Rebecca Jozwiak | staff writer

When he spoke to the media two Sundays ago after his team’s loss to the Penn State Nittany Lions, Duquesne Head Coach Dan Burt seemed optimistic about the rest of his team’s season.

“We’re playing a lot of young people, a lot of freshmen,” Burt said. “We’ll grow from this.”

That’s exactly what Burt’s team did. For the first time in five years, the high-flying Dukes broke the 100-point barrier, defeating Niagara 100-65 at Cooper Fieldhouse on Saturday night.

For Duquesne, four players contributed at least ten points in the resounding win. Arguably, junior Jerni Kiaku was the standout player for Duquesne: Though she was only on the court for 23 minutes, Kiaku netted a career-high 24 points while going 10-for-12 in field-goal shooting. The guard also contributed defensively, putting up three steals.

Megan McConnell, usually known for her offensive prowess and whom Burt has labeled a WNBA draft pick, was a leading contributor to the Duquesne defense on Saturday night. While she put up 15 points, she also logged five rebounds, six assists and seven steals. The senior, who played 35-plus minutes in the first two contests of the season, was only on the court for 28 minutes against the Purple Eagles.

The starters, like McConnell and Kiaku, were major keys to Duquesne’s triple-digit victory – but a chunk of the success came from its bench. The Dukes’ bench contributed 44 points in Saturday’s shooting palooza, with Mackenzie Blackford leading the charge.

Blackford, a freshman guard, scored 15 points in just 16 minutes. She went 3-for-5 from behind the arc.

“I mean, Coach always says that you never know when your name’s going to be called,” Blackford said after the game. “I think that I was just in the right spots at the right times. It was a fun game.”

In addition to cracking triple digits, Duquesne forced 38 turnovers, the most in one game in program history. Most of those came from 25 steals, which itself tied a program record. For Niagara, it was a blast to the past, as it was also victim of 100-plus point beatdowns by Duquesne in its 2009 and 2010 seasons.

“Obviously, we’re always happy to get a win, and to do it in pretty convincing fashion, and to put 100 points on the board is always a good feeling,” Burt said. “I wanted to be around 20 [defensive turnovers] and to force 30 [offensive turnovers] but we had 27 and we forced 38, so we’ll live with it and take the win.”

Wednesday night, however, was a different story. After a hard fought battle against Kent State in Ohio, the Dukes fell 81-61 to the Golden Flashes.

Duquesne struggled offensively after enjoying the triple-digit game against Niagara: the Dukes went 22-for-71 in field-goal opportunities while only making five 3-point shots out of the 34 that they took. McConnell and Kiaku were the only two Dukes cracking into the double-digit range, with 19 and 10 points, respectively.

McConnell was right back to ironman duty, playing 38 out of the 40 minutes in the contest while recording 19 points and 8 rebounds. Kiaku, who came off her career-high game, quietly put up 10 for the Dukes while forcing three turnovers.

Turnovers were another aspect of play that differed from Saturday’s win: Duquesne forced 17 team turnovers – less than half of the program record it had set just four days earlier.

The Dukes pulled in front of Kent State here and there in the first half, with its biggest lead being four points in the first quarter. The Dukes led by a point with 6:02 left in the second quarter and never again led, spending the second half slowly sinking into a larger deficit. They never seriously threatened to get hot as the game progressed.

The Golden Flashes took advantage of Duquesne’s offensive off-day, as the team saw four players crack double-digit scoring. Guard Dionna Gray led the charge with 20 points for Kent State.

The Dukes look to get back in the win column when they face-off against Robert Morris at home on Monday. Tip-off is slated for 6 p.m.