Duquesne’s basketball practice Tuesday morning was winding down in typical fashion at Power Center, the Dukes’ temporary on-campus workout facility until their new arena is completed.

It was the eve of their next game against Fordham at PPG Paints Arena, where Duquesne (14-2, 4-0 Atlantic 10) will look to continue its surprising start and quest to reach the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1977. The Dukes, the only 4-0 team in the conference, garnered nine points this week in the Associated Press Top 25 poll.

“The beauty of this situation is you’re paving your own path,” Duquesne coach Keith Dambrot said he told his players.

“You go to Ohio State. You go to Michigan. You go to Duke. Even Pitt. All those places already have been to the same tournament multiple times, and they’ve won NCAA Tournament games. And they’ve won their league. But Duquesne hasn’t. So, like, you can be the reason why Duquesne gets resurrected.”

In February 1954, the year Dambrot’s father, Sid, was a senior guard at Duquesne, the Dukes reached No. 1 in two national polls (AP and United Press International) after winning their first 22 games.

It is a sampling of the good old days at Duquesne.

“We don’t really talk about the history around here,” Dukes junior center Michael Hughes said. “It’s not about the past or the future and all that stuff. It’s about what we’re doing right now. We’re trying to achieve what we can right now.”

And “right now” is Wednesday night against Fordham (6-9, 0-3) visits the Dukes in Duquesne’s second appearance this season at PPG Paints Arena. In the season opener there, Duquesne beat Princeton, 94-67.

Duquesne will play four more A-10 regular-season games at the Pittsburgh Penguins home, including a Jan. 29 encounter with No. 13 Dayton. The other dates are Feb. 2 against La Salle, Feb. 19 against George Washington and March 6 against Richmond in the finale.

After Wednesday, Duquesne goes on a two-game road trip to Rhode Island on Jan. 22 and Massachusetts on Jan. 25 before returning to meet Dayton.

Fordham was picked to finish last among the A-10’s 14 teams in the preseason poll, and the Rams, who have given Duquesne fits in recent years, are without several injured players, including 6-foot-9 junior forward Chuba Ohams, the team’s leading scorer (11.0 ppg) and rebounder (8.2 rpg).

Dambrot isn’t expecting anything but a hard day’s work from his team.

“That’s all it takes. It doesn’t take anything special,” he said. “It’s just plain, old-school philosophy: work harder than anybody else and play better together.”

Hughes, Duquesne’s third-leading scorer (10.6) behind junior forward Marcus Weathers (14.3) and sophomore point guard Sincere Carry (11.9), mimicked his coach’s message.

“It comes down to playing at the highest level possible. It’s not about a specific goal. It’s about working as hard as we can,” said the 6-8, 240-pound Hughes, who is shooting 58% and ranks fifth in Division I in blocks percentage.

“I don’t expect to go out and lose or not achieve anything.”

Dambrot said after Saturday’s 66-61 victory at George Washington that he felt an urge to lay out the events of the Dukes’ season so far, especially after they gutted out their second consecutive road victory and fourth in a row overall in the A-10.

“My message was pretty simple,” he said. “I just told them, ‘So, you won the 10 games in a row to start the year, and you made some noise and you got some publicity.”

Duquesne received one point in the poll for consecutive weeks in early December but lost a pair of games to UAB and Marshall, both of Conference USA, and didn’t return again until this week.

Dambrot continued by telling his players, “‘You put yourself in position, then you stumbled a little bit. And now, you’ve won four games in the league, and most everybody doesn’t think it’s for real, right? They think, ‘Ah, well, Duquesne is going to revert back. They’re going to lose when they play the good teams.’ I said, ‘Look, we control it, man.’”

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