Temple Basketball defeated Clemson to win the Charleston Classic over the past week. Are the Owls for real this season as an at-large contender?
Fran Dunphy and the University of Temple has started out the season 3-0 after beating Old Dominion, Auburn and Clemson to win the 2017 Charleston Classic tournament. The opponents may not have been the greatest in the world, but each posed a challenge that the Owls had to deal with.
There were similar feelings about this team last year when Temple beat Florida State and West Virginia, who were both ranked, during the NIT Tip-Off Tournament. The small Cinderella run of last year was unexpected, especially after losing at home against New Hampshire and on the road at UMass right before the event.
It was supposed to be a momentum builder for the rest of the season, but the Owls could never beat the teams ahead of them and lost bad games against Tulsa and East Carolina. The team ultimately finished 16-16 for the season, wasting those two earlier quality wins.
This upcoming season has a team looking for redemption, with three key players returning in Shizz Alston Jr, Quinton Rose, and Obi Enechionyia.
The trio was the primary reason for the two upsets last season, but their inconsistencies were the issues for the losses as well.
It’s been just the three games, but each has been very impressive in the title run. Alston is the lead scorer at 18.3 ppg, Rose is second with 16.3 ppg and 7.3 rpg, and arguably the most talented player, Enechionyia, is at 15.3 ppg and 7.3 rpg. The overall numbers will go down of course, but if these guys can stay on course, this could become one of the top trios in the American Athletic Conference.
Next: AAC rankings for 2017-18
Temple has all the pieces to have a good season: a quality coach in Dunphy, a couple of NBA prospects, and enough talent with experience to make a run at the top teams. Now it’s about winning the games they’re supposed to while getting some more top-notch resume wins. Let’s see if this year will be different from last.