City of Basketball Love

Ari Rosenfeld (@realA_rosenfeld)
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After an impressive road win against Cincinnati to start AAC play, the Temple Owls came into their home game against Houston looking to build momentum after an up-and-down non-conference slate.

Instead, the Owls played an uninspired game, falling behind big in the first half and getting blown out by the Cougars in front of a despondent Liacouras Center crowd.

Here's a quick report from Temple's 77-50 loss:

At first…
Houston started the game hot, getting out to a 6-0 lead in the opening minutes. Temple bounced back to knot the score at 8-8, with the teams trading buckets for several minutes thereafter. A fastbreak layup by Trey Lowe had the Owls trailing 20-16 with just over eight minutes to go in the first half.

Turning point…
As it would turn out, Lowe’s bucket was Temple’s last for over seven minutes of action. The Owls struggled to generate anything offensively, shooting poorly from the outside and turning the ball over. That, coupled with efficient offense by Houston, led to a 17-1 Cougar run that broke the game wide open. When all was said and done, Houston had a 20-point lead and Fran Dunphy had burned two timeouts. The Cougars led 40-21 at half and coasted the rest of the way.

Shining stars…
Houston’s Rob Gray entered the contest as the AAC’s leading scorer at 18.5 points per game, and the sophomore JUCO transfer lived up to his billing, pouring in 23 points. Gray and backcourt mate Ronnie Johnson (17 points) looked to be a step ahead of Temple’s guards all day.

Obi Enechionyia and Quenton DeCosey each scored nine points to lead Temple.

Noteworthy numbers…
In case the final score wasn’t an indication, Temple’s first half offensive struggles bled over to the second session as well; for the game Temple shot just 20-for-58 (34.5 percent) from the field.

The Owls especially struggled from beyond the arc. Coming in shooting just 32 percent from deep on the year (259th in the country) but couldn’t manage to even approach that number today, knocking down just three of their 23 three-point attempts (13 percent), going 0-for-12 in the first half.

Up next...
Temple (6-6, 1-1 AAC) @ UConn (9-3, 0-0) (Jan. 5, 8 p.m.)
Houston (12-2, 2-0) vs. Tulane (7-7, 0-1) (Jan. 5, 9 p.m.)