George Washington University Athletics
George Washington University
No. 20/16 Temple
Men's Basketball Falls to No. 20/16 Temple, 70-57, in Regular-Season Finale
3/6/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
March 6, 2010
PHILADELPHIA, PA -- For the second straight game, George Washington junior Joseph Katuka led the Colonials with a team-high 13 points and 10 rebounds but it wasn't enough as No. 20/16 Temple outscored GW, 40-28 in the second half and coasted to the 70-57 victory Saturday at the Liacouras Center.
With the loss, the Colonials fall to 16-13, 6-10 in the A-10 and are in 10th place in the league standings. As the 10th seed, GW will travel to No. 7-seeded Dayton for the first-round game in the A-10 Tournament. The winner of that contest will advance to Atlantic City to meet the No. 2 seed on Friday, Mar. 12 at Boardwalk Hall. Dayton fell to the No. 7 seed after losing at home, 71-66, to Saint Louis Saturday night.
Temple (26-5, 14-2) had three players score in double figures led by Michael Eric's game-high 18 points on 7-9 shooting. Ryan Brooks added 14 in his final home game and Lavoy Allen chipped in with 12 points.
GW freshman Lasan Kromah added 12 points and senior Damian Hollis contributed 10 points for the Colonials who trailed, 30-29 at the half. The first half ended on a controversial play when the Owls' Ramone Moore shot a short jumper that was tipped back to him without touching the rim and he scored on the put-back as time expired. Officials were unable to review the play on video as it was a non-televised game and awarded the basket to Moore despite protests from the GW bench which maintained that time had expired before the ball left Moore's hands.
Temple opened the second half with an 11-2 run to take control of the game at 43-31 with 16 minutes left. The Owls clinched at least a share of the A-10 regular-season title with the victory. Temple's lead grew to as much as 15 at 70-55 on a jumper by Juan Fernandez with 1:43 left in the game.
GW's first-round game will take place on Tuesday, March 9 at the University of Dayton Arena. Game time to be announced. The GW-UD game will be broadcast live on 1500 AM and 820 AM and online at www.FederalNewsRadio.com.
