Defeating a tough Temple squad to move on to their 10th straight Sweet 16. This one didn't get "comfortable" until the last 2 minutes, thanks in part to Temple's tremendous determination and hustle (they seemed to beat us to most of the loose balls and rebounds until the latter minutes, when they seemed to run out of gas), and in part to a clunky second half by the Blue Devils. Unfortunately, neither Ali nor Abby played well; in the second half, Abby in particular suffered a series of pretty bad turnovers, while Ali and Nish missed a lot of layups. Fortunately, Lindsey was on fire in the first half, and we got enough defense to compensate for the offensive lapses in the second. But I don't know if we can afford to have both Ali and Abby perform like this against the higher-seeded teams we'll soon be facing and escape again. OTOH, the team showed strength and poise and versatility when Temple made a run, which bodes well. Survive and advance!
Stray ~~~;~~;~