After recent news of guards Rateska Brown and Megan Roxas transferring away from the team, Tonya Cardoza has secured a transfer of her own, signing Georgia Tech freshman guard Donnaizha Fountain to a scholarship.

Per the NCAA transfer rules, Fountain will sit out the 2014-15 season.

Although the Roxbury, Mass. native will not play next season, she joins the Owls’ recruiting class of guards Tanaya Atkinson, Alliya Butts, Khadijah Berger and forward Wendion Bibbins as the Owls’ newcomers for next year.

“I am really excited to welcome Donnaizha to our family,” coach Tonya Cardoza said in the team’s press release. “She hails from my hometown of Roxbury, Mass.”

“She will bring passion, toughness, athleticism, and size at the guard position,” Cardoza added. ” I expect her to make an immediate impact on our team even while she is sitting out her first year.”

Fountain averaged 3.3 points per game in 21 games last year for the Yellow Jackets, primarily as an option off the bench.

She played high school ball at Cambridge Rindge & Latin High School, and was once named to the ESPN Boston Super Team as one of the state’s top players.

With the Owls reportedly losing Brown, Roxas, guard Jaquilyn Jackson and one more player not yet named, the Fountain signing could be the first of more to come in the near future.

Senior guard Shi-Heria Shipp was named to the American Athletic Conference and Big 5 honor rolls Monday for the second time this season.

The George Washington transfer posted game-highs of 17 points and 16 rebounds in Temple’s 61-52 road win at Montana on Saturday en route to the honors.

Through her team’s seven games to date, Shipp has averaged 11.6 points-per-game for Temple (5-2) in her debut season.

-Andrew Parent

Sophomore May Dayan will leave the team and return to her hometown of Ashdod Israel, athletic communications announced Friday. The sophomore said personal reasons ultimately led to her departure.

The 5-foot-7 guard hasn’t played in Temple’s four games this season after seeing action in 30 contests a season ago with six starts and 1.7 points-per-game as a freshman.

“After a year-and-a-half at Temple University and due to personal issues, I have to return to Israel,” Dayan said to Owlsports.com. “I would like to thank all the people that helped me along the way, my coaches, my academic advisor, compliance, and especially my teammates. I would also like to thank Temple University for giving me this great opportunity. Temple was my home for the last year-and-a-half and will always have a special place in my heart. I wish the Owls good luck and know they will have a great season.”

Dayan joins a growing list of absentees for the Owls this season, as would-be sophomore Sally Kabengano didn’t return this season after a productive freshman year. Junior guard Rateska Brown and sophomore forward Jacquilyn Jackson also were key contributors to the team a year ago, and have both been sidelined due to indefinite suspensions.

The Owls came away with four signees on signing day, the team announced Thursday.

Tanaya Atkinson, Khadijah Berger, Wendion Bibbins and Alliya Butts all signed their National Letters of Intent with the team on the first signing day, and will likely round out Temple’s 2014 recruiting class.

Atkinson is a 5-foot-9 guard from Hill Regional Career High School in New Haven, Conn. who averaged 20.4 points and 8.1 rebounds in her junior year last year en route to All-Southern Connecticut Conference and All-Connecticut High School Coaches Association honors.

Berger, a 5-foot-10 guard, posted 17.1 PPG as a junior for Hampton High School in Virginia last year and earned a 2013 USA Today honorable mention. Per Owlsports, she played AAU ball with Temple freshman guard Feyonda Fitzgerald.

Bibbins is a 6-foot-1 power forward who could help supplement the loss of redshirt-senior forward Natasha Thames next year. The Helgen Cox High School senior was a 2012 LSWA Class 4A Honorable Mention All-State selection.

Butts, a local kid from Holy Cross High School in Edgewater Park, N.J., stands at a mere 5-foot-4 at the point guard position.

The height disadvantage clearly is no problem, as the current high school senior led all of Burlington County with 25.2 PPG last season for Holy Cross and was named to the Elite 100 Watch List. She has Philadelphia ties, as she played her AAU ball with the Philadelphia Freedom.

Senior guard Shi-Heria Shipp graced the floor during her Temple debut with a jump in her step Friday at La Salle, and it earned her a spot on the American Athletic Conference and Big 5 honor rolls for week one, it was announced Monday.

The George Washington transfer dropped a career-high 18 points in her Temple debut against the Explorers, and scored nine amid an Owls’ 19-0 run in the second half. Shipp also led Temple with an 8-for-8 performance from the free throw line, and swiped five steals en route to a 60-47 Owls win in the season opener.

Heading into their matchup against a very different Delaware team from a year ago, the Owls at least know who they don’t have to worry about.

Temple (1-0) will take on Delaware at the Blue Hens’ Bob Carpenter Center Tuesday night at 7 p.m., and will at least know who they don’t have to worry about.

The Blue Hens (1-0) return three starters from last year, and will be missing the reigning WNBA Rookie of the Year in Elena Delle Donne. Delle Donne was the No. 2 selection in the WNBA draft in 2013 after a four-year career at Delaware in which she averaged 26.4 points per game and led Delaware to back-to-back Colonial Athletic Association championships in her final two years.

Still, Blue Hens seniors Courtni Green and Kelsey Buchanan each put up 15 points on Rhode Island Friday in a 63-47 win. Buchanan, a 6’3” center, could be the Owls first challenge up front this season as the 6’0” redshirt-senior forward Natasha Thames is expected to start at center for the second consecutive game.

Temple senior guard Shi-Heria Shipp scored a game-high 18 points in the Owls’ 60-47 opening win against La Salle Friday night and is again expected to start, as coach Tonya Cardoza will likely go with the same relatively small four-guard lineup of Thames, Shipp, junior Tyonna Williams, sophomore Erica Covile and freshman Feyonda Fitzgerald.

Tuesday marks the first matchup between the two teams since Temple downed Delaware, 72-54, at McGonigle Hall in 1997.