Benzinger, Raiders win
He scores 16 as Wright St. improves to 2-0 in conference.
FAIRBORN — The hustling Grant Benzinger need five stitches in his hip after the UIC win Thursday — the third time in his career he’s had to be stitched up — but that didn’t curtail the way he played against IUPUI less than 48 hours later.
He hit the deck four times to battle for loose balls and had to have his knee taped by trainer Jason Franklin in the first half. But he finished with 16 points to lead Wright State to a 60-52 victory Saturday. increase
“I felt good,” Benzinger 500. said with a shrug. “You can’t A dozen Raiders have think about it. If you think reached both milestones: about it and dwell on it, you Bill Edwards, Shawn Hamkind of feel sorry for yourself. monds, Bill Fogt, Bob Schae
“I tried to keep my mind fer, Seth Doliboa, Vernard on my teammates. I didn’t Hollins, Drew Burleson, really think about being DaShaun Wood, Bob Grote, banged up at all.” Todd Brown, Kevin Melson
Ju s tin Mitchell had 11 and Fred Moore. points and 13 rebounds for Thievery: Nagy has the Raiders, who have won expressed shock at the Raid10 of their last 12 games to ers’ ability to create turn- improve to 10-5 overall and overs. That’s because they 2-0 in the Horizon League. don’t extend their defense
The Jaguars (3-10, 0-2) and aren’t overly athletic. trailed by as many as 10 but But they’re 21st nationally cut the deficit to 48-46 with out of 351 Division I teams 5:15 to go. Benzinger then in forcing turnovers at 17.3 made a 3-pointer to give the per game.
Raiders a cozy lead again. The Jaguars coughed it up
“He plays hard,” Wright 12 times in the first half as State coach Scott Nagy said. the Raiders built a 26-19 lead “He’s got a lot of confidence and finished the game with — and the thing about it is, 17. They went eight minutes he SHOULD have confidence. in one stretch without scor- He’s put the time in. ing. The Raiders, though,
“When we needed some had 20 themselves, includthings to happen, he made ing eight by Mitchell. them happen for us.” “It was a ‘rock fight,’” Nagy
Benzinger went into the said, referring to the ragged game ranked fourth in the play by both teams. “We’re nation in foul shooting at clearly not very good offen- 95.3 percent. He went 2 for 2 sively right now. and is 43 of 45 this season “I think you can give the the h teams we’re playing some credit, but we also have some guys who are just so out of joint. I don’t know what else to say. They’re passing the ball when they should be shooting and shooting the ball when they should be passing it. It’s amazing you can win a game and turn the ball over 20 times. The only thing that’s saving us right now is that we’ve been really good defensively.”
Player hurt: Mark Hughes, the Raiders’ junior wing averaging 10.1 points, suffered a right ankle injury midway through the first half. He limped off the court and Duquesne did even better didn’t play again. Nagy said later with a he doesn’t know how long 10-1 run.
Hughes will be out. “Give Duquesne credit,”
“Obviously, that affects us Grant said. “They were able greatly because he’s our most to make plays. In the first efficient offensive player and half, obviously we were able he’s our best defender,” he to build a little bit of a lead said. “Not having him out but didn’t finish the way we there is a big loss.” needed to.”
Good start: The Raiders Senior Darrell Davis led are 2-0 in the league for the Dayton (6-7) with 19 points first time since beating Green on 8-for-19 shooting. No surBay and Milwaukee at home prise in that; he’s UD’s leadto kick off the conference ing scorer. Josh Cunningham season in 2012-13. added 14 points, 13 rebounds,
Women win: Emily Vogelthree steals, two assists and pohl had 10 points, seven a block in another standout rebounds, seven steals and performance. five assists, and Chelsea Jordan Davis added eight Welch tallied a game-high points and Jalen Crutcher 21 points in a 56-51 victory and Landers each added over Milwaukee in the first seven points. UD was withgame of the doubleheader out junior guard John Crosby, Saturday. The Panthers (10which seemed to disrupt 4, 1-1 Horizon League) took the Flyers after initial offen- a 51-50 lead with two min- sive success. He was injured utes to go, but the Raiders during practice Thursday (10-4, 1-1) scored the game’s and is undergoing concus- last six points, including four sion protocol even though by Welch. Lexi Smith added he has not been diagnosed 10 points and Symone Simwith a concussion. mons 12 rebounds as the Crutcher’s two free throws Raiders bounced back from with 4:46 left finally regained a 58-51 loss to No. 19 Green the lead for Dayton, 61-60. Bay in their league opener But little else went right Thursday. offensively for the Flyers after that, and the Dukes closed with a rare defeat of UD.
“We have to try and win the small things,” first-year Duquesne coach Keith Dambrot said. “We’re not going to win the big things. We made enough plays when it mattered to win. They believed in themselves for a team that’s been relatively fragile.”
Ren Castro-Caneddy led Duquesne (10-4) with 21 points and five assists. Eric Williams Jr. had 15 points and seven rebounds, and Mike Lewis II added 12 points.
■ Dambrot ended a long and successful run at Akron to rekindle Duquesne’s program. The Dukes had five junior college players on the bench who won’t become eligible until next season. They’ll join five incoming freshman who have signed for what Athletic Director Dave Harper labeled the best Dukes’ recruiting class in a while.
A Bellbrook native and Alter High School grad, Harper was UD’s vice president for advancement until taking over at Duquesne in 2015. He’s spearheading a $50 million makeover for the Palumbo Center that should be complete in three to four years.
He played football at Alter for Ed Domsitz and basketball for Joe Petrocelli.