After going ice cold from long range during last Saturday’s 77-63 victory over Rice, Temple came back and shot the ball much better and squeezed out a highly contested 80-75 win over Delaware on Sunday at the Liacouras Center.
“(Temple coach Fran Dunphy) just does an unbelievable job every time out and I admire, I actually enjoy watching, preparing for the game just because of the way that they do play and the way that they play the game of basketball,” Delaware coach Monte Ross said during his postgame press conference.
After an eight-day layoff, Dunphy was concerned that his squad might come into Sunday’s game a bit sluggish, especially after Delaware had played two games this week in the NIT season tip-off. The Blue Hens dropped both contests, a 66-63 loss to Kansas State Wednesday and an 85-59 loss to Pittsburgh on Friday.
“To be off eight days is not the easiest thing but we didn’t do what we needed to do today in terms of defense,” Dunphy said after the game. “A lot of it is me and I have to take care of that. We’re grateful for the win, but know we have to play better.”
Temple’s bench, projected to be one of the Owls’ biggest strengths this season, struggled mightily vs. Rice recording only five points. But behind Jake O’Brien’s 13 points, including three 3-pointers, Temple’s bench scored a combined 22 points to give Dunphy’s team a tremendous boost.
“My shot was obviously falling today,” O’Brien said. “I think my teammates did a pretty good job of finding me. You know, we have a lot of weapons on this team, a lot of talented guys and they start to double down on them it frees me up for some open shots.”
O’Brien undoubtedly had his best game since joining Temple and although the offensive statistics may stick out to the common fan glancing at the boxscore, it was O’Brien’s effort on defense that encouraged Dunphy.
“Jake did a really good job and you know what he did, I mentioned it to him after the game too I thought he did a really good job defensively,” Dunphy said. “I thought he kind of battled (Jamelle) Hagins probably better than Anthony (Lee) did. He blocked his shot, I thought he competed very well today on the defensive end and he’s a valuable asset because he can step away from the basket and make shot. His minutes will go up as well.”
Before the half, with the shot clock unplugged Temple senior guard Khalif Wyatt shook Delaware forward Carl Baptiste out of his shoes with a beautiful crossover, and managed to convert a no-look pass to Scootie Randall on the wing who hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer giving the Owls a 41-34 advantage going into the locker room.
“We just wanted a pick and roll at the end of the clock and they switched it,” Wyatt said when asked about the play. “I made the move on Baptiste and Scootie’s man helped and I just gave Scootie the ball and Scootie made a big shot.”
With momentum in their favor the Owls came out hot in the second half en route to a 14-point lead, but behind junior guard Devon Saddler, who played all put one minute of the game, scoring 25 points and senior forward Hagins, the Blue Hens were able to stay close giving Temple a very tough test down the stretch.
“Hagins was really good and Saddler was really good and we weren’t very good defensevly,” Dunphy said during his postgame press conference. “We didn’t do what we needed to do a number of times. We need to get ourselves in a little bit of rhythm of playing then we won’t have any more excuses.”
Hagins proved to clearly be the most talented big man on the floor and was virtually unstoppable all afternoon, as the Owls couldn’t find an answer to stop him. The 6-9, 235-pound forward scored a game-high 29 points along with 12 rebounds.
“One of the things that we talked about is we had to get Jamelle the ball,” Ross said. “We weren’t doing a good job and I wasn’t doing a good job of making sure that he got the ball because he was coming into the game shooting 62 percent from the field. When he’s rolling the way that he was rolling today, it’d be foolish not to keep giving him the ball.”
Clutch free throws down the stretch ultimately helped Temple come out with a huge win against a highly talented Blue Hens team.
“I knew they were gonna be ready and I knew they were gonna look to attack,” Randall said. “Both of those guys [Hagins and Saddler] can do pretty much anything you need them to do on the court, so I think it was a tough matchup for us but it’s something that we can learn from.”
By seizing the victory, the Owls move to 3-0 for the first time under Dunphy and the first time overall since the 2000-01 season, when the Cherry and White advanced to the Elite 8.
Wyatt and Randall paced Temple’s scoring with 18 points apiece and Wyatt was one assist shy of his career high, as he dished out 7 dimes.
“I’m having fun trying to get my teammates involved. I know shots are gonna come often,” Wyatt said. “I just try not to think about it and just try to go out there and make the right play whatever it is, whether it’s a shot or a pass for one of my teammates.”
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Notes: Will Cummings got the start at point guard and had his best game of the season chipping in with 6 points on 3-4 shooting despite playing only 11 minutes, but it was senior guard T.J. DiLeowho got most of the burn, playing 29 minutes. DiLeo was a key factor on defense as he came up with 4 of the Owls 12 steals. “I think we gave good help side defense and then tried to make them make the extra pass and sometimes when they made those extra passes people were able to step in the passing lanes and get those steals,” DiLeo said. … Dalton Pepper also proved that he is a threat when left open for three point opportunities. Pepper went 2-5 from downtown for 6 points.
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Sound Off: With the Owls moving to 3-0 for the first time since 2000-01, how does this team compare to John Chaney’s unit in 2000-01?
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