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OMAHA, Neb. -- A players-only meeting held on the eve of Duquesne's return to the NCAA Tournament made one mission clear.
The Dukes earned their first NCAA Tournament win since 1969 Thursday at the CHI Health Center by defeating BYU 71-67 in the program's first appearance in the dance since 1977. It was a game played in typical Keith Dambrot fashion. It was a game that, from the time Dambrot set foot on campus in 2017, was one to envision from a Dambrot-led team that could reach an NCAA Tournament.
Just as he did at Akron, Dambrot rebuilt the Duquesne program. With his mission of returning the Dukes to prominence accomplished and with personal matters ready to be addressed, Dambrot announced this run would be his last as a head coach and he would retire.
That gave the players a little extra juice in their missions. That players-only meeting held Wednesday provided a cry to keep Dambrot employed for at least another day and potentially longer. The Dukes have the belief that something special can begin here in Omaha, and Dambrot is on everyone's mind while working towards that.
“It means so much. It’s what we’ve been working towards since the summer," sophomore guard Kareem Rozier said after Thursday's win. "I’m just so proud of our guys, proud of our team. This is huge, man. We had a team meeting without the coaches and we said we want to send him out the right way. This is just a test of our character and the team that we hav to take a punch that they threw at us and we stuck together.
“The message was, and I’m going to keep it short, we believe that we can do something special here. That was the main point of the meeting. Nobody believes that we can beat anybody in this tournament but we believe. Those are the two words we’ll continue to use. We believe.”
That win came from a gritty, hard-nosed, swarming effort that forced BYU out of what it does well. It's a Dambrot-esque win because that's the only way it could have happened.
“It’s an amazing feeling to be a part of history, it’s amazing to take our team somewhere we haven’t been in a really long time," David Dixon said. "I hope to keep going, I hope to be more successful with this program. I’m just really happy.”
Dambrot inherited a program that had gone nowhere for 40 years. Duquesne endured records at or below .500 in 31 of the 40 seasons in between that NCAA Tournament run in 1977 and the end of the 2017 season, and half of the eight coaches who succeeded John Cinicola never experienced a winning record during that stretch.
He worked his magic, and he will leave this program in a far better spot than how he found it seven years ago.
But, the run isn't over just yet. Up next for the Dukes is a bout with Big Ten Tournament champion Illinois at 8:40 p.m. Eastern Saturday in Omaha.
"If you have a great guy like coach Dambrot he’s worthy of doing everything for him because he’s a great human, great coach, and he cares about his people," Fousseyni Drame said. "Him retiring this year means a lot for him, so we’re doing everything we can to send him off right.”
There was a belief in Dambrot's process, even after a 6-24 finish to the 2021-'22 season.
“When I was coming here, my first year was after the six-and-20-something season, and I’ve always been about going to programs that are low and bringing them up," Rozier said. "That’s what I’ve always been about. I’ve never been about going to those programs that’s already winning, the we know are going to win. That’s how I was in high school. That’s not just about me, that’s about how they recruited. I trusted in his words, I believed in what he said, and in doing that we’re making history.”
Dambrot put his faith in his process, but this day and age of college basketball forces some conforming within the transfer portal. He experienced the lows and highs of that process. An exodus came before that 6-24 season, but Dambrot didn't adjust his formula.
He punched back in the transfer portal by bringing in, among others, leading scorers Dae Dae Grant and Jimmy Clark III. Two years later, two players who were given another chance within college basketball will be remembered as the stars of a completed build from Dambrot at Duquesne.
"It's very gratifying and just exciting," Grant said. "It's a blessing and high appreciation to be under coach's wing and be here for a couple years and be under the legacy, learn so much. Build that love and relationship means a lot. We're trying to keep it going. We're not satisfied."
Added Clark: "I'll have to say the same. It's definitely a blessing playing for coach. He gave me an opportunity along with other guys. Just learning so much from him, day in and day out, whether that's with basketball or in life. So I feel like those things helped us come together more and built this team together."
I asked Grant and Clark to answer the same question on the dais about winning Thursday's game for Dambrot. Unprompted, Dambrot chimed in after their answers:
"They just won't let me retire, man," Dambrot quipped. "I'm trying to retire, we keep winning games. They'll make me an old man."
Looks like 18 holes at Oakmont Country Club will have to wait at least a couple more days.
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