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Quenton DeCosey said he was up most of the night, unable to fall asleep.
Jaylen Bond said he played video games and ate, among other things, to keep his mind clear.
Head coach Fran Dunphy took a different approach, saying he paced around the empty concourse of the Liacouras Center rather than watch the show.
But after 24 hours of uncertainty following a lackluster loss to Connecticut in the semifinals of the AAC Tournament, the Owls can exhale. They’re heading back to the NCAA Tournament after a two-year absence (see story).
On Selection Sunday, Temple was revealed as a No. 10 seed in the South Region and found out it will face No. 7 seed Iowa in the first round on Friday at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn in the second game of the day.
“I didn’t know we were getting in and after what happened after last year, you have second thoughts going through your mind,” a relieved Dunphy said referring to last season’s experience when the Owls were similarly on the tournament bubble but ultimately left out of the dance.
“It’s a crazy day. When you don’t know if you’re in, it’s a crazy, crazy day. My stomach is still jumping.”
This will be Dunphy’s 16th time coaching a team in the NCAA Tournament and seventh at the reins of the Owls.
Overall, it’s Temple’s 32nd NCAA Tournament berth, and perhaps none with more anxiety attached to it than this one.
“Everybody was excited to hear our name called,” senior guard and leading scorer (15.6 points per game) DeCosey said. “We got left out the previous year. So it’s an amazing feeling. Everybody is just excited.”
“It’s a lot of excitement for me and my teammates just to hear our name called,” Bond, the team’s leading rebounder (8.3 per game), said. “Last year, we thought we had a good enough season. So we didn’t want to take anything for granted this year.
"We felt we had a good enough year and we're happy to get our names called."
The Owls, who finished 21-11 overall and were the AAC regular-season champs with a 14-4 conference record, found themselves sweating after bowing out of the conference tournament semis on Saturday.
That happened last season and the Owls, who finished with a better 23-10 record, were heartbroken on Selection Sunday when their name didn’t flash on the television screen.
But, as it turns out, Temple wound up being firmly in the field this year.
The NCAA released the overall seed listing on Sunday evening and the Owls checked in at No. 38, good enough to nab the 10 seed in the South, where tournament top seed Kansas is located and where the regional will take place in Louisville, Kentucky.
But now the attention turns to Friday’s opponent — No. 7 seed Iowa.
The Hawkeyes are coached by Philly native and Penn grad Fran McCaffery, whom Dunphy called a “good man and good friend.” They finished the season 21-11 and sixth in the Big Ten with a 12-6 record. But it’s been a season of peaks and valleys for the Hawkeyes.
They started out hot, going 17-4 out of the gate and reaching the No. 3 spot in the AP Poll on Jan. 25. They were even ranked as high as No. 4 on Feb. 15. But things have come crashing down since.
Once pegged as a potential top seed in the NCAA Tournament, Iowa closed the season losing six of its last eight games, including losses to conference lightweights Penn State and Illinois, which finished with a combined 12-25 record in Big Ten play.
Iowa’s leading scorer is senior forward Jarrod Uthoff, who averages 18.9 points per game. The Hawkeyes also feature sophomore forward Dom Uhl, whom Temple recruited hard out of Point Pleasant High School in New Jersey but ultimately lost out on.
“I’ve seen them a number of times and I know they have good players,” Dunphy said of the Hawkeyes. “I know they have some really good talent. We’ll have our hands full."
The fact of the matter is that this draw really couldn’t have fallen any better for Temple.
The Owls avoided the First Four play-in games out in Dayton, Ohio, where many thought they were destined.
Instead, they find themselves heading to Brooklyn, the closest first-round site to Philadelphia, and facing an Iowa team that has gone downhill over the last four weeks.
"Brooklyn is great for our fans, our administration, our students, our team," Dunphy said. "I think it's terrific. We don't have to go very far. And we'll be able to hopefully get a lot of Temple fans there."
And, of course, potential Big 5 Armageddon is looming in the second round because if the Owls find a way past Iowa, the likely opponent is …
… blood-rival Villanova.
But the message echoing from the Liacouras Center was clear — the focus is steadily on Iowa and not what could go down next Sunday at the Barclays Center in the second round.
“We’re just going to take one game at a time,” DeCosey said. “We’re looking at Iowa first.”
“We haven’t thought a lot about Villanova being in our pod,” Dunphy said.
It’s a fun thing to think about, but much like Temple’s previous fate, far from uncertain.
If things go the way the Owls hope they do, we’ll talk more about that come Friday evening.