The Blue Hens’ Cazmon Hayes drives to the basket against Temple on Sunday. He had a season-high 17 points and nine rounds in the game. (Submitted photo)
PHILADELPHIA — The Delaware men’s basketball team battled Temple for most of the way but eventually wore down as the Blue Hens suffered a 69-50 loss to the Owls Sunday at the Liacouras Center.
But the Blue Hens (2-2) suffered an even tougher loss when sophomore Chivarsky Corbett went down with a season-ending knee injury late in the first half.
That injury comes one game after Devonne Pinkard suffered a broken foot. Pinkard is expected to miss three to six weeks.
Junior Cazmon Hayes led the Hens with a season-high 17 points and a career-best nine rebounds, while senior Marvin King-Davis posted his third double-double of the season with 13 points and 10 boards. Kory Holden contributed eight points on the night, while Maurice Jeffers chipped in with six points and five boards.
Temple (2-3) got a season-high 16 points from Obi Enechionyia, while Jalen Bond added 11 points and Quenton DeCosey contributed 10 points and eight rebounds. The Hens dropped their 20th straight game to Temple dating to 1963
Delaware shot just 31.7 percent from the field during the contest, including only 3 of 18 from three-point range.
Delaware guard Kory Holden looks to get off a shot against the Owls.
However the Hens remained within striking distance for a majority of the game by limiting Temple to 40 percent shooting, and just 9 of 29 from behind the arc. The Hens also won the rebounding battle for the fourth consecutive game, 43-42, over the Owls.
“Chivarsky’s injury took a lot of wind out of our sails, but I thought we competed throughout the game before we got worn down at the end,” said Blue Hen coach Monté Ross .”We were able to outrebound them, we just couldn’t score enough points. At the half we wanted to regroup and I thought we did that, getting to within six early in the second half.”
Delaware hung tough with the Owls early on, and a three-point play by Holden capped an 8-2 run that knotted the game at 23-23 with 5:23 to play in the first half.
However the Blue Hens would not hit another field goal the rest of the period, as Temple closed the half with a 14-2 spurt to take a 37-25 advantage into the break.
Delaware scored eight of the first 10 points of the second half to pull within six, while a Hayes three-pointer with 14:52 remaining made it a 43-36 game. However the Blue Hens would not get closer, as consecutive three-pointers by Enechionyia put Temple up 56-41 and forced a UD timeout with 9:39 left.
Holden converted a three-point play and Skye Johnson found King-Davis for a dunk to make it a 10-point game at the 7:47 mark, but the Owls scored the next six points and weren’t threatened from there.
The Blue Hens are back home Tuesday to host Bradley at 7 p.m. at the Bob Carpenter Center. Sunday’s contest was the first of four games in an eight-day stretch for Delaware