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I was short-sighted in suggesting that Rose not play so many minutes as Temple needs both his offense and defense.

Temple had a stellar record last season (2018-2019) in conference play, in part, because Temple was the third best team by forcing 259 opponent turnovers, while Temple only turned the ball over 203 times. That’s over three less turnovers per game. Such was accompanied bt Temple making 155 steals (16th best in nation) compared to opponents 103 steals.

But things changed dramatically in HC Mckie’s first season as HC. As in the 2019-2020 season, Temple’s forced turnovers declined 12 percent, from 259 to 222 opponent turnovers, and Temple ‘s turnover’s increased 10 percent from 203 to 222.

Steals go hand in hand with turnovers This past season, Temple’s steals declined to 134 steals in conference play, and opponents steals increased to 124 in conference games. Temple’s 3 more steals per game advantage from the season before had virtually disappeared.

Temple did so well winning the turnover battle during conference play in the 2018-2019 season, as Temple with Q.Rose, NPL, Alston, and Alani, were four of the best ball stealers in the nation. Q.Rose, NPL and Alani Moore. The only player to not return was Alston.

In the 2018-2019 season, Rose finished second in the conference in steals at 2.45 steals per 40 minutes, and NPL fifth in the conference as he averaged 1.65 steals per 40 minutes. Alani Moore averaged 2.4 steals per 40 minutes.

Temple lost Shizz Alston, the AAC’s seventh best ball stealer, but he was replaced by James Scott, who was the fifth best ball stealer in the A-Sun conference when he played for KSU. Scott averaged 2.17 steals per 40 minutes at KSU. That stat would have placed him third in the ACC right behind Q. Rose, who had 2.45 steals per 40 minutes.

Alston averaged 34 mpg and 1.4 steals per conference game, Scott this past season only averaged 20 minutes per game and .8 steals per game.

Temple committed more turnovers in the 2019-2020 season in conference play as it’s offense was sloppy and because McKie did not employ a pressure defense often enough, nor did Scott play as much as he should have, and both A.Moore and Scott were not used enough to apply pressure and thus create more steals. This A.Moore and Scott did not make as many steals per 40 minutes as they should have.

POST SEASON PROSCRIPT On TEMPLE TURNOVERS aND STEALS.

Temple went from committing less turnovers the the year before to committing more turnovers this past 2019-2020 season.

The main reason is that McKie did not play a pressure defense in conference play.

Such is clearly see in Alani Moore’s decline in steals. Even though Alani Moore played twice as much in 2018-2020 than he did the previous season, he saw his steals drop fro 1.4 per conference game to 1.2 per game. Playing twice as much he didn’t even average what he did the prior season.

In the 2019-2020 season, Scott made 1.6 steals per 40 minutes compared to Alston’s 1.6 steals per 40 minutes, but since Scott played far less than Alston did he made far fewer steals per game as Alston did.

Rose dropped from 2.45 steals per 40 minutes the season before to 2.2 steals this past season in conference play. NPL only dropped from 1.65 steals per 40 minutes to 1.6 steals this past season.