Owls Crush Falcons

The foul taste of revenge on their lips like Satan's bile, the Temple Owls avenged last year's defeat at the Stroh in medieval fashion, with an 18 point smackdown of the Falcons (75-57) in a game that wasn't even that close.  With 3 minutes left, the Owls led by 29 before a wild scoring spree by walk on G Damarkeo Lyshe got the game to its final result.

That's a four game losing streak for the orange and brown.

There's not a tremendous amount to say.  With 9 minutes left in the first half, BG was on a mini-run and down 19-14.  In the next 9 minutes, Temple scored 20 and held BG to 11 and from there the rout was on.  Temple pushed the lead over 10 with 5:50 left and it never was closer again.  BG was never closer than 14 in the second half and never closer than 20 in the last 10 minutes until the very end.

College Basketball Stats

The key difference in the game was shooting.  BG shot 37.7% from the field for the game and 25% from beyond the arc.  BG shot 42% on its 2-FGs and the effective field goal % was 41% on the way to .86 points per possession.

This team is struggling badly to shoot the ball.  BG has shot under 40% in 5 of its last 7 games and has not shot 45% since the Detroit game.  BG has also shot under 30% from 3 in 5 of the last 7 games.

As you can see below, Temple had more success shooting the ball.  They scored 1.14 points per possession and shot 47% from the field and 42% from beyond the arc.  They took better care of the ball--though turnovers were not a big issue for BG either--were dominant on the boards and held an advantage getting to the line.

NCAA Basketball

For BG, A'uston Calhoun had a huge game, scoring 22 points on 9 of 17 shooting and he added 9 rebounds.  Cam Black had 6 points an 6 rebounds in 22 minutes.  Beyond that--and Mr. Lyshe, who had only 1 point coming into the game in his career--you had some serious issues scoring the ball.

BG's guards (Orr, Crawford, Kraus, Henderson and Clarke) shot a collective 6 of 28 (21%--that's on all FGs), 5 of 18 (28%) on 2-FG and 1-10 on 3FGs.

Richaun Holmes played only 15 minutes, scoring 4 points (2 for 4) with 3 rebounds and 3 blocks.

So, the Falcons get a break before they start MAC action against CMU up in Mt. Pleasant on January 9.  They will enter that on a four game losing streak--albeit, with 2 of those games against a team from a major conference and one of them against a team just outside the Top 25.  Having said that, I don't think we are much different from what we feared--a team that does not have the consistent ability to score and make shots and without the defensive prowess to win on solely a defensive platform.

Overall, they are 5 and 8 and 3 and 8 against D1 competition.  The CMU game will be a good test....yes, it is on the road, but they are not unbeatable.