Category Archives: Sports

Lacrosse: offense too much for Delaware Blue Hens

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Mark McHugh

The Temple News

 

Following a difficult road trip, the women’s lacrosse rebounded by beating Delaware, (2-7) 11-9, in a gritty comeback victory on Saturday, March 17.

Trailing by three early in the second half, the Owls (6-2) picked up the intensity and scored four unanswered goals to go ahead. Two more Delaware goals put Temple behind 9-8, but the last 12 minutes were dominated by the Owls, who sealed the deal with the final three scores of the game.

Junior midfielder Charlotte Swavola and senior midfielder Karly Cohen lead the way for Temple with three goals each, while senior midfielder Stephanie Markunas and junior midfielder Stephany Parcell provided key experience and leadership that fueled the second half comeback.

All year long, Markunas and Parcell have been instrumental in leading a the team whose mental toughness seems to set them apart, especially in hard fought games such as the one on Saturday.

“We never have the mentality of, ‘we’re down,’” Markunas said. “It’s always, ‘we’re going to win this game.’ Even if the score isn’t going our way at certain points, we still feel like we’re up.”

Markunas and Parcell are the core of what has become a tight-knit group of players, who all dedicate themselves to the common goal of winning an Atlantic Ten Championship.

“We, as a team, work so hard in the weight room and on and off the field and it shows in the game that we can come back from behind,” Parcell said.

The team-oriented nature of the group exhibits itself on the field, as well.

“Compared to other schools, we like to assist,” Markunas said. “We don’t depend on one-on-one’s. We can use our [personal] strengths but we can also work with each other.”

Saturday’s game was a prime example of the team’s unity and resilience, as they were forced to bounce back from a tough road trip, in which the Owls recorded their first two losses of the season, the most recent being a 20-3 pounding by No. 5 Florida.

“Coming off of two losses, we were really hungry for a win,” coach Bonnie Rosen said. “I’m really proud of the fact that we gritted it out to get a win.”

Despite the slip up in Florida, Rosen said she was confident that her players would rise to the occasion and earn a win when they really needed one.

“I really wasn’t worried about how we would respond to our two losses in Florida,” Rosen said.

“This is a really special team,” she added. “They have demonstrated resiliency day in and day out. They come out to practice ready the next day, regardless of win or lose.”

Although Saturday wasn’t the most efficient win for the Owls, Rosen said that she said she was pleased with the way her players found a way to win in a game that required both patience and tenacity.

The Owls’ next test is Tuesday, March 20 at home against Towson, the final matchup before opening up the A-10 schedule against St. Bonaventure.

Mark McHugh can be reached at mark.mchugh@temple.edu.

Baseball: Owls split doubleheader to Binghamton

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Tyler Sablich

The Temple News

 

In game one of Sunday, March 18’s twin bill against Binghamton, redshirt-senior Steve Nikorak pitched 5.1 innings, allowing only one run on five hits while striking out three in route to an Owls’ 2-1 game 1 doubleheader victory. The Owls would lose game 2, 13-5.

Standout freshman shortstop Nick Lustrino had a big day at the plate, going 3-3 while knocking in the tying run in the fifth inning. After leading off the sixth inning with a hit, senior catcher Taylor Juran scored the go-ahead run on an RBI base hit by junior infielder Henry Knabe. Red-shirt senior closer Brian Sustersic recorded his second save of the season with a 1-2-3 seventh inning.

Game two of the doubleheader saw a much different result for the Owls. The Bearcats came out with a vengeance and tallied 17 hits while crushing Temple 13-5.

Binghamton sophomore center fielder Bill Bereszniewicz went 2-6 at the plate with three RBI’s. He drove in the first run of the game in the top of the third with an RBI single and immediately swiped second. Bereszniewicz went on to score on an RBI double by senior first baseman Dave Ciocchi. Ciocchi, along with freshman Jake Thomas, had three hits a piece.

Senior starting pitcher Dan Moller went four innings, giving up four runs on six hits while punching out five and walking two. The southpaw escaped the first two innings unscathed before the Bearcats put up a three-spot in the third inning.

“I threw a lot of strikes that happened to find their bats,” Moller said. “They hit me pretty hard in the third but I settled down. Overall, I’m content with my outing.”

Freshman righty Eric Peterson relieved Moller in the fifth. After Juran cut the deficit to 4-1 with an RBI double that scored Lustrino in the bottom of the fourth, Peterson surrendered eight runs, five of which were earned, while giving up seven hits and walking another in 1.2 innings.

Moller’s counterpart, Binghamton’s sophomore hurler Jack Rogalla, picked up his first win of the season. Rogalla went six innings, allowing two runs on four hits while striking out four and walking one.

The game paused for a few minutes when Owls freshman reliever Ryan Kuehn was struck in the knee with a screaming line-drive off the bat of Ciocchi. Kuehn exited the game with a round of applause from the fans as he limped to the dugout.

The Owls went 3-1 on the weekend after playing four games in just three days. The team edged out St. Peter’s 3-1 on Friday before clobbering New York Tech on Saturday, March 17 with a final score of 17-1.

“Despite the second game against Binghamton, I think this was some of the best baseball we’ve played all year,” Wheeler said. “We got good starting pitching, timely hitting and played outstanding defense.”

After improving their record to 9-11 following the Big 5 Bash, the Owls will have one more tune-up game before they begin Atlantic Ten Conference play next weekend with a series in St. Louis.

“I just want us to continue to improve each day we’re out here,” Wheeler said. “We’ve started to find ways to win games instead of waiting around to lose them. Even with the A-10 season starting I don’t want us to approach things any differently.”

“The goal is to have teams fear coming to Ambler,” Moller added.

Before heading to St. Louis to begin A-10 play, Temple will take on La Salle Wednesday, March 21th in their second meeting of the season. The Explorers defeated the Owls 9-7 on March 13th.

Tyler Sablich can be reached at tyler.sablich@temple.edu.

HALFTIME UPDATE: Owls: 19, Bulls: 15

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The Owls lead, 19-15 at the half and the game began as expected with low-scoring and physical.

The Bulls struggled offensively at the half, shooting 11.1 percent from the field, going 3-27. Meanwhile the Owls had 14 fewer field goal attempts and went 5-for-13 (38-5 percent).

The score was 11-5 at the 10-minute mark of the first half, in favor of Temple and junior forward Rahlir Hollis-Jefferson led the squad with four points, two steals and a rebound.

Entering the game, the Owls were expecting to face a tough South Florida defense. The Bulls have been stingy all year and has been talked about lately, after coming off a win over California in the first round of the NCAA Tournament where they allowed 13 points in the first.

Junior guard Khalif Wyatt scored nine points at the half, which bested all scorers in the game. Wyatt added two rebounds, two steals, an assist and a block as well.

Redshirt-senior guard Ramone Moore senior failed to score in the half and senior guard Juan Fernandez recorded a single point. Both guards average 17.7 and 11.4 points per game, respectively, on the year and are statistically the Owls first and third-best scorers.

The Bulls are led by sophomore forward Victor Rudd Jr., who scored four points in the half. The Bulls’ defense has kept the game close with suffocating man-to-man coverage, as it recorded five steals and a block.

Redshirt-freshman forward Anthony Lee, sophomore Aaron Brown and senior guard T.J. DiLeo all saw action as reserves in the half and combined for two points.

March Madness: Temple MBB: Scouting the South Florida Bulls

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NASHVILLE, Tenn.—The Owls practiced for their allotted 40 minutes Thursday evening at the Bridgestone Arena in preparation for a second round NCAA Tournament match up with the play-in game winner South Florida Bulls.

Although the practice appeared to be nothing more than a typical pre-game shoot around, the fifth-seeded Owls made it evident during its press conference earlier on Thursday that they weren’t going to take the 12th-seeded Bulls lightly. The game will tip-off at 9:50 p.m on Friday (TNT broadcast).

Friday’s game will feature the Owls’ first meeting with the Bulls in program history, but coach Fran Dunphy told the media that he has been following South Florida’s play in the Big East Conference this season.

“I thought they were a really terrific defensive basketball team, who took care of the ball in pretty good fashion and great control of games; most teams played at their pace,” Dunphy said. “And then last night, obviously they defended very well, but they also made shots, and made a ton of them early and got a sizeable gap between they and California. I just thought they were on their game last night.”

Graduate center Micheal Eric said South Florida appears similar to an opponent that Temple faced earlier in the year at the 5 Hour Energy Puerto Rico Tip-Off.

“I think they remind me of Wichita St., [South Florida] has depth with the guards and scoring abilities from the wings” Eric said. “It’s going to be an interesting game.”

The Owls defeated Wichita St. in overtime, 78-74.

South Florida is led by 6-foot 10-inch senior forward Augustus Gilchrist who averages 9.6 points per game.

The Bulls have four other players who average at least eight points. Senior guard Hugh Robertson averages 6.7 points per game and is the team’s leader in field goal percentage at 52.7 percent.

Wyatt took several shots during the practice that looked like he was anticipating shooting over the length of the Bulls.

Temple will be facing a South Florida defense that shutdown California in the first round game on Wednesday night, as they went onto win 65-54. The Bulls held the Bears to 13 first half points and to 5-of-24 shooting.

“We’re going to have to move the ball, be patient and move without the ball too,” senior guard Juan Fernandez said. “And play as a team more than ever on offense, if we’re going to break them down.”

The Owls will look to make it two consecutive years in which they make it past the second round, as last year then-No. 7 Temple defeated No. 10 Penn State, 66-64 at Tucson, Ariz. in the NCAA Tournament. Temple’s run ended in 2011 when they lost to No. 2 San Diego State in double overtime, 71-64.

“This is our [seniors’] last go-around, as far as we’re going to make it, it would be great to make it to the Elite Eight.,” redshirt-senior guard Ramone Moore said. “But, we don’t want to try to look too far ahead.”

Men’s basketball will face South Florida in 2 Rd. of NCAA Tourney

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The men’s basketball found out its second round match up Wednesday night when South Florida defeated California, 65-54, in the play-in game at Dayton, Ohio.

The Bulls played stiff defense and limited the Bears to 5-of-24 shooting at halftime and began the second half with a 36-13 lead. On the year, South Florida has had just three games where its offense has scored more points at halftime.

Check back at www.temple-news.com for coverage of the men’s basketball team in Nashville, Tenn. Coverage begins at the team’s practice on Thursday, in preparation for the Owls’ Friday game at 9:50 p.m.

(Watch TNT for the nationally-televised broadcast of the game).

Nikorak leads Owls to win over Penn on the diamond

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Temple overcame a five-zero deficit after two innings to tie the game at seven in the eighth before prevailing,11-9, in the 11th innig to spoil Penn’s 2012 home debut.

By Scott Samuel David Weiss

 

UNIVERSITY CITY, Pa.- Following a disappointing 9-7 defeat at the hands of visiting LaSalle on Tuesday March 13, the Owls had fewer than 22 hours to regroup before their next Big Five showdown at Pennsylvania’s Meiklejohn Stadium on Wednesday, March 14.

 

 

Temple’s defeat by LaSalle had been the final game of a four-game homestand at Ambler’s Skip Wilson Field, in which the Owls outscored opponents, 29-28. Penn, which made its 2012 home debut in front of nearly 100 spectators, played eight consecutive road contests to begin this season, and they have been outscored 62-38.

 

 

After the Owls fell short in their comeback attempt against LaSalle a day before (in which Temple rallied trailing 8-0 to trailing 8-7), Temple had been bailed by a game-tying three-run sayonara by redshirt-senior third basemen Steve Nikorak in the bottom of the eighth to knot the score at seven.

 

 

The Owls and Quakers could not tally another run in their frames of the ninth, sending this Big Five contest to extra innings, where the visiting Owls prevailed against the host Quakers, 11-9, snapping a two-game skid.

 

 

The visiting Owls began the game with a fifth-pitch hit-by-pitch to Jordan Queja by Penn righty Connor Cuff to lead off the first. However, Cuff’s next three batters saw nine pitches, including strikeouts of Nikorak and Elijah Yarborough. In the bottom of the first, Owls righty Ryan Kuehn, making his first start of 2012, struggled after retiring Brandon Engelhardt on a right field flyout. Then, the Quakers’ Greg Zerback had been hit on his back on a cutter from Kuehn, and Spencer Branigan followed with a single.

 

 

There had been two on and one out with the count at two balls and two strikes when Quaker Ryan Dietrich, Penn’s leading hitter at .393, sent a screamer to deep left field onto the protection screen over the 365 mark for a three-run sayonara to put Penn leading 3-0. One more run crossed for the hosts on a Foster Dunigan Error, which had Derek Vigoa score from second for a Penn 4-0 advantage.

 

 

Connor Reilly’s one-out single in the Owls’ top of the second wiith one out  turned into a pickled when he was caught between second and third, and Matt Elko grounded out to second. Engelhardt walked, stole second, reached third on a Kuehn misthrow to first, and scored on a Zerback sacrifice fly for a 5-0 Quaker lead after two.

 

 

Temple nor Penn scored in the third, which included a one-two-three inning from Kuehn in the bottom half. First-year coach Ryan Wheeler saw his Owls find their groove off Cuff in the top of the fourth, receiving two runs on two hits, including an RBI double from Elko that brought in Reilly, cutting the Penn edge to 5-2. Kuehn allowed an infield single to Kyle Toomey in the bottom half, but Toomey had been caught stealing second to end the frame.

 

 

“Let’s stay up now and get in this game,” Wheeler yelled at his players while approaching the bottom half of the fourth.

 

 

Additional chances of trimming Penn’s lead in the top of the frame began with Dunigan walking, but Queja grounded into a five-six-three double play. Nick Lustrino drew the Owls’ second walk of the inning before Nikorak struck out swinging.

 

 

Entering the bottom of the fifth, Wheeler removed Kuehn after four innings of four hits, five runs (four earned), one walk, and one strikeout. Steve Visnic, a sidearm righty, replaced Kuehn and did not disappoint as Visnic yielded two hits without a run along with one walk and two strikeouts. Zebrack gave the Quakers a runner in scoring position in the fifth by smoking a double off the right field wall from a Visnic offering.

 

 

“Don’t you let much go in,” Wheeler yelled at Visnic after he yielded Zebrack’s double. “Find your pitch.”

 

 

The Owls had an opportunity to chase Penn’s lead in the top of the six as Matt Gotschall replaced Cuff. Cuff pitched five innings, allowing four hits, two runs (both earned), three walks, and five strikeouts. However,Gottschall had been relieved by Quaker lefty John Beasley after Gotschall yielded singles to Taylor Juran, who has hit safely in 15 of 16 games in 2012, and Matt Elko, and Gotschall loaded the bases by walking Jabir Kahn. Dunigan, seizing the opportunity to drive in Owls, grounded out to the second baseman.

 

 

Unlike the top of the sixth, the Owls drove in runners in the top of the seven to cut their defecit to 5-4, in which they faced three Penn relievers. Beasely threw two-thirds additionally, Stephen Selvestri could not record an out by allowing a two-RBI single to Juran, and Cody Thompson allowed a single to Reilly and walk to Elko to load the bases for Kahn.

 

 

Before Juran’s seventh-inning at-bat, Reilly told him, “All it takes is one bat.”

 

 

Khan had been the batter at the plate with the bases loaded and two outs, but he struck out on three pitches. The hosts extended their lead, 7-4, in the bottom of the seventh, with a two-run homerun by Branigan.

Penn held onto the lead for only half an inning before the homerun by Nikorak, which marked his first roundtripper of the season.

 

 

Penn(3-6,0-1 Big Five) had won the previous three meetings against the Owls(6-10, 1-1 Big Five). Also, the Quakers finished their 2011 home slate at Meiklejohn Stadium with nine victories against six defeats.

 

 

The Owls will have a day off to celebrate a rally that did not fall short before hosting St. Peters of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) at Skip Wilson Field on Friday March 16.

Scott Samuel David Weiss can be reached at scott.weiss@temple.edu.

 

March Madness: Men’s basketball earns No. 5 seed

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The Owls were selected as the No. 5 seed in the Midwest bracket and will play the winner of 12 seeds California and South Florida on Friday in Nashville, Tenn for the second round of the NCAA tournament.

North Carolina is the No. 1 seed in the Midwest and will play the winner of a first round game between 16 seeds Lamar and Vermont. The No. 2 seeded Kansas Jayhawks will face No. 15 Detroit.

The following matchups round out the Midwest bracket: No. 8 vs. No. 9 Alabama, No. 4 Michigan vs. No. 13 Ohio, No. 7 Saint Mary’s vs. No. 10 Purdue, No. 3 Georgetown vs. No. 14 Belmont and No. 6 San Diego State vs. No. 11 N.C. State.

The other No. 1 seeds in the tournament are Kentucky, Michigan St. and Syracuse.

Three other Atlantic Ten Conference teams earned a spot in the “Big Dance” including No. 9 seed St. Louis, No. 10 seed Xavier and the A-10 tournament champion No. 14 St. Bonaventure.

Drexel was one of the teams left out of the tournament along with Miami, Northwestern, Seton Hall, Mississippi State, Nevada and Washington.

No. 24 Temple loses to UMass, 77-71

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ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.–The Owls entered the Atlantic Ten Conference Tournament with the top seed and a No. 24 ranking, but the Massachusetts Minutemen played disruptive basketball as the eight-seeded underdogs.

The Minutemen (22-10, 10-7 A-10) trailed by five points at half, 36-31,  but came out in the second half on a 15-0 run in the first five minutes to take a 46-36 lead. Sophomore guard Jesse Morgan scored seven of those points during that stretch and finished with game-high 21 points.

The Owls’ loss marked just the second time in 20 games this season they lost after holding a lead at halftime.

Temple remained close down the stretch and reclaimed a lead with just under nine minutes remaining after redshirt-freshman forward  Anthony Lee knocked down two free throws to give the Owls a 58-57 advantage. Lee ended up with eight points, four rebounds and three blocks in the game.

Senior guard Juan Fernandez made a three-pointer to extend the Owls lead to four points–their largest lead of the half–after Lee blocked a shot attempt by UMass’ junior forward Terrell Vinson on the other end.

With five minutes remaining, UMass regained the lead at 65-64 and held on to win its first A-10 Tournament quarterfinal game since 2001.

Listen to post-game audio from UMass players, sophomore guard Chaz Williams, Morgan, redshirt-senior Sean Carter and coach Derek Kellogg, and Temple players, redshirt-senior guard Ramone Moore, Fernandez and coach Fran Dunphy.

Williams, Morgan, Carter, Kellogg

Moore, Fernandez, Dunphy

Check back with The Temple News later for a full game recap.

Owls lead by five points at half against UMass in A-10 quarterfinals

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TTN ABI REIMOLD

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.–The men’s basketball team is up five points, 36-31, to the eight-seeded Massachusetts Minutemen at halftime of the quarterfinals of the Atlantic Ten Conference Tournament.

Junior guard Khalif Wyatt started the game on the bench for the Owls, as redshirt-junior T.J. DiLeo spelled the Norristown High School product in the lineup.  Wyatt saw action with less than 10 minutes remaining in the first half and scored a game-high eight points off the bench.

No. 24 Temple is also led by multiple starters who have provided at the half, as the team shot 46.4 percent from the floor. Senior guard Juan Fernandez and junior forward Rhalif Hollis-Jefferson each scored six points and redshirt-senior guard Ramone Moore and graduate center Micheal Eric each added five points.

The two teams last met on Feb. 29 at the Liacouras Center, where the No. 23 Owls defeated the Minutemen in overtime, 90-88.

The Minutemen shot 37.5 percent as a team and are led offensively by redshirt-sophomore guard Chaz Williams and bench player redshirt-freshman forward Maxie Esho who each have seven points.  Williams scored a team-high 26 points last time the Minutemen played the Owls.

Check back on www.temple-news.com for post-game coverage.