The Guru Report: Green Wave Swamp Temple While St. Joe/La Salle Open Away in A-10

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

Way down yonder in New Orleans it was not the land of the dreamy scenes for the Temple women’s team who dropped their fourth straight game, this one at 53-50 to end the regular season helping Tulane snap a seven-game losing streak in the American Athletic Conference.

While there were a series of lead changes in the final quarter, not to be confused with the nearby French quarter, it was the third quarter when the Owls (15-14, 7-9 AAC) literary got swamped by the Green Wave (13-15 8-7) via 17-4 surge.

Thus, in a month’s time, Temple has slumped from contending for a bye in this weekend’s conference tournament up at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville to landing the eighth seed.

Meanwhile, how’s this for potential bookends?

The Owls will open play Friday afternoon against 9^th seed ECU at 2 p.m.

And if you think they’ve seen the last of UConn,barring non-conference play in the future, after opening the AAC season with the Huskies way back in mid-November as a favor to the schedulers for the move up, the answer is not necessarily so.

Should Temple prevail, the Huskies, who completed a lifetime regular season of conference perfection against South Florida Monday night after returning to the Top 5 in the AP Poll earlier in the day, will be there waiting on Saturday afternoon holding a bye as the No. 1 seed.

Thus, an interesting storyline with Temple coach Tonya Cardoza going up against her former boss for 14 years on Geno Auriemma’s staff.

Unfortunately, this blockade deprives the Owls of going a little deeper in the field to pick up some extra wins to land a WNIT bid.

But the matchup does offer some storylines if It happens, consider this is the farewell weekend for UConn after never losing a game in the seven years since becoming a charter member of the conference.

It’s also likely the last of the American where the event has been held but not the last of UConn at this time of year since there is a strong sense that the Big East will pick up the baton and move from its past Chicago home hosting the women’s tournament for most of the same amount of time.

Both contracts are up after this year with the landlords hosting the two tournaments.

Meanwhile, as for the stats off the Tulane game, the Owls had an 11-point lead, 35-24, before the Green Wave flipped the control with a 29-15 second half.

Mia Davis had 13 points and six rebounds for the visitors while Marissa Mackins scored 12 points.

Speaking of quarters, at least Temple will have the memorable fourth quarter back in January to wrest control from Penn and earn a share of the Philadelphia Big Five title with Villanova.

The Postseason Look from Sunday’s Action – Upside for Rutgers, Drexel, and a Mixed Bag for Villanova

Since there was no Guru report off Sunday’s action, with only five teams playing from the local group – Temple was the only one Monday – here’s what went down.

After getting decimated by preseason favorite JMU Friday night to bring the Colonial Athletic Association back to a dead heat, Drexel took care of business at Towson in suburban Baltimore with a 63-60 victory in SECU Arena to complete a sweep of the Tigers (14-13, 9-7).

So if the Dragons (21-7, 14-2) finish off the regular season with a winning  trot Thursday night at 7 over UNCW in the Daskalakis Athletic Center and less then 48 hours later in the same venue pay back Charleston for that CAA seasoning-open upset, which is also at the DAC on Saturday afternoon, if still deadlocked with JMU they will have the tiebreak for the top seed because the Dukes split with Towson during the season.

Of course, there are other permutations to get to the tie or even win outright or not, but for the moment that is the easiest path.

Sweeping Towson had its own sweet reward for Drexel after the Tigers rallying in the last five minutes in the CAA title game last season to beat the Dragons at Delaware.

But understand the reality. speaking of the postseason, which in the case of the CAA will be at Elon near Greensboro in North Carolina, that being a one or a two makes little difference. 

In all likelihood, Drexel will have to deal with James Madison one more time, though stranger things have happened.

As for Sunday’s game, Bailey Greenberg had 20 points for the visitors, while Keishana Washington scored 12, including a game-saving layup after Towson had come within a point in the closing minute.

Meanwhile, Delaware came close to doing Drexel a favor, extending James Madison down in Harrisonburg, Va., until the home folks prevailed 69-64.

It was the last ever game in the JMU Convocation Center, soon to be replaced by a new venue.

Delaware (10-17, 6-10 CAA), which is in a three-way tie for seventh, jumped to a 13-4 lead but the Dukes (23-4, 14-2) righted their own ship and moved out to a 14-point advantage in the fourth.

The Blue Hens then roused with some fight getting within five but that was all time allowed.

Nicole Enabosi had 24 points for the Blue Hens to move into third place on the all-time program scoring charts with 1,639 in her career.

Samon DeFrese scored 10 and Jasmine Dickey grabbed a game-high 12 rebounds.

 Delaware, as Drexel’s travel partner, runs the same schedule in reverse so the Blue Hens will be home in the Bob Carpenter Center Thursday hosting Charleston and then on Friday UNCW.

 Up in New England, Harry Perretta guided his last regular season game in his 42^nd year with Villanova, and the Wildcats made good with a 74-63 win over Providence in a Big East game.

One could say ‘Nova (17-12, 11-7 Big East) came a long way from back in November when the ‘Cats launched with an 0-3 start right after Perretta announced this would be his last season.

The result locked the visitors into a five-way tie for third and when the smoke cleared after the Big East mathematicians did their work without help from NFL types, Villanova became the loser but maybe a winner being dropped into the seventh slot.

Thus, it’s one extra game to start the Big East on Friday at DePaul’s Wintrust Arena in Chicago. 

But it’s a winnable game and may lead to a few more so it seems like at worst Perretta will be back with an encore playing a game or two in the WNIT or maybe some miracle happens and, well, you know.

 In Sunday’s win against the Friars (12-18, 3-15), ‘Nova had to rally from a 14-point deficit.

Senior Mary Gedaka scored 26 points and tied a career-high with 16 rebounds. Bridget Herlihy scored 14, and freshman Maddy Siegrist tied that number.

Gedaka became the eighth player to reach 1,500 points on the Main Line and slipped past recent grad Adriana Hahn into seventh with 1,523.

Perretta finished with 345 Big East wins joining a prestigious men’s and women’s crowd of Syracuse men’s coach Jim Boheim (416), UConn women’s coach Geno Auriemma (402), and former UConn men’s coach Jim Calhoun (309).

 Sunday was his 50^th win at the Friars’ Alumni Hall, whose court is named for the father of Villanova associate women’s coach Joe Mullaney Jr.

The other two D-1 locals in play were the Big Ten duo of Rutgers, where your Guru stopped by for senior day in Piscataway, N.J., and Penn State and the outcome was split.

The Scarlet Knights had a lead get away and get into overtime, but they recovered for a 78-74 upset of then-No. 18 Iowa (23-6, 14-4), one of the schools Hall of Fame coach C. Vivian Stringer brought to prominence, along with Cheyney, prior to arriving at the central New Jersey school.

Rutgers (21-8, 11-7) finished tied with Ohio State for fifth but gets the fifth seed off a head-to-head win over the Buckeyes and will get a first-round bye in the conference tournament in Indianapolis that begins later this week.

On Thursday afternoon at Bankers Life, the Scarlet Knights will meet the winner between Illinois and Wisconsin, who play in an opening round game Wednesday.

Stringer won 269 game with the Hawkeyes from 1983-1995 after leaving Cheyney in Philadelphia’s western suburbs. But being on the other bench when playing against them has been a hardship.

The win over Iowa was the first since 2006, predating the Scarlet Knights’ membership in the Big Ten and it stopped what had become an eight-game run by the Midwesterners in the series.

“That’s a great team we played, and we couldn’t be happier with the win,” said Stringer, also with an eye to landing a berth in the NCAA tournament. “It’s been a monkey on our back, so it was great to do what we needed to do today.

Arella Guirantes, Khadaizha Sanders, and Tekia Mack each scored 17 for the home team. Mael Gilles had 13 points and 11 rebounds. Jordan Wallace had 10 rebounds.

Iowa’s Kathleen Doyle, who had 14 points, behind Gabbie Marshall (22) and Monika Czinano (19) was named Big Ten player of the year on Monday.

On the other side of the aisle, Penn State fell at Michigan State 99-80 to finish at the bottom of the conference at 7-22 overall and 1-17 in the Big Ten.

The Lady Lions will open Wednesday with 11^th-seeded Minnesota (15-14, 5-13).

Kamaria McDaniel had 27 points for Penn State, including her 1,000^th career point, while Siyeh Frazier scored 20.

Looking Ahead: La Salle and Saint Joseph’s Open on the Road in the Atlantic 10.

Just two of the Guru group play Tuesday and as we go into overlap this week with some conferences finishing regular season while others get under way, Saint Joseph’s as the 14^th seed will be up at third-seeded Fordham in Rose Hill Gym in the Bronx.

It’s a quick return for the Hawks who finished the regular season with a loss to the Rams Saturday on the road.

La Salle will be at Davidson with a chance to atone for giving up a game at home to the Wildcats last week. The Explorers are the 10^th seed.

Small Colleges: CACC Quarterfinals Begin

Four locals who took all the four seeds from the South in Division II Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference will be playing Tuesday night against four North Division seeds in the quarterfinals.

USciences, the top seed from the South, will be going for its 20^th straight overall victory, hosting North 4 Nyack at 6 p.m. in Bobby Morgan Arena in Southwest Philadelphia, while second seed Holy Family will host North 3 Caldwell at 6 p.m. in Campus Center Gym in Northeast Philadelphia.

South 3 Jefferson, on a nine-game win streak, visits North 2 Dominican at 5:30 p.m., while South 4 Chestnut Hill visits No. 1 Post at 5:30 p.m.

The Semifinals are 12 p.m. and 2 p.m. Saturday with the championship Sunday at noon, both at USciences whether or not the Devils win.

The Chestnut Hill and Holy Family game winners from Tuesday are in one bracket, while USciences and Jefferson are in the other.

The NCAA Division III 64-team field was announced and there are some surprises. 

Rowan, which won the New Jersey Athletic Conference and was ranked second in the Atlantic Region, will be up at Amherst, which has become a national power, and will meet Merchant Marine on Friday and then the winner of Amherst and Framingham State.

Widener, picked as an at-large, will be up at Scranton, first playing Christopher Newport, and then if advances will meet either Scranton or Endicott.

Haverford, which won the Centennial, is going to Columbus, Ohio to play Baldwin Wallace, and if the Fords win, they meet either Chicago or La Roche.

And that’s the report.