Atlantic 10 Conference Basketball Fans

Temple vs Dayton Basketball Recap

Temple 49, Dayton 41

It's not just the fact that the Dayton Flyers are losing late in February. It's the way they're losing that's causing stomachs to churn in Southwestern Ohio.

A little over a week ago, Coach Brian Gregory's team lost focus late in regulation and coughed up an overtime loss at Saint Louis. This past Sunday, more last-minute turnovers contributed to a searing two-point setback against a ho-hum opponent from Duquesne University. On Wednesday night in Philadelphia, the Flyers got grounded in a distinctly different manner: They forgot how to shoot a basketball.

Seriously: UD got dumped by the Temple Owls at the Liacouras Center because the visitors from Ohio couldn't hit the ocean from the shore. Despite holding coach Fran Dunphy's Owls below 50 points and allowing Temple to shoot just 32 percent from the field, Dayton fell, and by eight points at that. The Flyers had to shoot the ball extremely poorly in order to lose in spite of A-plus defense against a team that's tied for the lead in the Atlantic 10.

Does 26 percent shooting qualify as poor enough?

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Yes indeed, Dayton went 15 for 57 from the field, making Temple's 17 of 53 stat line look positively pristine by comparison. The Owls struggled to a 19-point first half on 9-of-31 shooting, but because Gregory's group could only go 5 of 31 from the field, the Flyers took a six-point deficit - that's right, deficit - to the half against a Temple team that couldn't even score 20. It was that kind of an evening in the City of Brotherly Love, which needed to give some tender care to the rims that were serially abused throughout this 40-minute rock fight... a rock fight, it should be said, in which no one landed a solid blow until the very end, when a winner and loser had to be declared.

Few if any losses come at a great time, but for Dayton, this Wednesday letdown really increases the pressure on the Flyers to win the Atlantic 10 Tournament in two weeks. Dayton was looking great for the NCAA Tournament two weeks ago, but a losing binge to some sketchy teams made this tilt with Temple appreciably urgent. To now fall to the Owls - and not recoup the value lost in the twin setbacks to Saint Louis and Duquesne - makes the screws tighten in one very downcast locker room. Winning out over the remainder of the regular season is now a must, and quite frankly, the inability to make anything less than the Atlantic 10 Tournament's semifinal round would just about cook UD as an at-large team.

There's no margin for error in the world Dayton inhabits. Considering the fact that the Flyers missed so many shots by a considerable margin against Temple, it doesn't look as though the NCAA Tournament is going to be the late-March destination for a team that could be doing so much better.

By: Matt Zemek
A10-fans.com Staff Writer