Basketball: Temple With Some Down Time Before Home Opener
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The Temple Owls sit at 3-2 after a tough loss at Bowling Green on Sunday, 67-64 (see game story). Now they get a bit of an extended break from game action before returning to the court on Saturday for their home opener against Central Michigan at the Liacouras Center.
Temple head coach Fran Dunphy (in photo) says they can't dwell on the loss to the Falcons.
"We gotta move on," he tells KYW Newsradio. "We have another stretch of games here, with two MAC games (Central Michigan and Toledo), and then Villanova. So we've got our hands full here. So we gotta figure out a way to get better as we move on here."
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The Owls played that Bowling Green game without forward Michael Eric, who suffered a right patella injury during Friday's practice. Eric missed ten games last season when he fractured that same patella.
"We're going to have to sit down with the doctors this week," Dunphy says of Eric. "He had an MRI, so we'll have to go over that and just see what the nature of the injury is and how similar it is to his previous one, and with the doctor and trainer and Mike, just kind of come up with the best solution we can here."
Eric's absence opened the door for redshirt freshman forward Anthony Lee to make his first collegiate start against Bowling Green, and he responded with career highs of 11 points and nine rebounds.
Dunphy liked what he saw from the 6'9" Lee.
"Anthony is doing well -- he is certainly a light for us," Dunphy says. "I don't want to play him that many minutes (30), but if Mike is hurt, that's where he is going to find himself. He's doing well, he's very quick off his feet, still learning the game of course, not always in the right spots. But I think he has done a very, very good job for us to this point."
As for Saturday against Central Michigan, Dunphy says the 4-2 Chippewas will be a challenge.
"Their best player is the coach's son, (sophomore guard) Trey Zeigler. He's just a very, very good basketball player. They've had a good start to their season (4-2 record). A lot of similarities with many of the MAC teams -- well-coached, good players, and not a lot of people know how good these teams are. So it's where we find ourselves -- we're in for it. Then we'll go out to Toledo next week and it will be very similar game to what we saw with Bowling Green, so we're going to have to be ready to go."
Temple and Central Michigan tip off at 4:00pm on Saturday.
Reported by Matt Leon, KYW Newsradio 1060
