Arizona 67, Duquesne 59

[recap] [box score]

Tuning in during the middle of a basketball game is always a little bit disorienting to me. So much of the rest of the game is dictated by those early moments; we learn what pace the teams want to play at, what matchups they're looking to exploit, what defensive strategies they plan on using. A great deal of the scouting report shows up in those first few minutes.

Because Lehigh at St. John's ran late, I missed almost eight minutes of the beginning of this game, which is a lot to miss -- especially early in the season, with a team I was completely unfamiliar with. It didn't help that Duquesne's leading returning scorer, senior B.J. Monteiro, picked up two fouls in the first four minutes and a third immediately upon re-entering the game seven minutes later. I never really got a feel for the flow of this game, other than to (again) be impressed with Arizona's defense and less than unimpressed with both teams' offense.