Temple and North Texas were picked to finish sixth and seventh, respectively, in the American Athletic Conference’s preseason poll conducted by the league’s head coaches back in October.

And so it is three months later that the Owls and the Mean Green will play Wednesday night at UNT’s Super Pit in Denton, Texas with identical 4-1 conference records and a chance to join UAB in first place if they win. ESPN+ will stream the game at 8 p.m. EST.

While Temple has turned things around with a three-game win streak that included last Thursday’s victory over then-No. 18 Memphis, UNT has also won its last three. And like the Owls, the Mean Green have yet to lose at home. They’re unbeaten in nine road games at the Super Pit, which has a seating capacity (10,500) similar to the Liacouras Center, although UNT has also struggled to draw at home with an average attendance of a little less than 3,000 in those nine home games.

Jamal Mashburn Jr., the American Athletic Conference’s Player of the Week, averaged 26.5 points, 4.5 rebounds and 3.0 assists in Temple’s wins over Memphis and Tulane, and he turned in arguably his finest game of the season Sunday against the Green Wave, pouring in a season-high 32 points on 12 of 16 shooting to go with four rebounds, two assists and a steal with just one turnover. He’s received solid supporting cast play from backcourt mates in starting point guard Quante Berry and top reserve guard Shane Dezonie, both of whom will be counted upon on the road this week if Temple wants to stay in first place.

Berry, one of the league’s most improved players, averaged 13.0 points, 5.0 rebounds and 2.5 assists in the wins over Memphis and Tulane, while Dezonie averaged 14.0 points and 8.0 rebounds in those two victories. Dezonie posted his second straight double-double, this one of 15 points and 13 rebounds, in the Memphis win, but the six turnovers he committed against Tulane are obviously something he’ll have to eliminate during the Owls’ two-game Texas road swing.

If Temple is without top reserve forward Elijah Gray at UNT and at UTSA Saturday, freshman forward Babatunde Durodola will have to avoid foul trouble and look for rebounding help from Dezonie and Steve Settle III and bench help from 7-foot-1 big man Mohammed Keita and potentially freshman forward Dillon Battie if Adam Fisher and the staff turn to him. Durodola had six points and six rebounds, including five on the offensive glass, against Tulane and fouled out against Memphis after collecting four points and two rebounds in 20 minutes.

So what’s been the secret to North Texas’ success? Defense and rebounding, along with a steadily-improving offense. While the Mean Green are scoring a league-low average of 69.4 points per game, they’re also to this point the conference’s best defensive team by a wide margin, holding opponents to a league-best 58.6 points per game. That mark, by the way, is also the fourth-best nationally, behind only Houston, Drake and Tennessee. UNT is also second in the American in rebounding margin at a 5.5 boards-per-game differential in the positive.

UNT’s season scoring average is a bit deceiving. In their five conference games, the Mean Green have averaged 1.2 points per possession, trailing only UAB in that statistical league category.

Checking into Wednesday night’s game with a 13-4 overall record and a NET ranking of 53, UNT built its three-game win streak with a home win over Rice (81-59) and road victories at East Carolina (69-60) and UTSA (72-57), and the Mean Green turned aside fellow first-place team UAB, 78-75, in their AAC opener back on New Year’s Eve. Guard Atin Wright, UNT’s leading scorer at 14.1 points per game, hit a three at the buzzer to win that game. Wright, who played his first three seasons at Cal State Northridge and last season at Drake before transferring to North Texas, is averaging 21.6 points per game and shooting almost 58% (15 of 26) from three-point range during his team’s current three-game winning streak.

Temple’s two biggest concerns in UNT’s frontcourt will be 6-9, 245-pound starting forward Moulaye Sissoko, the team’s leading rebounder at 5.8 boards per game, and 6-9, 215-pound reserve forward Brenen Lorient, who is averaging 12.1 points and 3.9 rebounds in 17 games, all of which have seen him come off the bench. After playing sparingly during two previous seasons at FAU, Lorient is averaging almost 24 minutes per game this season and has scored in double figures over the last four games, including a 13-point, seven-rebound performance in UNT’s win at UTSA. One of his better games of the season came in the Mean Green’s 68-64 loss at then-No. 21 Memphis in which he collected 18 points and three rebounds and shot 7-for-8 from the foul line.