As he sat up on the dais during his postgame press conference at the Daskalakis Center, Temple head coach Adam Fisher said on a couple of occasions that he knew Tuesday night’s Big 5 game at Drexel would be a one-possession game.
It didn’t have to be, but it was. And for the second time in five days, the Owls worked their way through some dicey late-game situations to squeeze out another win and remain undefeated.
Hysier Miller overcame a rough shooting night to lead Temple with 19 points, and the Owls committed just five turnovers and held Drexel’s best post player in check to churn out a 66-64 win over the Dragons, improving to 3-0 overall and 1-0 in Big 5 play.
“Man, that’s Big 5 basketball,” said Fisher, repeating the same words that past Philadelphia coaches have uttered countless times over the years. “We knew it was going to be a possession game. It’s just what it is, and we talked a lot about it. We take great pride in playing in the Big 5, and especially going on the road in the Big 5. It’s hard. It’s really hard to do."
Miller shot just 5 of 22 from the floor, 3 of 13 from three-point range, and committed four of Temple’s five turnovers as Drexel (1-2), playing in its first Big 5 home game, mixed in some pressure and some zone looks on defense, and Matteo Picarelli was the only other Temple to reach double-figure scoring with 11 points, six of which came at the free throw line.
At the other end of the floor, the Owls held Drexel’s best player, forward Amari Williams, to just eight points on 2 of 8 shooting after the 6-foot-10, 265-pound forward had averaged 17 points in the Dragons’ first two games. He was guarded for much of the night by Sam Hofman, a 6-5, 280-pound forward from Brussels, Belgium who transferred to Temple this summer from Houston Christian.
“We knew what type of player he is, what emphasis we put on him,” said Hofman, who gave up five inches to Williams in that matchup. “The coaches did a great job with the scouting report, and it was just a battle down there, trying to be physical and take away what he tries to do.”
Williams did try to be a hero in the closing seconds but came up short.
With Drexel down three with four seconds left, Dragons point guard Justin Moore went to the free throw line and made his first foul shot and missed the second. Williams made a move through the paint to grab the rebound and had a clear shot at a putback that would have tied the game and sent it to overtime, but he missed.
While Williams remained face down on the floor, Temple forward Steve Settle grabbed the rebound and dribbled out the last second to secure the win.
The Owls won despite shooting just 31 percent – 18 of 58 overall and just 8 of 26 from three-point range. Temple hasn’t won a game shooting 31 percent since last season’s signature win over then-No. 1 Houston for the program’s first win over a top-ranked team in almost 23 years.
Tuesday night’s win wasn’t as big as a road upset over a top-ranked team, but it was still big for a rookie head coach whose team is still learning to play and win together with a roster of six new players and one that lost four key contributors to the NCAA’s transfer portal.
In the new Big 5 format, Temple is in a pod with Drexel and La Salle. If the Owls beat the Explorers Wednesday, Nov. 29 at the Liacouras Center, they will play for the city series title in the inaugural Big 5 Classic on Saturday, Dec. 2 at the Wells Fargo Center.
Temple still has two home games ahead against Columbia this Saturday and next Wednesday at Ole Miss before it can refocus on contending for a Big 5 title in the new format, and there are still plenty of things to work on for a team with three new starters.
Drexel jumped out to a 10-3 lead and still led by five with 13:20 left in the half after a three by Lamar Oden Jr. before the Owls used an 11-0 run to gain control of the game with the help of an elbow jumper from Jahlil White, four points from Zion Stanford and five from Hofman, who had eight in the first half along with Picarelli.
Temple led by as many as 14 points in the first half at 32-18 after Picarelli drew a foul on a corner three-point attempt and knocked down all three foul shots. But with the help of switching to some 3-2 zone looks and a more aggressive approach on the offensive end in the last two minutes of the first half, Drexel used a 7-0 run to slice Temple’s lead to 32-25 at halftime.
The Dragons seemingly had their biggest advantage heading into the game with Williams in the post, but he got his four first-half points at the foul line and missed all five of his attempts from the floor. The Dragons at one point were shooting just 1 of 12 from inside the three-point arc and 5 of 23 overall before their run at the end of the first half got them back in the game.
“Just communicating, talking through our switches, picking up our pressure and then rebounding,” Miller said of Temple’s first-half defensive effort. “If we can rebound the ball after holding them to one shot, that finishes each possession.”
The Owls never trailed in the second half and led by as many as 10 with 5:50 left after Settle scored on a transition layup off a Jordan Riley steal. They still led by eight with 59 seconds left after a pair of Miller free throws and by six after Settle knocked down two foul shots with 24 seconds to go.
Things officially got too close for comfort for Temple when Hofman got whistled for a foul on Moore as he scored on a layup with 19 seconds to go and Moore hit the free throw to complete the three-point play to make it a 64-61 game. Then a bad pass from Miller off Moore’s three-point play gave Drexel the ball again.
Out of a timeout, Williams got the ball to a cutting Oden for a layup, and things got really interesting at 64-63 with 7.9 seconds left. A little more than a second later, Miller was fouled, rattled home his first free throw and drained the second to push Temple’s lead out to 66-63.
Then came Moore’s free throw, the miss, and the putback attempt from Williams that failed and sent Temple into a celebration.
The Owls survived a 20-point game from Drexel guard Luke House, who shot 7 of 13 overall and 4 of 6 from three-point range. Moore, the son of former Temple point guard Malik Moore, added 18 points and four assists as the only other Drexel player in double figures.
When Miller was asked what it means to be 3-0, he tried not to make too much of the Owls’ first three games.
“If I’m being honest, nothing,” Miller said.
“But,” he added, “it’s a great feeling because we know that we’re rolling right now. We’ve got three out of the way and three tough games so far. Just trying to shift our focus to the fourth and put this behind us, but it’s a good feeling to have. Nobody wants to lose any games early. Just trying to ride this streak as long as we can.”
When asked the same question, Fisher talked about a one-game approach.
“It’s so cliché … but it’s just one game,” Fisher said. “We just talk about, what do we need to do for this one, and don’t worry about it. We tell our guys all the time, you get 31 opportunities. This is the only chance team 128 gets, so now there’s three gone. Can’t get them back. We can learn from them, but now we’ve got to move on to the next one.
“So it’s kind of that mentality we’ve had all season. We did it in the offseason. Same thing. Just take that practice. Worry about that practice. Don’t worry about two days from now, and live in the moment.”
Putbacks: Tuesday night’s game was Temple’s first at the Daskalakis Center since 1985. …. The last time the Owls committed just five turnovers in a game was back in 2015. … After a slow start, Georgetown transfer Jordan Riley hit two big buckets – a driving layup and a line-drive three-pointer that just beat the shot-clock buzzer – in the second half. Those were his only points of the game, but they were critical in helping Temple get a 10-point second-half lead.
