The Temple College women's basketball team journeyed to Denison on Wednesday afternoon as they took on the Grayson College Vikings to continue North Texas Junior College Athletic Conference play.

Temple's roaring start soon turned into a battle from behind, as they faced a late third-quarter 15-point deficit and ran out of time as the Leopards fell to the Vikings, 72-67.

TC (11-6 overall, 1-2 NTJCAC, 0-2 road) took advantage of Grayson's early offensive struggles, as Gabby Edo drilled four field goals, which included a three-pointer, and all three of her free-throws in a span of 3:17 to give Temple a 12-0 lead with 5:38 left in the opening quarter.

In that span, Grayson turned over the ball over three times and went 0-of-4 from the free-throw line.

However, the No. 24 team in the nation countered with an 8-2 run over the final 4:14 of the opening period, as Jaycee Ingram, Fia Filoialii, Iv Jackson, and Andrea Johnson combined to straighten out the Vikings offense. The Vikings clipped Temple's lead to six by the end of the first period, 14-8.

The teams combined to 44 points in the second quarter, as Temple hit five three-pointers in the period. Kyla Clark (two), Ranyiah Hunt, Emori Lasalle, and Korina Garcia combined on the effort.

Grayson (12-2 overall, 2-0 NTJCAC, 2-0 home) got a balanced scoring effort in the second quarter, as they outlasted the Leopard 27-17, and took a four-point lead into the halftime break, 35-31.

The Vikings opened the second half on a 21-10 having covered 6:30 as Filoialii and Susan Fahnbulleh two three-pointers and Ingram added another to give Grayson a 15-point lead, 56-41, with 3:30 remaining in the third quarter. The Vikings led 62-49 as the game traversed into the fourth quarter.

Temple began to mount an offensive push in the fourth quarter as Garcia, Clark, and Antronea Jackson hit field goals to help push the margin into single digits.

The Leopards' final charge came in the final 1:51. Down 67-59, Lasalle's field goal and Chyna Nixon's three-pointer was sandwiched around an Ingram field goal to clip the margin to five. Temple forced a five-second violation with 40.9 seconds to go, but two misses from the field and a foul gave Grayson two free-throws to Fahnbulleh, who converted one.

Lasalle was fouled beyond the three-point arc and was awarded three free-throws, in which she made two that made the score 70-66 with 17 seconds to go. That was the closest the Leopards got as they fell at the end by five points.

Temple converted 14-of-22 free-throws and scored nine three-pointers.

Edo led the Leopards with 16 points. Lasalle drilled 11 points, and Jackson and Hunt each scored ten points.

Grayson shot 10-of-19 from the charity stripe and hit eight three-pointers.

Filoialii led all scorers with 18 points for Grayson. Ingram added 15 points and Fahnbulleh added ten for the Vikings.

Temple will host Hill College on Saturday at 2 pm at Kirby Johnson Court.