Reeling Owls drop fifth straight in 77-73 loss at FAU
Gavin Griffiths recovered from a six-week shooting slump Thursday night, but Temple couldn’t put together enough pieces around him to get what would have been a much-needed road win.
While Griffiths scored 20 points, grabbed a team-high seven rebounds, knocked down four threes and scored in double figures for the first time in more than a month, Temple got outrebounded by eight and produced just five bench points in a 77-73 loss at Florida Atlantic.
The Owls’ fifth-straight defeat dropped them to 15-13 overall and 7-8 in American Conference play. At the time the game ended Thursday night in Boca Raton, Temple found itself in ninth place in league play, ½ game behind Memphis and ½ game ahead of 10th-place North Texas.
The top 10 teams in the American advance to next month’s conference tournament in Birmingham, and the top six get a first-round bye. With three regular-season games left against Rice at home Sunday, at Tulane March 5 and at Tulsa March 8, the Owls currently sit just two games ahead of East Carolina and Rice, both of whom own 5-10 league records.
Now, a win over Rice Sunday at the Liacouras Center would go a long way for Temple in ensuring a trip to the conference tournament, but it’s been a disappointing fall for a team that was in a three-way tie for second place 19 days ago.
FAU (16-13, 8-8) did hold Griffiths to six second-half points after he shot 5-for-5 overall and 4-of-4 from three in the first half, but the junior wing guard produced his best scoring output since a 24-point game in a Jan. 7 win over ECU. Derrian Ford matched Griffiths’ 20 points and shot 8-for-8 from the free-throw line, and Aiden Tobiason scored 10 of his 19 points in the second half.
Beyond that trio, the remaining members of the roster were not good enough. Starting point guard Jordan Mason scored just six points on 3-of-11 shooting, and big men Jamai Felt and Babatunde Durodola combined for just five points and five rebounds. Durodola and freshman forward Ayuba Bryant (three) tallied Temple’s five bench points on a night when top reserve guard Masiah Gilyard went scoreless and attempted just one shot in seven minutes.
Meanwhile, FAU got 12 points from forward Xander Pintelon and 10 from guard Yohann Sissoko off the bench and a game-high 22 points from guard Kanaan Carlyle. The shorthanded Owls were playing without starting guards Devin Vanterpool and Isaiah Elohim, who combined for 19 points in FAU’s win at Temple back on Jan. 18.
Temple was up by 11 with 2:04 left in the first half before surrendering a 15-2 FAU run from there that stretched into the first 2:37 of the second half and left the Owls trailing by two.
After falling behind by 11 following two Sissoko foul shots with 9:50 to go, Temple used a 16-4 run over the next 8 minutes and 34 seconds to come all the way back and regain the lead on a Ford layup with 1:16 remaining.
From there, though, the Owls folded and didn’t score again.
Two Carlyle free throws with 50 seconds to go put the home Owls up for good at 74-73, and Temple responded with its sloppiest stretch of basketball at a critical time.
Going to his left 12 seconds later, Ford turned the ball over. Temple head coach Adam Fisher called for his players to foul after the turnover, but they didn’t converge in time, and the ball made its way to Amar Amkou, who scored on a layup and drew a foul from Ford with 24 seconds to go.
Amkou missed the foul shot, giving Temple a chance to tie the game and send it to overtime, but a missed Tobiason three with seven seconds to go and a Carlyle rebound sealed the Owls’ fifth consecutive loss.
