Temple Welcomes Tulsa To Town Wednesday Night
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Temple will look to bounce back from a heartbreaking overtime loss when they welcome Tulsa to the Liacouras Center on Wednesday night for an American Athletic Conference match-up.
The Owls (8-9 overall, 1-5 American) fell to Memphis on Saturday, 75-72, losing when Kareem Brewton Jr. hit a deep three-pointer after picking up a loose ball with just one second remaining in the extra session.
"We thought we had done enough on that last possession," Temple head coach Fran Dunphy tells KYW Newsradio. "We actually had a pretty good hand on the rebound [prior to the winning shot] that they then got a chance to [inbound] the ball. If we'd just held on to the ball, I think we'd have been okay. Then the last shot was just one of those great shots by a kid that just made a tough, tough play for himself. I thought we guarded it pretty well."
Temple has had more than its fair share of tough losses in conference play this season. Dunphy talks about dealing with that adversity.
"I think you just work at it," he says. "You're just continuing to do what you think is the right thing and to keep plugging through, try to stay as positive as you possibly can and hopefully the bad fortunes will change to good fortunes. So we're just going about our business, doing what we think is the right thing to do. The guys, their mindset has been great, I've been very appreciative of that."
Tulsa brings a 10-8 record into Wednesday night. After winning their first three conference games, the Golden Hurricane have dropped their last three. On Saturday, Tulsa lost to #7 Wichita State, 72-69.
"They've got a team that we have had difficulty against in the past [Temple is 1-6 all-time against Tulsa]," Dunphy says. "Their two top scorers are a young man [redshirt senior forward] Junior Etou [team high 15.9 ppg & 6.9 rpg] who is playing very, very well, and their point guard Sterling Taplin [12.3 ppg, team high 72 assists] is playing well, also."
Temple and Tulsa get underway at 6:00 p.m. on Wednesday night.
You can follow Matt on Twitter @MattLeonKYW.
