill said. “It was just another game for us. Obviously, we beat them at their place, so we knew they were going to come out with an edge. We just tried to lock in on getting (our first tournament win).”