City of Basketball Love

CoBL Staff (@hooplove215)
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The college basketball season got off to a strong start on Monday night, with eight of the city’s 12 Division I programs in action on the season’s opening day. The on-court results were certainly mixed, as a few wins were offset by some ugly losses.

Here’s a roundup of all the action, with links to our five stories from Monday night:

WBB: No. 24 Princeton 67, Temple 49

The Owls got off to a slow start on the road at a top-25 opponent, and poor 3-point shooting ensured that they wouldn’t come back in Diane Richardson’s debut as Temple’s head coach.

Click here for Owen McCue’s coverage

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MBB: No. 16 Villanova 81, La Salle 68

The first Big 5 clash of the year saw two new head coaches (but familiar faces) in Villanova’s Kyle Neptune and La Salle’s Fran Dunphy both find positives and negatives to take away as two programs in very different places. 

Click here for Josh Verlin’s coverage

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MBB: Wagner 76, Temple 73 (OT)

Temple entered this season with high hopes coming off a 17-win campaign, but got a significant dose of reality with an overtime home loss to a team they were a 15-point favorite against. 

Click here for Joseph Santoliquito’s coverage

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WBB: Villanova 60, Marist 38

The Wildcat women went up to Poughkeepsie as star forward Maddy Siegrist returned home, then overcame a slow start for a typical Siegrist performance — plus a few other impressive stat lines as well.

Click here for Jonathan Kinane’s coverage

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WBB: Saint Joseph’s 66, Bucknell 49
The Hawks got their season off on the right foot, with freshman Laura Ziegler impressing in her debut and Mackenzie Smith leading the way for Saint Joseph’s.

Click here for Jerome Taylor’s coverage

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WBB: Howard 62, La Salle 57
The Explorers got off to a slow start on the road against the preseason MEAC favorites, and a late-game rally wasn’t enough to overcome it. La Salle was down 39-25 at half but closed within a point in the final minute, just couldn’t get the stop it needed. West Virginia State grad transfer Charity Shears led the way with 14 points in her first game in a La Salle uniform, getting the start, while Amy Jacobs and Gabby Crawford added 10 each.

Click here for the full box score

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MBB: Iona 78, Penn 50
The Quakers’ men got off to a solid start against Iona, leading 17-11 a dozen minutes in, but then it was all downhill. The Gaels closed the half on a 23-4 run, extending that to a 31-4 stretch that spanned the halves, Rick Pitino’s group putting it out of reach before the midway point of the second half. The Quakers shot 3-of-25 from 3-point range, with Jordan Dingle (0-7), Clark Slajchert (0-6) and Jonah Charles (0-5) having a particularly rough night from deep; they also turned it over 18 times to just five by Iona, taking 18 fewer shots than their hosts. The only real bright spot was Max Lorca-Lloyd, who had his best collegiate game with nine points and 14 rebounds in 28 minutes. 

Click here for the full box score