Dukes Run of Out Gas in Loss to Charleston

JMU lost to the College of Charleston Cougars last night by the score of 75-61. The loss means JMU will forever be the answer to the question, “Which team did C of C beat for its first ever CAA victory?” That’s unfortunate. The Dukes are now 6-10 overall and 1-1 in CAA play. The Cougars improved to 9-7 and 1-0 in the league.

Charles Cooke and Andrey Semenov paced the Dukes scoring 21 and 19 points respectively. The duo combined to go 13 of 22 from the floor. The rest of the Dukes struggled shooting the ball to the tune of a 9 for 32 effort. Anthony Stitt and Nori Johnson led the way for the College and put on quite an impressive shooting display. They knocked down 10 of 17 from behind the arc. The game was close until about the final 10 minutes, when Charleston went on a run and left the Dukes in the dust.

The Return of Nation

After sitting out the first 15 games due to a suspension, Andre Nation was in the lineup for the first time all year. He came off the bench and immediately announced his return with a three pointer. He mostly struggled after that, hitting only 30% of shots and scoring 7 points. He did pull down 6 rebounds, which was tied for the team high. Unfortunately, he also was slowed by leg cramps throughout the game.

It wasn’t the most sparkling season debut, but it was still great to see him out on the court. And simply having him in the lineup seemed to elevate the team’s play initially, particularly the play of Semenov and Cooke. Once he gets his legs back and gets comfortable in his role, we expect the entire team to play better.

Hell of a Three Quarters

For roughly the first 30 minutes, this was one heck of a ballgame. At times it reminded me of the JMU vs. Northeastern game from last year (the one the Dukes lost…boo), with two teams shooting well and going right at each other. It was a close and exciting contest. And then it wasn’t. After tying it up 49-49 around the 12 minute mark, things went south for JMU. Credit to the College, especially Stitt and Johnson, who continued to execute and hit shots, but JMU just completely ran out of gas. What was a close game, turned into an easy win for Charleston. JMU was just a step slow everywhere on the court down the stretch. Based on the first 30 minutes, you could convince yourself JMU might be better than anyone guessed. Based on the last 10 minutes, you might think the sky is falling.

JMU was pretty much destroyed on the glass. As mentioned above Andre Nation was tied for the team lead for rebounding. He tied with Charles Cooke. The Dukes are fortunate to have guards who can rebound the basketball that well. They’re less fortunate that virtually nobody else on the team could grab a board last night. Charleston grabbed 44 rebounds to JMU’s 27. The Cougars had 18 offensive rebounds. No team, especially one with JMU’s size, should get beat that badly on the boards.

Welcome Charleston

It would have been nice for JMU to introduce the Cougars to the CAA by handing them a loss. That’s not how it worked out though. Despite the disappointing result, it was great to finally see Charleston play its first CAA contest. While there has been a lot of hand wringing about some of the CAA’s expansion moves, the addition of Charleston seems to have been well received. Based on last night, there is good reason for that.

The College played a great game and looked worthy of the praise they received in the preseason, when they were picked to finish 3rd. They play in a nice arena (in a great town) and had a pretty good crowd on hand for a Tuesday night game. We’re happy to have them join the fold and anxious for the rematch in the ‘burg. It should be a great game. Provided the Dukes can rebound the ball and Stitt and Johnson don’t have career nights again of course.