GAME NOTES: The 2015 American Athletic Conference Tournament moves into the quarterfinal round on Friday, with the second game of the day pitting the fifth-seeded Memphis Tigers against the fourth-seeded Temple Owls.

The winner will advance to Saturday's semifinals to face either No. 8 seed East Carolina or top-seeded SMU.

Memphis went 18-13 during the regular season, which included a 10-8 league ledger, while Temple went 22-9 and won 13 of its 18 conference bouts.

Memphis comes into the postseason having lost three of its last four games. The Tigers are 0-1 in this event, as the AAC is only two years old at this point.

Temple too dropped its only AAC Tournament game last year, and the Owls enter the postseason with three consecutive wins in tow. Going back a bit farther, TU has won 10 of its last 12 games.

These two teams met only once during the 2014-15 regular season, with Temple narrowly winning at Memphis on Feb. 7, 61-60. As a result, the Owls inched closer in the all-time series, as they now trail by just a 7-6 margin.

Memphis is the second-most potent scoring team in the AAC, as the team puts up 67.1 ppg behind typical shooting outputs of 44 percent from the field and 33.1 percent from 3-point range. The Tigers do defend the long-range shot exceptionally well, yielding a league-low 29.9 percent success to its opponents. In giving up 62.5 ppg, Memphis also leads the conference in blocked shots (6.5 bpg), while matching Temple for the lead in steals (7.1 spg). The team has just one double-digit scorer on which to lean, as Austin Nichols nets 13.3 ppg to go with 6.1 rpg, and he is tied for the league lead with 3.4 bpg. The only problem at present is that Nichols remains sidelined with a sprained right ankle, which means a guy like Shaq Goodwin (9.5 ppg, 7.1 rpg) will need to elevate his game considerably.

Temple is known more its defensive prowess than its exploits on offense, as the team permits a mere 59.9 ppg to rank third in the conference. The Owls produce 64.6 ppg on average, and they are the worst shooting team in the league, hitting their field goals just 38.5 percent of the time, and their 3- point tries at a paltry 30.5 percent. TU does lead the league in both turnover margin (+2.94) and assist-to-turnover ratio (1.2). The Owls, who are led by AAC Coach of the Year Fran Dunphy, boast three double-digit scorers in Will Cummings (14.1 ppg, 4.2 rpg, 4.3 apg), Quenton DeCosey (12.3 ppg, 4.3 rpg) and Jesse Morgan (11.9 ppg).

It's somewhat interesting that Memphis is 6-0 when playing on Friday the 13th since World War II, which includes a 2-0 mark on the day in the month of March. That said, with Nichols out of commission, and Temple being the much hotter team, expect the Owls to advance.