PHILADELPHIA – Temple suffered its first ever loss on Hooter’s birthday, 80-59, at the hands of Houston after previously being 12-0 on the beloved Owl’s birthday.
Houston enforced their will on Temple right from the get-go, starting the game on a 15-0 run and held Temple without a field goal for the first six and a half minutes of the game. An integral part to Houston’s hot start was junior guard Corey Davis, who scored 15 of his 20 points in the first half all on three-pointers. Houston would go into halftime with a 41-20 lead and Temple would never come within more than 17 points of Houston in the second half as the Cougars cruised to the finish.
“I think we came out really flat and we underestimated them,” freshman Nate Pierre-Louis said. “They (Houston) came out with their guns blazing, shooting everything and making everything.”
Temple has only been beaten by 21 points or more at the Liacouras Center seven times and Houston has been able to do it twice, including this game.
Temple Head Coach Fran Dunphy Post Game Press Conference
The most glaring stat of the game is how Houston dominated Temple off the glass. The Cougars out rebounded the Owls 53-to-22 and had a plus-12 advantage on the offensive glass as well. At one point in the game, Houston had more offensive rebounds than Temple had total rebounds.
“Well, the rebounding margin was 17 to 5 on the offensive end,” Temple Head Coach Fran Dunphy said. “The thing I always look at is the offensive rebounds and it broke our backs.”
To show how bad Temple’s rebounding actually was, this performance is the worst rebounding margin by a Temple team in the history of the Liacouras Center/Apollo. It looked like a lack effort by Temple when it came to rebounding in the game, but Coach Dunphy said it was more of a lack of execution.
“We are just not disciplined enough on the rebounding side of things,” Dunphy said. “We had a couple of guys, who played some decent minutes and didn’t get rebounds.”
One thing Temple did well in the game was forcing Houston to turn the ball over 17 times. However, the Owls were only able to turn those opportunities into 13 points.
Shizz Alston Jr. and Quinton Rose both struggled to make shots, combining for 20 points on 9 of 27 shooting from the field. Temple’s 59 points snapped a streak of six straight games where the Owls had scored 73 or more points in the game and it’s their lowest point total since losing to Cincinnati 75-42.
Temple’s NCAA Tournament hopes are ever so slim now with the Owls basically needing to win the American Athletic Conference Tournament to get into the big dance. Temple will have a week to regroup before the Owls will host UCF, who won the first meeting 60-39, at 2 p.m. on Senior Day.