Late free throws lift Temple past UCF, 62-55, for first AAC win
It took four-and-a-half games, but Temple really looked like a team that knew how to play together Thursday afternoon while collecting its first win in conference play.
The Owls defeated a reeling UCF team 62-55 at the Liacouras Center thanks to a few clutch free throws down the stretch and some heady defense when it mattered most.
True freshman Jeremiah Williams drained a pair, pushing him to 12 points on the day, complemented by four assists and three rebounds. Redshirt freshman Damian Dunn put home the next pair to ice the game to bring his tally to a game-high 20 points.
Temple (2-3) and UCF (3-4) individually account for the two fewest games played of any team in the American Athletic Conference. Both teams have dealt with COVID-related pauses, cancellations and postponements.
And both teams played like it through much of the first half.
“We didn’t play connected in the first half and I was pretty upset,” Temple head coach Aaron McKie said following the game. “We didn’t share it and when we got out there we were just a step slow. We had careless turnovers and they were getting out in transition and getting easy baskets. ... I was upset with that and I just thought we needed to put together a better second half.”
McKie added that he told his team in the locker room that the Knights looked too comfortable on the floor and gained confidence off of Temple’s mistakes. By mistakes, he was referring to the 14 first-half turnovers and letting up five offensive rebounds.
There was a clear shift in momentum early in the second half following a Williams steal that led to a herculean breakaway dunk from senior captain De’Vondre Perry. From there, the Owls seemed to play more cohesively by sharing the ball while having a better sense of where guys were on the floor.
Fellow senior captain J.P. Moorman II said when the Owls started getting stops and making plays in transition, they “just started having fun.” He added that sharing the ball was a major deciding factor in the win, and that is the most fun part of basketball.
Moorman knocked down a triple and had three assists, but his biggest impact came on the glass, where he notched a career-high 13 rebounds.
Perry was a crucial part of Temple’s second-half push that had the Owls leading by 10 at one point. All 10 of his points came in the second half and provided a spark to keep the Owls in front.
“He’s always super crucial for us because of his versatility,” Moorman said. “His ability to knock down shots, his ability to get to the rim, he does it all for us. He did a great job knocking down shots and staying ready. I told him at halftime to just keep shooting.”
In addition to Temple's offensive resurgence in the second half, they stepped up defensively as well.
Staying in front at that end of the floor and being able to play team-oriented defense made all the difference in the win. The Knights shot 19-for-58 from the field and much of that can be credited to Temple's defensive efforts.
While Darin Green Jr. and Isaiah Adams led UCF with 17 points apiece, Temple held UCF's leading scorer Brandon Mahan to just four points on 1-of-9 shooting.
"Our plan [defensively] was the same as our plan from the first game of the season," Dunn said. "Just continuing to try and get after guys and trying to create chaos on the defensive end. It just comes with trust."
In a normal year, a back-and-forth game like this one would elicit a raucous crowd creating an intense atmosphere down the stretch. With no fans in the stands, that wasn’t the case.
“We practice with a lot of silence," McKie said. "At the end of our practice, everybody is dead quiet, no balls are bouncing everybody is shooting free throws. The game is the game. You still got to go out there and play but the one benefit of [having no fans in crunch time] is I can yell out there and talk to those guys while they’re out there.”
Temple will return to the court on Saturday against Tulane at 1 p.m. on ESPN+, the conference announced Thursday. The Owls were originally scheduled to play at ECU, but the game was postponed due to COVID related issues within ECU’s program.