The Guru Report: Temple Rally Falls Short in AAC Semis; Rider Takes MAAC Opener; Portland Upsets Gonzaga in WCC; Texas Captures Big 12

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

An encore battle of Owls after third-seeded Temple had beaten new American Athletic Conference members FAU and Rice during the season went the wrong way Tuesday night for the Philly contingent in the second meeting with 10^th-seeded Rice in the league semifinals at Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas.

A fortuitous run to Wednesday’s league championship, the round with an automatic bid to the NCAA field of 68, was short-circuited by the Houston delegation 60-57 who now will face defending champion East Carolina (19-13), who completed a remarkable run in the earlier semifinal edging fourth-seeded UTSA 55-54, the Pirates’ third upset after starting play as a ninth seed.

How much may have been a toll taken on Temple (20-11) from the triple overtime win over Tulane on Monday in the last game of the day considering the 22 turnovers against Rice (18-14) is hard to say, though the losing Owls had a full day to recover off the 9:30 p.m. start.

Unlike earlier times when facing an onslaught from former member UConn in league play, Temple managed to rally from a 13-point deficit under the five-minute mark of the third period to spur hope rallying to within a point with 6:14 left in regulation.

Malia Fisher had 17 points for Rice while Destiny Jackson scored 16.

Trailing by a basket with with 4.1 seconds left, Temple had possession but was denied a chance to tie when Fisher stole an inbounds pass.

Demi Washington had 19 points and six rebounds for Temple, also plagued by foul difficulty, while Tiarra East had 10 points and eight rebounds.

With none of the top four seeds in the AAC final or likely to be picked up as an at-large NCAA participant, it creates a crowd out of the conference for selections to the new NCAA-organized 32-team WBIT or 48-team WNIT, though Temple was the hottest team down the stretch and perhaps the program-tying best nine win improvement may count for something.

Rider Takes MAAC Opener

Down in Atlantic City at Boardwalk Hall, eighth-seeded Rider (10-20) beat ninth-seeded Iona 66-56, the Gaels ending their season at 11-19.

“That was a complete team effort on both sides of the ball pretty close to 40 minutes, and that is something that we’ve been talking about and working on,” said Rider coach Lynn Milligan. “We’re really proud of how we did it.

“It was clear today that we were really locked in on what we needed to do. We felt like if we were able to carry out our game plan for 40 minutes that we would be able to have another opportunity to play.”

Taylor Langan and Sanaa Redmond each scored 13 points for the Broncs, while Molly Lynch and Mariona Cos-Morales each scored 10.

The unfortunate prize for the win, however, is a 1 p.m. date in the quarterfinals against top seed and No. 25 Fairfield (28-1), who just whipped Rider at home Saturday in the last game of the regular season.

The Stags have been the hottest team in the country behind No. South Carolina (32-0), but need to win the MAAC to earn a trip to the NCAAs.

In the second wave of conference tourneys leading to Selection Sunday (8 p.m., ESPN), Fairfield and No. 21 UNLV (29-2), which meets San Diego State (22-12) for the Mountain West title 10:30 p.m. Wednesday night (CBSSN), are the last two ranked teams in action, though Princeton hopes to squeeze back into the final poll of the season by winning another Ivy title this weekend at Columbia.

The Tigers meet Penn at 4:30 p.m. Friday before Columbia plays Harvard at 7:30 in the semifinals.

With the departure of Dayna Smith from Cornell, Penn’s Mike McLaughlin is now the dean Ivy coaches while Cindy Griffin is the Big Five and Atlantic Ten dean.

Fairfield is coached by Carly Thibault-DuDonis, the daughter of WNBA Washington Mystics general manager Mike Thibault, who retired from the coaching sidelines now guided by his son Eric.

Longhorns Claim Big 12

No. 5 Texas cruised over Iowa State 70-53 to win the Big 12 in Kansas City and stay in the conversation for a No. 1 NCAA seed, where No. 1 South Carolina and No. 2 Iowa are considered locks, while Pac-12 tourney champ No. 3 Southern Cal and regular season winner Stanford are also considered to be contenders.

Stanford’s Cameron Brink announced she will shed her extra year of eligibility and head to the WNBA, where she is expected to be a lottery pick in next month’s draft.

The Longhorns (30-4) and regular season champion Oklahoma are headed to the Southeastern Conference while Stanford is ACC bound and USC with UCLA are headed to the Big Ten, part of the major realignment coming this summer that will leave the PAC-12 in name just for the football programs of Oregon State and Washington State.

The other sports from the latter two schools will compete in the West Coast Conference, which had a bid steal occur Tuesday when Portland for the second straight year upset No. 14 Gonzaga 67-66 in the title game in Las Vegas, perhaps costing the Zags (30-3) a Top 16 hosting slot for the NCAA opening weekend.

In the Texas win, rookie Madison Booker scored 26, continuing the remarkable story of rescuing the team moving from forward to point guard several months ago when all-America Rory Harmon was injured. 

Other titles claimed Tuesday were by second seeded Green Bay over top seeded Cleveland State in the Horizon League and top-seeded South Dakota State in the Summit League.

 And that’s the report.