After a tough but highly successful two game road trip the Dukes head back to Harrisonburg for the first of 4 straight games at the AUBC. First opponent this week will be the Ap St Mountaineers. They are currently 6-9 overall and 2-2 in conference beating ODU and Ar St. Do not know anything further about them as the wife and I are still trying to figure out everything about the Dukes new conference mates. Looks to be a good game for the start of a tough looking homestand so hopefully the Dukes will be ready to go come Thursday.

Will be there Thursday ROOTIN. Hope to get a nice crowd and next week the students will be back so we can see an uptick in attendance and the return of the Pep Band.

Go Dukes

Brian

Game day!! Hope to see a nice crowd at the AUBC tonight!!

Brian

What is Claire Neff's status? Anybody know? That looked like a nasty sprain she got in the last game.

I will be there tonight!! Looking forward to a good game.

O to P

Have not heard anything. Guess we will find out this evening. Hope it is not too bad.

Brian

This is a good ballgame. Dukes with a tight lead midway through the 2nd period. 32 - 30

Starting to take too many from the outside.

App State probably playing above their normal. 39 - 30 Dukes leading at the half.

App has made this a lot tougher than it should have been. 25 seconds to go 71 - 64 Dukes

64 - 73 Dukes win

Kind of a nail biter of a game last night. Dukes had a 21 pt lead about midway through the third quarter and then ApSt went on a tear and cut the lead to 1 late in the 4th before the Dukes tightened up and put the game away. Peyton did not dress for the game and according to Sean in his pregame interview she is dealing with some soreness etc. Hopefully she will be back soon. Claire seemed to be firing on all cylinders also so the ankle injury she suffered last Saturday seems to be taken care of.

On another note former JMU Point guard Angela Mickens and her mom were at the game last night sitting about 10 rows in front of us. Got a chance to say hello to her as they were leaving. She is doing well and I told her we miss seeing her out on the floor and she said she misses it also!!

Brian

FYI - we beat St Joe's at their house earlier....they are now 14-2 with the only losses to us and #25 Villanova

We DEMOLISHED St. Joe’s at their house.

From talking to Claire's parents who were sitting behind us last night, apparently she stepped on a South Alabama player's foot and rolled her ankle and it felt and looked worse than it was. She is a tough cookie. I know how her mom feels though every time she goes out on the court because she leaves it all out there. My daughter played soccer and she was the same way. She never really got hurt but was black and blue in a few places more than once.

I felt like App State is kind of used to being the schoolyard bullies and not used to getting it handed back to them. I have to commend our girls on not getting as chippy as I'm sure they wanted to. That #11 was all up in Kiki's grill the whole game and you could tell Kiki was getting pretty tired of it. It was a good thing she fouled out when she did. The reffing was questionable at times. Does anyone know if Kristen Bell (one of the refs) is kin to the infamous Sally Bell, aka "the ref from hell"?

Even though losing that huge lead made me more than a little nuts last night, what I appreciated was how JMU never lost their cool or their focus and were able to work out of it, kick things into one last high gear and win the game. That has not always happened over the last couple of years.

(01-13-2023 06:18 PM)orange-to-purple Wrote:  From talking to Claire's parents who were sitting behind us last night, apparently she stepped on a South Alabama player's foot and rolled her ankle and it felt and looked worse than it was. She is a tough cookie. I know how her mom feels though every time she goes out on the court because she leaves it all out there. My daughter played soccer and she was the same way. She never really got hurt but was black and blue in a few places more than once.

I felt like App State is kind of used to being the schoolyard bullies and not used to getting it handed back to them. I have to commend our girls on not getting as chippy as I'm sure they wanted to. That #11 was all up in Kiki's grill the whole game and you could tell Kiki was getting pretty tired of it. It was a good thing she fouled out when she did. The reffing was questionable at times. Does anyone know if Kristen Bell (one of the refs) is kin to the infamous Sally Bell, aka "the ref from hell"?

#11 (Faith Alston) was a player originally from VA that JMU did not recruit. She had a career game against JMU last night. She was 6-11 from the field, and 2-3 from 3 for 15 pts. Her season avg. is 9.4. She added 4 assists and 2 rebounds to her stat line before fouling out. I believe this was the first game she had fouled out this season.

She played like she was trying not just to win the game, but prove something as a matter of personal pride against JMU. Nothing wrong with that, but hopefully JMU will be ready for her (and the rest of App) in a return matchup. I honestly felt the game should not have been a single digit victory.

Sure hope Peyton’s soreness is not too serious. Wonder if it’s her knee? If last year is any indication, she is not a particularly quick healer. We really need her great outside shooting. She’s shooting 43% from 3 point land. The rest of the team combined is 29%.

(01-14-2023 06:10 AM)olddawg Wrote:  Sure hope Peyton’s soreness is not too serious. Wonder if it’s her knee? If last year is any indication, she is not a particularly quick healer. We really need her great outside shooting. She’s shooting 43% from 3 point land. The rest of the team combined is 29%.

I agree. She currently plays the roll of our "6th Man" and is the critical component of the team, she's that key person off the bench that makes the team instantly better. She is not intimidated by the North Carolina's that we occasionally play. I just wished that she was a bit more streamlined so she could play at a high intensity for longer periods of time. The best example of a player who got her game exponentially stronger after a year of conditioning and shedding some pounds is Lauren Okafor. She would get the rebound at one end, dish it to a guard and then receive pass for a layup at the other end. The WNBA noticed and drafted her. But I digress, YES we need Peyton!