No. 11 seed Duquesne (25-11) beat No. 6 BYU 71-67 for its first March Madness victory since 1969. The Dukes, who won the A-10 tournament championship Sunday, have won nine games in a row.
“Just a tribute to our guys,” Duquesne coach Keith Dambrot said. “It’s a tribute to our league. Teams like Davidson, VCU, Richmond kind of prepared us for this because they do a lot of similar things, and the great coaches in our league got us prepared for this game.
In the A-10′s second game of the day, No. 7 seed Dayton beat No. 10 Nevada 63-60 at the Delta Center for its first victory in the tournament since 2015.
“Every season it’s about the experiences you go through together, right?” Dayton coach Anthony Grant said. “All those experiences got us to the point where we were in this tournament, right? We know that we have a good team, right? We don’t always play to the best of our ability. Sometimes we can get sidetracked, we can get off kilter. We can get out of character.
“I think the thing that this team has done on a consistent basis is they’ve showed a level of grit, resiliency, togetherness that’s gotten us to where we are, and thankfully an opportunity to continue to play in this tournament.”
Duquesne plays No. 3 Illinois at 6:40 p.m. Saturday in Omaha, Neb., in the second round. Dayton plays No. 2 seed Arizona at 12:45 p.m.
Here’s what the two victories mean for the nation’s eight-ranked conference:
• This the first time the A-10 has won two first-round games since 2014 when Dayton and Saint Louis were the only teams from a group of six A-10 teams to win their opening games.
• The last A-10 team to win two games was Dayton in 2014. The No. 11 seed Flyers beat Ohio State, Syracuse and Stanford before losing to Florida in the Elite Eight.
• The A-10 has not sent two teams to the Sweet 16 since 2004 when Saint Joseph’s and Xavier reached the Elite Eight.
• Duquesne and Dayton are the first A-10 teams to win a NCAA tournament game since No. 12 seed Richmond beat No. 5 Iowa 67-63 in the first round in 2022. Last year, No. 12 seed VCU lost 63-51 to No. 5 Saint Mary’s in the first round.
• The A-10 has lost six second-round games in a row.
In 2022, Richmond then 79-51 to No. 4 Providence in the second round.
In 2018, No. 7 seed Rhode Island beat No. 10 Oklahoma before losing to No. 2 Duke.
In 2017, No. 11 Rhode Island beat No. 6 Creighton before losing to No. 3 Oregon.
In 2016, No. 8 Saint Joseph’s beat No. 9 Cincinnati before losing to No. 1 Oregon, and No. 10 VCU beat No. 7 Oregon State before losing to No. 2 Oklahoma.
In 2015, No. 11 Dayton beat No 11 Boise State and No. 6 Providence before losing to No. 3 Oklahoma.
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