Temple has struggled on both sides of the field all season, but the first half of its game against Pittsburgh looked as if it might be finally figuring out the solution. The Owls’ defense held the Panthers’ offense at bay while Temple’s offense kept pace to go into halftime tied at six.
The Panthers scored the first goal of the third quarter but Temple responded to tie the game at seven. The goal marked the fifth and final time the Owls leveled the score as Pitt pushed Temple just out of arm’s reach.
The Panthers tacked on three straight goals, their largest run of the game, in a four minute span and the Owls weren’t able to recover. Pitt held a four-goal lead with as many minutes remaining and Temple was only able to score one more time as it dropped its third straight game.
Temple (2-8, 0-1 American Athletic Conference) was outperformed by Pitt (6-5, 1-4 Atlantic Coastal Conference) in the second half to fall 13-10 on Tuesday afternoon at Howarth Field. This is the first time this season that the Owls have shot more times than their opponent.
“This was a game we were in right until the very end,” said head coach Bonnie Rosen. “This was probably the first game that we’ve played solidly for four quarters.”
It took the Panthers just two minutes to take the lead behind midfielder Paige Telatovich. She was given a free position shot and took advantage, getting the ball past Temple keeper Taylor Grollman. Owls’ attacker Erin King responded andleveled the game at one midway through the first quarter.
Pitt attacker Avery Moon erased Kings’ efforts and snatched the lead back two minutes later. Temple attacker Laura Conner sent her free position shot past Panthers’ keeper Molly Cain to knot the game at two to close out the first quarter.
Pitt midfielder Emily Coughlin had a free-position opportunity to give her team the first lead of the second quarter and she capitalized on it. The Panthers continued their momentum and doubled the lead two minutes later behind a goal from attacker Jenna Hendrickson.
King struck again for the Owls, beating Cain to put them right back into the game. However, the hope was short-lived as Telatovich scored her second goal of the day to push the lead back to two. Temple stayed in the attack mindset and midfielder Sabrina Martin grabbed a goal of her own to make it a one goal game at 5-4 with three minutes remaining in the first half. Temple added two more goals in the closing stages of the half, but Pitt countered to draw the game at six heading into halftime.
“Throughout the season, we’ve been able to take what the coaches have given us and build off of that and take charge of the plays that we have,” King said. “We need to look at what we did well during the game and building off of that, capitalizing off of the good things that we did this game.”
Both teams struggled offensively in the beginning of the second half but the Panthers were the ones to break out of their slump first. Midfielder Kaitlyn Giandonato took advantage of the free-position opportunity to give her team the 7-6 lead. Temple attacker Jenna Facciolli was awarded a free position of her own and found the back of the net to tie the game at seven.
Hendrickson notched a hat trick as she scored on the free position shot to break the tie. She didn’t stop there and followed up her own goal with another to give Pitt the 9-7 lead with six seconds left in the third quarter.
Coughlin snuck a shot past Grollman less than a minute into the fourth quarter for the Panthers’ 10th goal. Facciolli attempted to stop the game from getting too far out of reach and scored just 26 seconds later to end Pitt’s 3-0 run.
“We have a really strong defense, we played really well today and caused a lot of turnovers,” Grollman said. “We need to really look at their scout and lockdown their girls, one play at a time, one shot at a time and executing defensively so we can give the offense every opportunity possible.”
Martin notched her third goal of the game to cut the deficit to three with 58 seconds left in the game. The Owls spent the final minute desperately trying to pull off a quick upset but it was too little too late for the Owls.
Temple will conclude its brief homestand as it takes on East Carolina (2-5, 0-1 AAC) on March 29 at noon.
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