In the first of four consecutive Chevrolet Gotham Classic contests for Temple (8-1), the Owls played down to its opponent’s talent level for a majority of the game yet again, before taking down a subpar Alcorn State (2-8) team, 63-46.
It was the first-ever meeting between the two institutions and credit must be given where credit is due, because the Braves stuck with the Owls punch for punch until Temple started to pull away midway through the second half.
“We were not great on offense, turned it over 15 times, and didn’t shoot it particularly great,” Owls coach Fran Dunphy said. “Sometimes we get caught in between being very kind and considerate to our teammates, to shooting a little bit too quickly.
“We haven’t found a great rhythm other than the second half of Villanova, we just haven’t had a great rhythm to our game.”
Sophomore forward Anthony Lee did not play due to an illness, opening the door for graduate student Jake O’Brien to get his name penciled into the starting lineup for the first time this season.
O’Brien responded well, scoring 10 points on 5-for-8 shooting, but Temple struggled in the post – a trend that has continued for much of the season. O’Brien, known for being more of a stretch forward that camps out around the perimeter, was forced into playing a majority of his minutes down low, which is not necessarily his strong suit.
Freshman Devontae Watson was thrown into the mix at the 11:39 minute mark and played his first significant minutes of the season. Watson fared well for such an inexperienced player,scoring 4 points, and blocked 3 shots in just five minutes of action.
“(Devontae) did some really good things,” Dunphy said. “He really did some terrific things. I think he’s going to be a terrific basketball player. He’s going to be hard to score against.”
Temple entered halftime with a 28-26 lead, and received boos from the light crowd at the Liacouras Center as the team headed to the locker room at intermission.
“During halftime we just came amongst ourselves and said we’ve just got to continue to play,” said senior swingman Scootie Randall, who scored 11 points and grabbed 9 rebounds. “We’re gonna make mistakes as well as them, so we just had to keep playing.”
Senior forward Rahlir Hollis-Jefferson played a crucial role in keeping the Owls’ heads above water with numerous hustle plays on both sides of the floor. Hollis-Jefferson finished with 11 points and 4 rebounds.
Senior guard Khalif Wyatt returned back to form after going ice cold in Temple’s three previous games vs. Villanova, Duke and Towson. Wyatt dropped 20 points on 5-11 shooting. Fourteen of Wyatt’s points came in the second half to help the Owls pull away.
“He’s a terrific scorer and he’s a really good basketball player, but I don’t think he’s playing at the top of his game at this point so I hope that’s coming together for him,” Dunphy said.
With Wyatt’s 20 points on the night, he became the 49th player in Temple history to surpass 1,000 career points.
“It’s been a long process,” Wyatt said. “I just wanna thank all of my teammates that I had till I got here and all my coaches. And I’m grateful for all of them and the accomplishment means a lot to me. I just wanna thank everybody who helped me get there.”
Senior guard Anthony Nieves led Alcorn State with 16 points, and junior center Josh Nicholas went a perfect 5-5 from the floor to record 12 points and 7 rebounds.
The Owls did hold the Braves to 34 percent shooting and the score indicates that it was not much of a close game, but in reality it was another contest in which Temple struggled to find a rhythm up until the second half.
Though the Owls do sit at 8-1 on the season, second behind Charlotte in the Atlantic 10, the Cherry and White have struggled to put together a clean, smooth 40 minutes of basketball.
If this type of up-and-down performance continues, Temple could find themselves in deep trouble when they play teams like Syracuse and Kansas, which await the Owls in the next few weeks.
What could be attributing the Owls’ erratic play is their inconsistent schedule thus far. Temple has not strung together three games in a week’s span, but that will no longer be the case after this week as the Owls finish out the week with Canisius on Wednesday and Syracuse on Saturday.
“We haven’t had a constant schedule yet,” Wyatt said. “We just had a couple long breaks and stuff like that so now we get into the meat of our schedule, we’re playing twice a week and three times a week so we get into a good rhythm and it should be good for us.”
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-Lee Update: Lee missed tonight’s game with an undisclosed illness. The forward’s status is unknown and it looks like he will be a gametime decision for Wednesday’s game vs. Canisius.
“Whatever the doctors and Anthony say,” Dunphy said. “It’s a combination of Anthony and his family and what the doctors say.”
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-Sound Off: With Khalif Wyatt becoming just the 49th player in the history of Temple basketball to record 1,000 career points, where does he rank among your favorite all-time Owls?
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Postgame Video
Fran Dunphy
Post game audio
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