VCU holds off the Dukes of Duquesne, 71-62 (2-5-22)

By: Tyrone Montgomery Jr.

Headline Photo Credit: Darrell Owens-LMS Network

In the world of sports, especially in basketball, there are games called Trap Games. Trap games are games 1 particular team should win when they’re playing against a team that has struggled all season. We see this oftentimes in the NBA. When a good team like the Warriors is on a back-to-back and they played another good team like the Suns. Then the very next night, they’re playing OKC or the Detroit Pistons. All that energy was focused on the good team and they appear to be burnt out the next night. VCU hosted Dayton a couple of nights ago. Dayton has been solid all season. The Rams struggled in that game. But they were without their best player in Vince Williams. His absence was shown. In this game Saturday night, they were without Williams yet again. We have seen how much VCU missed him in this game. As they hosted Duquesne, a team that lost their previous 6 games, this was the trap game the Rams ran into. The offense struggled yet again without Vince Williams, especially early on. The Dukes looked like they were going to run away with this one. Frustrations were looking at the Stu. All eyes were on Ace Baldwin, the leader of this offense. Troubles came as soon as the game started as he has gotten in foul trouble. The Rams had to focus defensively because Duquesne was getting a lot of easy buckets and a lot of rebounds too. That was another area where Vince William’s presence was missed. Later in this game, VCU was able to lock down defensively. They turned it on in the second half and were able to storm back and defeat the Dukes 71-62.

As this game got closer down the stretch, the Dukes showed us all why they had been struggling and looked like that team that was on a 6 game losing streak. There were 3 possessions late in this game where the Dukes made a very careless mistake. They inbounded and passed the ball to someone that had their foot on the line. Those turnovers converted into scores for VCU that helped them to win this game. There were also a lot of blocks courtesy from none other than Hasan Ward. Hasan Ward is one of the best defenders in the Atlantic 10 and one to be feared too. The Junior Forward has recorded over 100 blocks in his career now and is still counting. The Rams now move to 14-7 and they will host Rhode Island Tuesday at 7 PM. Vince Williams has been marked as day-to-day now as he is still recovering from that calf injury. He should be questionable in this game.