Temple drops second straight in 63-55 road loss to Ole Miss, takes share of Big 5 title

In its first game in a week, Temple fell, 63-55, at Mississippi. With the Dec. 10 loss to Penn and Villanova’s win over Saint Joseph’s on Saturday, Temple will share the Big 5 title with the Wildcats.

The Owls (6-6) were without sophomore center Jamille Reynolds as he recovers from a right thumb surgery that will sideline him for 6-8 weeks. Additionally, Temple was outrebounded, 46-34, by the Rebels (8-3). With the loss, all signs point to Temple needing an automatic bid if it hopes to make the 2023 NCAA Tournament.

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Damian Dunn (16 points) and Khalif Battle (15) combined for 31 points on 9-of-30 shooting. Sophomore point guard Hysier Miller led the game in assists with five.

For Ole Miss, junior guard Matthew Murrell led all scorers with 21 points. Senior forward Myles Burns led the game in rebounds with 12. Senior forwards Jayveous McKinnis and Theo Akwuba had three blocks each.

In Reynolds’ absence, Temple was forced to rely on graduate transfer Kur Jongkuch and sophomore Emmanuel Okpomo — who was making his season debut.

Temple also didn’t have a go-to scorer on the block, so the Owls had to rely on winning isolation matchups to get easy looks at the rim. Reynolds also forces teams to help down and leave shooters open on the perimeter. On Saturday, that didn’t happen, and the Owls settled for contested jumpers, shooting 20.8% from three.

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Temple also struggled to protect the paint on Saturday, allowing 32 points inside to the Rebels. It wasn’t able to go small at the center with sophomore Nick Jourdain because of the size of Ole Miss’ frontcourt. It prevented the Owls from spacing the floor and running a more up-tempo offense throughout the night as Temple finished with zero fast-break points.

Neither team was able to score efficiently as they shot a combined 34% from the field.

Temple forced six turnovers in the first eight minutes of the game, turning those into 11 points to take an 11-6 lead at the 12:08 mark of the first half heading into a media timeout.

After the third media timeout of the first half, Ole Miss used a three-minute Temple scoring drought to go on a 6-0 run to cut the deficit to 17-15.

With less than 14 minutes remaining in the second half, Ole Miss made three straight field goals to tie the game, 35-35, and force a Temple timeout. The Rebels then took a 38-37 lead 40 seconds later for its first lead since both teams were still scoring in single digits.

The Rebels went on an 8-0 run that lasted nearly three minutes to go up by six after the third media timeout of the second half. Temple had missed nine of its last 10 field goals at that point, allowing Ole Miss to secure its eighth win of the season.

Temple returns Tuesday to the Liacouras Center to wrap up nonconference play against Maryland Eastern Shore (7 p.m., ESPN+). The Owls beat the Hawks, 72-49, in Temple’s 2021 season opener. The Hawks (3-7) currently are 0-7 on the road in 2022.