With seven minutes remaining in the fourth quarter, Knights’ junior guard Alisha Lewis converted a 3-pointer from the corner, capping off a 7-0 run giving the Knights a 55-25 lead.
Temple University women’s basketball (12-11, 7-5 The American Athletic Conference) fell to the University of Central Florida (20-3, 12-1 The American) 68-31 on Saturday afternoon at McGonigle Hall.
In their first meeting on Jan. 31, the Owls lost 64-55, despite leading by as much as 13 points early in the contest. Temple could not apply the same offensive pressure in its second matchup, with the loss marking the largest margin of defeat for the Owls this season.
“Our approach was much better last time we played them,” said head coach Tonya Cardoza. “Today it felt like there was a basketball game that we just happened to be playing in rather than going in there and fighting and we just rolled over right from the first quarter.”
After narrowly trailing for most of the first quarter, the Owls started to fall behind after being on the wrong side of a 10-2 run that pushed the deficit to 20-8 heading into the second quarter.
The Owls went into halftime down 12 points, but cut the deficit to 10 at the beginning of the third quarter after freshman forward Caranda Perea made a mid-range jumper on a second-chance opportunity.
The Knights responded by going on a 20-3 run that included two 3-pointers by Lewis, and was capped off by a pair of free throws from graduate Knights’ student forward Masseny Kaba.
Graduate student forward Mia Davis, the Owls’ top scorer this season, was held to just one point, the fewest amount she’s scored in a game since her freshman season.
“They did not let us find [Davis] at all today,” Cardoza said. “Whenever she caught the ball there was a second person there so anything that she tried to do was forced.”
The Owls shot a lackluster one for 12 from behind the 3-point line, and forced too many unwarranted shots once they started to fall behind, Cardoza added.
The Owls will look to bounce back when they travel to Houston, Texas, to take on the University of Houston (12-12, 5-7 The American) on Feb. 23 at 8 p.m.
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