Temple University Athletics
#21/24 Temple Falls To UMass, 77-71, in A10 Quarterfinals
3.9.12 | Men's Basketball, Tournament Central
Owls must now wait for at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament
Boxscore | Media Conference | Gallery | Transcript
ATLANTIC CITY, NJ - Nine days after a 90-88 overtime loss at the Liacouras Center, Massachusetts extracted its revenge on #21/24 Temple, posting a 77-71 win over the Owls in the Atlantic 10 Tournament quarterfinals Friday afternoon at Boardwalk Hall. It marked just the third time Temple has been eliminated in the quarterfinals, and the program's earliest exit since 2004.
"I would like to congratulate UMass," said Temple coach Fran Dunphy. "I thought they played well, I would like to congratulate Atlantic City and the Atlantic 10 for what would have been a good weekend for us in terms of sticking around for a few days but we didn't do a good enough job today."
The Minutemen (22-10), trailing 36-31 at the half, stormed out of the locker room, scoring the first 15 points of the second half to take a 46-36 lead before the first media timeout. Jesse Morgan, who had a game-high 21 points, scored seven in the stretch, including a three-pointer to ignite the run.
The Owls (24-7) recovered from that run with Ramone Moore (14 pts) and Juan Fernandez (12 pts) making threes on four consecutive possessions, three straight by Moore, to cut the deficit to five points, 55-50. The Cherry and White then went on an 11-2 run, capped by a Fernandez trey, to take a 61-57 lead with eight minutes to play.
UMass, which shot six-of-seven from long-range in the second half, answered with big threes from Chaz Williams, Morgan and Javorn Farrell, the latter two on consecutive possessions to give the Minutemen a 68-64 lead with 4:10 remaining.
Following a Rahlir Hollis-Jefferson (13 pts) free throw, Farrell dished to Sean Carter for a lay-up to expand the margin to five points, 70-65.
Temple cut it to three, 72-69, on a Hollis-Jefferson lay-up off a Moore feed with 1:41 on the clock, and following a turnover had a chance to tie. Fernandez, TU's second alltime three-point shooter, was off the mark on his three. The Owls got the ball back as it went out of bounds off UMass, but Morgan stole the ball from Moore, one of 22 Temple turnovers.
Williams made one free throw, to make it 73-69, with Khalif Wyatt cutting the margin to two, 73-71, on a basket with 28 seconds remaining.
Williams, who scored 21 points and dished a game-high 10 assists, drained two free throws and Morgan did the same to close out the upset for the Minutemen.
"It was a lot of mistakes down the stretch, a lot of turnovers, and those guys converted on the other end," Moore said. "I mean, in these tight games you've got to be perfect down the stretch and not make too many mistakes and that was our down fall tonight."
Wyatt, who did not start due to a "timing issue", led the Owls with 15 points. redshirt junior T.J. DiLeo made his first start of the season. Micheal Eric had a game-high 11 rebounds for Temple.
The Owls now must wait until Sunday's NCAA announcement of its 2012 Men's Basketball Championship bracket to see who their next opponent will be.
