The Temple College men's basketball team patiently waited as their classmates on the women's side to finish their battle with the Southwestern Christian College Rams in Terrell on Wednesday night.

It gave the Leopards some extra time to focus, in fact, a whole extra hour with the Rams having celebrated their Sophomore Night.

When the teams finally took the floor, the Leopards pounced on the Rams early, countered with a big run, and ran their up-tempo offense to a 105-87 win.

Temple (18-11 overall, 9-4 NTJCAC) broke out of the blocks on a 7-2 run in the game's first 1:36, courtesy of Jaymes Brown-Peterson and Harry Bates.

SWCC (12-16 overall, 3-9 NTJCAC) answered with a 16-4 run of their own, as they led 18-13 with 13:11 left in the opening half.

The Leopards answered with a prolonged run of 37-20 over the final 12:20 of the half, as Temple led at halftime, 50-38.

Temple continued their attack out of the locker room, having stretched their lead to 14 before SWCC countered with a 17-10 stretch to pull the Rams to within seven points, 62-55, with 14:08 left.

The Leopards caught fire in the middle portion of the second half, as Ovie Agbigbe, Roy Gardner, and Byron Piper combined to give Temple an 16-3 run over 2:20 to push Temple's lead out to 18, 76-58.

SWCC was only able to get the margin down to 11 before the Leopards went on a 17-3 run gave Temple a 94-73 lead with 5:16 to go.

The Leopards held off the Rams late to hang on for the 18-point win.

Temple hit 11 three-pointers and sank 9-of-14 shots from the free-throw line.

Six Leopards scored ten points or more, led by Brown-Peterson with 16 points and Joel Brown with 13.

SWCC converted four three-pointers and made 19-of-25 at the charity stripe.

Ahmare Rose led all scorers with 29 points, and Niko Smith added 24 for the Rams.

With Temple's win coupled with Collin College's 75-41 loss to McLennan Community College in Waco on Wednesday, the Leopards are now in second place by one-half game over Collin. The Cougars have two games remaining and Temple has one game left.

The Leopards will host McLennan Community College on Wednesday to conclude their regular season schedule.