Temple University Athletics
Photo by: Joseph V. Labolito/Temple University
Temple in the NCAA Tournament, Day Four: Survive and Advance
3.23.13 | Men's Basketball
Photo Gallery (also shown below) l Press Conference Quotes
By Kami Mattioli, Owlsports.com columnist
DAYTON, Ohio -- Suspended high above the basket stanchion, the game clock wound down, precious moments fading away into what could have been the final moments of the Temple University men's basketball team's last game of the season.
A team that had once led by as many as 16 points, the Owls clung to a fragile three-point lead in the final seconds of last night's game against the No. 8 seeded North Carolina State Wolfpack.
In these brief flashes of time, tunnel vision takes over. There's a sudden hyper-awareness that ripples through each player on the court. A narrow focus blurs the edges of everything but what lies before him.
He's playing against the shot clock, against the defender in front of him. He's playing for that moment when everything he had hoped and worked and sweated for finally comes to fruition.
There's no time to think about what could have been.
There's just now.
On top by two points, with two seconds on the game clock, Senior Khalif Wyatt was at the charity stripe shooting two shots hoping to shoo away an early exit -- the invisible grim reaper at his back, scythe in hand breathing down his neck.
“It's those kind of moments that you say to yourself 'this can't be happening,'' head coach Fran Dunphy said of the frenzied final moments.
Wyatt stood at the line, sighed, cocked his right knee inwards into his traditional pigeon-toed stance -- in homage to his idol Allen Iverson -- as he had done so many times before and extended Temple's whirlwind season.
Said Dunphy of his star, who dropped 31 points en route to tying former Temple standout Mark Macon for the fifth-most points scored by an Owl in an NCAA Tournament appearance:
“He's certainly the guy you want on the foul line. He's got an extraordinary game, and we need him to have one right now. That's who we are as a group.”
“Just wanted to enjoy it for this moment,” Wyatt said, describing how it felt to help his team advance to the field of 32. “We were ready to play.”
“We had just enough to survive and move on,” Dunphy said.
With unselfish play, high intensity and the dominance to control the pace of the game, Temple bought itself another 48 hours in Dayton.
After the game, a reporter asked Dunphy if he had envisioned this particular group of guys having the ability to make it out of the first round of play in a tough East bracket.
He paused for a moment on the illuminated podium, contemplating the mechanics of his response.
“You're certainly always hopeful,” he began.
“I think we can be good. I wasn't sure how good we could be.
But we had some really good wins, and we played well in terms of being resilient. If we lost a game, we were okay the next time out. I give these five seniors a lot of credit for that.
That's a veteran group.”
A veteran group buoyed by youthful contributions off the bench, this is a Temple team with a ragtag assembly of various talents. It may be unorthodox, but it works.
And it works because they stand united under a shared motivation -- to survive and advance, to chase the shining moments that define careers and determine legacies.
They got their first whiff last night as the final buzzer sounded -- the grim reaper's scythe slicing through the arena and terminating NC State's season.
With the heat of University of Dayton's spotlights at their backs, the Temple Owls surged into the locker room content in knowing that in that particular moment, what could have been was a far worse fate than what actually was.
Photos by Joseph V. Labolito/Temple University
By Kami Mattioli, Owlsports.com columnist
DAYTON, Ohio -- Suspended high above the basket stanchion, the game clock wound down, precious moments fading away into what could have been the final moments of the Temple University men's basketball team's last game of the season.
A team that had once led by as many as 16 points, the Owls clung to a fragile three-point lead in the final seconds of last night's game against the No. 8 seeded North Carolina State Wolfpack.
In these brief flashes of time, tunnel vision takes over. There's a sudden hyper-awareness that ripples through each player on the court. A narrow focus blurs the edges of everything but what lies before him.
He's playing against the shot clock, against the defender in front of him. He's playing for that moment when everything he had hoped and worked and sweated for finally comes to fruition.
There's no time to think about what could have been.
There's just now.
On top by two points, with two seconds on the game clock, Senior Khalif Wyatt was at the charity stripe shooting two shots hoping to shoo away an early exit -- the invisible grim reaper at his back, scythe in hand breathing down his neck.
“It's those kind of moments that you say to yourself 'this can't be happening,'' head coach Fran Dunphy said of the frenzied final moments.
Wyatt stood at the line, sighed, cocked his right knee inwards into his traditional pigeon-toed stance -- in homage to his idol Allen Iverson -- as he had done so many times before and extended Temple's whirlwind season.
Said Dunphy of his star, who dropped 31 points en route to tying former Temple standout Mark Macon for the fifth-most points scored by an Owl in an NCAA Tournament appearance:
“He's certainly the guy you want on the foul line. He's got an extraordinary game, and we need him to have one right now. That's who we are as a group.”
“Just wanted to enjoy it for this moment,” Wyatt said, describing how it felt to help his team advance to the field of 32. “We were ready to play.”
“We had just enough to survive and move on,” Dunphy said.
With unselfish play, high intensity and the dominance to control the pace of the game, Temple bought itself another 48 hours in Dayton.
After the game, a reporter asked Dunphy if he had envisioned this particular group of guys having the ability to make it out of the first round of play in a tough East bracket.
He paused for a moment on the illuminated podium, contemplating the mechanics of his response.
“You're certainly always hopeful,” he began.
“I think we can be good. I wasn't sure how good we could be.
But we had some really good wins, and we played well in terms of being resilient. If we lost a game, we were okay the next time out. I give these five seniors a lot of credit for that.
That's a veteran group.”
A veteran group buoyed by youthful contributions off the bench, this is a Temple team with a ragtag assembly of various talents. It may be unorthodox, but it works.
And it works because they stand united under a shared motivation -- to survive and advance, to chase the shining moments that define careers and determine legacies.
They got their first whiff last night as the final buzzer sounded -- the grim reaper's scythe slicing through the arena and terminating NC State's season.
With the heat of University of Dayton's spotlights at their backs, the Temple Owls surged into the locker room content in knowing that in that particular moment, what could have been was a far worse fate than what actually was.
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Photos by Joseph V. Labolito/Temple University
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