Home >  Sports >  Duquesne U.

Tuesday, January 07, 2003

By Paul Zeise, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

Duquesne’s game plan to against No. 12 Vanderbilt last night was to stop the Commodores 6-foot-7 All-American center Chantelle Anderson from taking over the game.

	Vanderbilt All-American Chantelle Anderson goes up for two of her 20 points in the Commodores' 78-56 win at Palumbo Center. (Annie O'Neill, Post-Gazette) Related article A cautionary tale brings star home

The Dukes played a tight zone defense against Anderson, but she scored 20 points and was 10 of 11 from the field. However, she only had four rebounds and was in foul trouble for much of the game while the outcome was still in doubt.

The Dukes, though, had few answers for Anderson’s supporting cast, which helped Vanderbilt cruise to a 78-56 victory before a crowd of 1,606 at the Palumbo Center.

The Commodores got 21 points and 10 rebounds from Jenni Benningfield and 13 points and 10 assists from Ashley McElhiney. According to Vanderbilt Coach Melanie Balcomb, that is the formula in which the Commodores are seeking.

“We’ve seen every defense you can imagine this year against Chantelle, so this was nothing new,” Balcomb said. “Every team will try and double and triple down against her, so that’s why we’ve been working on being balanced and getting production elsewhere. We want to take a lot of 3-pointers and try and open some things up. We’ve improved our outside shooting and need to continue to work on it.”

Upper St. Clair High School graduate Beth Friday led Duquesne with 14 points and 15 rebounds and kept Anderson off balance with her physical defense. It was Friday’s 40th career double-double. She needs only seven rebounds to become the first Dukes player to record 1,000 for her career.

“I wanted to get seven more tonight, but I fell short,” Friday said. “It felt good to compete against a player like Anderson and I feel I held my own. It was a great experience because we won’t see 6-foot-7 in our league. So we know we can rebound with anyone.”

Duquesne (7-5) took a 5-4 lead, but Benningfield hit a layup with 17:39 remaining in the first half and the Commodores (10-3) never trailed again.

The Dukes kept it close for much of the half and trailed 25-21 at the five minute mark. The Commodores then stepped up their defensive pressure, forced five quick turnovers for easy transition baskets during a 14-4 run as they took a 38-25 halftime lead.

“The thing that is a little frustrating at that point is that they made that run with Anderson on the bench with fouls,” Duquesne Coach Dan Durkin said. “I really felt if we could hang in there, this was a team to be had. They had played a number of road games in a short period of time, but our turnovers right at the end of the half took us out of it.”

The Dukes were hampered by injuries. Starting guard Candace Futrell is out with an ankle injury, starting forward Nikolina Pender played only six minutes because of a clavicle injury and starting center Erin Wehrle missed the game with the flu.

Minus several starters, the Dukes did get some quality minutes from freshmen Aiga Bautre, who scored 11, Kristin Kalervo and Nicole Sinclair and senior Selma Delibasic.

“I’d love to see what our team could do if we were at full strength, but that hasn’t happened yet,’’ Friday said. “The good thing, however, is that a lot of the younger players are getting some experience and playing well. That should help us down the stretch.”