Relentless D puts quick end to Temple's Big Mo
DENVER -- On the cover of the Temple Owls postseason media guide, Dionte Christmas and Mark Tyndale pose with their hands encased in Everlast boxing gloves, their faces frozen in the type of sneer usually associated with boxing weigh-ins. It took only 40 minutes of Michigan State's feinting and grabbing to reduce them to a pair of glass chins.
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| An agitated Dionte Christmas has trouble finding room to work against Travis Walton. (AP) |
But the two Philly natives never got going in Temple's 72-61 loss to the Spartans in the first round of the South Region. Christmas, coming off an Atlantic 10 finale in which he scored 22 points on 8-of-14 shooting, including 5-of-8 from behind the arc, shot a wretched 1-for-12, missing all eight of his 3-point attempts. Dogged all game by Raymar Morgan and Travis Walton, Christmas didn't score until the 13:27 mark of the second half and finished with three points. He got to the line a single time.
It looked even worse than it reads. Christmas' off-target afternoon was most notable for the sheer variety of his misses: mid-range jumpers that nicked the bottom of the backboard, reckless drives wedged into the rim/backboard armpit, 3-pointers that sailed far wide of the hoop, as if blown astray by a stiff breeze. If it wasn't the least aesthetically pleasing day of his so-far extraordinary career, it had to rank near the bottom. Cue the inevitable and inexcusable "Blue Christmas" headlines.
"I just tried to press up on him a little bit, keep a hand in his face," Morgan said. "He's a great shooter."
Tyndale was slightly better in his tournament swan song, scoring 16 points on 6-for-14 shooting but with only four assists against three turnovers. His trademark on-court feistiness was largely absent, only bubbling up during a handful of exchanges with the refs and a single entanglement with Michigan State's Kalin Lucas. As Temple started to decompensate during a second half when they got no closer than within 10 points of the lead, Tyndale was uncharacteristically unable to rally the troops.
After the game, the pair seemed oddly indifferent, adopting a just-happy-to-be-here tone.
"(I) couldn't ask for anything better than this. They treat you like royalty, you know, (when you) make the tournament," Christmas said.
He credited the Spartans' defenders for helping each other out, especially during Temple's myriad attempts to free him behind the arc.
"Michigan State did a good job of just playing me tonight," he said with a shrug. "They took away the three, took away the drive. Like Coach (Fran Dunphy) said, we couldn't get into any sets. We had to depend on Mark coming down, making a lot of plays for us."
Tyndale didn't make nearly enough. Allen and sophomore Ryan Brooks (13 and 14 points, both on 5-of-8 shooting) provided the bulk of the Owls' offense, with the rest of the team shooting 29 percent from the field.
The senior chose instead to focus on the Owls' early-2008 evolution from afterthought to contender.
"(The last month) was great for the program," he said. "I think we worked very hard in the summertime leading up to this. We weren't surprised at all about the outcome of our season."
