Owls

It would take a mathematician to compute the odds against two teams from the same city reaching the Final Eight in National Collegiate Athletic Association basketball. Whatever the odds are, you can be sure they are astronomical. That's a full fourth of the best teams in the country coming from the same place. The odds against Temple and Villanova advancing all the way to the Final Four, of course, would be virtually unthinkable, if it weren't for some past history. By tomorrow - after surprising Villanova upsets Oklahoma and No. 1 Temple humbles Duke - the unthinkable will have occurred.

When you spend most of your life towering above your peers, the only thing you grow to expect is people looking up to you. Nearly everyone has looked up to Lavoy Allen since the day he decided to pick up a basketball 5 years ago as a freshman at Pennsbury High School. They weren't looking up to him just because he stood more than 6 inches taller than everyone else. They were looking up to him with high expectations on the basketball court. "I think that year had to be the hardest time of my life.

TEMPLE'S basketball program has received its third verbal commitment for the recruiting class of 2013. Mark Williams, a 6-8 power forward from Montrose Christian Academy in Maryland, who averaged 16 points and 11 rebounds as a senior, chose the Owls over scholarship offers from Vanderbilt and Kent State. He joins New Jersey guards Josh Brown (St. Anthony's in Jersey City) and Kyle Green (Camden Catholic), who gave coach Fran Dunphy their word last year. The Owls must replace five key seniors, including Atlantic 10 Player of the Year Khalif Wyatt, from a team that made the NCAA Tournament for the sixth straight season and lost to top-seeded Indiana in the third round.

Temple probably didn't have any business being in the NCAA Tournament in the first place. The Owls start two freshmen on the back line, a sophomore point guard who didn't play the position in high school, two junior anchors who sat out the first season as Proposition 48 casualties. They don't have much depth and lost their only two seniors some 10 weeks ago to injury and academics. Yet, the seventh-seeded Owls (18-12) are in the second round after dumping 10th-seeded Missouri, 75-61, last night in a West Regional opener.

John Chaney was right when he said his Owls didn't deserve to be ranked seventh in the nation before they had played their first game. They probably should have been rated higher. And after last night's impressive 73-59 win over No. 3 Kansas at Allen Field House, they figure to be. As opening statements go, it was quite a mouthful. The Owls seemed to pick up right where they left off last March, when they made a magical run in the NCAA Tournament and reached the Elite Eight.

After Temple escaped Saturday with a 28-27 victory over Bowling Green at Lincoln Financial Field, Owls coach Al Golden was asked if he would have preferred for the game to go into overtime with an extra-point kick by the Falcons. "In that instance, I probably would have preferred hitting the reset button and going into overtime," Golden said with a chuckle. Instead, the Falcons lined up for a two-point conversion with no time remaining. Temple defensive back Marquise Liverpool broke up a pass from quarterback Matt Schilz to wide receiver Kamar Jordan, and the Owls survived.

Temple's basketball team will open its Atlantic 10 season on Jan. 12 at Charlotte, one of the three conference teams the Owls play twice. Their conference home opener is Jan. 16 against defending champion Xavier. Temple also plays Saint Joseph's and Fordham twice. The Hawks visit the Liacouras Center on Jan. 26, and host the Owls at the Palestra on March 2. Temple and La Salle meet once, in the March 8 finale at the Gola Arena. The Owls open at Tennessee on Nov. 9 before heading to the eight-team Puerto Rico Tip-Off Classic, where they'll open against Providence.

Temple University has fired former Owls star Paul Palmer as a sideline reporter on its radio broadcast team for Temple football games. Palmer, a Temple Hall of Famer who holds the Owls' rushing record with 4,895 career yards, was in his fourth season in the role. Palmer worked Temple's game at Toledo last week. Although WPHT-AM (1210) carries Owls games live, the university coordinates and produces the radio broadcasts. The details surrounding Palmer's departure were unknown last night.

Temple basketball recruit Belefia Parks has achieved the necessary minimum score of 18 on his American College Test and is eligible to play for the Owls as a freshman. Parks, a 5-10 guard from Chicago's Simeon Vocational High School, averaged 20 points, 7 assists and 6 rebounds last season and was an all-city selection. He is expected to provide at least backup help for junior Vic Carstarphen at the point position this season. Parks, who signed a national letter of intent with the Owls in May, is described as a "streetwise, heady-type" player by Taylor Bell, who covered him for the Chicago Sun-Times.

Ten Temple Owls earned All-Mid-American Conference team honors for football, the league announced yesterday. Named to the first team were senior offensive lineman Pat Boyle, junior running back Bernard Pierce, senior tight end Evan Rodriguez and senior defensive end Adrian Robinson. It was the third straight year that Pierce and Robinson were named to the first team. Named to the second team were senior linebacker Tahir Whitehead and junior punter Brandon McManus. Third-team honorees were senior offensive lineman Wayne Tribue junior running back Matt Brown, senior defensive end Morkeith Brown and senior safety Kevin Kroboth.

Temple forward Rahlir Hollis-Jefferson was among 105 Owls student-athletes who graduated Thursday at the Liacouras Center. Hollis-Jefferson led Temple in blocks in his senior season and tied for first on the team in steals with guard Khalif Wyatt. He averaged 8.9 points, 6.1 rebounds and 3.4 assists in 33 games for the Owls. "For now, I want to focus on playing basketball for as long as I can," the former Chester High star said. "I'm still looking at options on where to go and where to play.

TEMPLE University last week said that it will stop pursuing plans to build a new 23,000-square-foot boathouse on the east bank of the Schuylkill. The university ran into problems because those plans came in direct conflict with a city ordinance to protect open space. That law prohibits acquiring public land without offering a replacement parcel of parkland in return, which Temple didn't do. Of course, in a city with tens of thousands of parcels of vacant land, some might find it ironic to have a law designed to protect open space.

It didn't take long for Wellington Zaza to leave his mark on the final day of the 119th Penn Relays. Running in just the second high school race Saturday, the Garnet Valley senior finished third in the boys' 400-meter hurdles championship with a time of 52.79 seconds. "It's beautiful because friends, family members, hometown - everybody's loving it," Zaza said. "I'm happy with the results. " A fast start in the first 200 meters put Zaza among the leaders for most of his heat.

TEMPLE'S basketball program has received its third verbal commitment for the recruiting class of 2013. Mark Williams, a 6-8 power forward from Montrose Christian Academy in Maryland, who averaged 16 points and 11 rebounds as a senior, chose the Owls over scholarship offers from Vanderbilt and Kent State. He joins New Jersey guards Josh Brown (St. Anthony's in Jersey City) and Kyle Green (Camden Catholic), who gave coach Fran Dunphy their word last year. The Owls must replace five key seniors, including Atlantic 10 Player of the Year Khalif Wyatt, from a team that made the NCAA Tournament for the sixth straight season and lost to top-seeded Indiana in the third round.

With Temple's quarterback position up for grabs this spring, an unexpected player is finding himself as a serious contender for the starting position. Connor Reilly, who has never thrown a single pass in a collegiate football game and spent last season listed fourth on the depth chart, has impressed head coach Matt Rhule this spring by stepping up and completing passes. Rhule said Reilly is thriving under his new "pro-style" offense. "I see a guy that can throw the football and deliver the football," Rhule said of Reilly's performance this spring.

When you score 33 in a win over Syracuse at Madison Square Garden, 26 at Kansas, 34 at Saint Joseph's, 30 in a win over VCU and 31 in an NCAA win over North Carolina State and another 31 in a close NCAA loss to No. 1 seed Indiana, you have had a season that will get you noticed. Those scoring numbers were the highlights of Khalif Wyatt's senior season at Temple so it was no surprise when it was announced Monday that Wyatt is the 2012-13 Big 5 Player of the Year. Wyatt is joined on the first team by La Salle's Ramon Galloway and Tyreek Duren.

Lauren Fortunato is not a fan of diving. The Agnes Irwin senior knows it's silly - she is a shortstop, after all - and her softball coaches even joke with her about it. But the Skidmore College signee is working on it, thanks to the new approach of second-year head coach Laura Stott. "In past years, practice was the same way, every day," Fortunato said. "There wasn't time to practice one thing we wanted. Now we can become more confident in the skills we need to work on. " Stott lets the girls decide what they want to individually work on for the last half hour to 45 minutes of practice.

On the softball field, Lauren Quense and Sam Offenback couldn't be a better unit for Neshaminy. Quense is the starting pitcher for the Redskins and hits third in the batting order, and Offenback is the catcher and bats cleanup. As far as tandems go, these two are beyond effective, dominating games defensively as well as offensively. The two kept the routine going Thursday afternoon against Suburban One League National Conference opponent Bensalem, as the Redskins defeated the Owls, 15-2.

Top-ranked Serena Williams ended a long and successful day for the Williams family as she and sister Venus both won twice Friday in Charleston, S.C., to reach the Family Circle Cup semifinals and set up their first sibling showdown since 2009. Serena won her 13th straight match by defeating sixth-seeded Lucie Safarova , 6-4, 6-1. Earlier, she topped two-time NCAA doubles champ Mallory Burdette in a third-round match moved due to Thursday's 71/2-hour rain delay. Venus also had double duty, rallying past Varvara Lepchenko in three sets before ousting 18-year-old Madison Keys later on Billie Jean King Court.