The math for Stan Drayton was getting problematic after the Army loss.

After the fumble heard round the world on Saturday, nothing adds up. Temple’s fumble at the goal line on an ill-advised play call went so viral, it was the number one trending sports video on twitter (or X) between 8-9:10 p.m. on Saturday night. So pretty much everyone saw it and was laughing at Temple.

All the while we who have loved the program so many years were crying.

We’re No. 1, at least in ridicule. That’s the kind of math Temple doesn’t need to be associated with, and the numbers adding up in its favor at the end of this season not likely now.

Temple would have to basically run the table–and lose only to, say, Tulane–in order to qualify for a bowl.

In just about every other job in the world “up or out” applies after a certain probation period. Drayton’s probation period expired a long while ago and in no world does 3-9, 3-9 and (most likely) 3-9 represents an up.

Does it really represent an out, though?

At a normal school, an evaluation is made after three or so years whether it’s prudent to keep paying the guy big-time money to keep repeating the same record, or “fish or cut bait.” The assumption is that an important decision must be made and caution or indecisiveness just postpones the inevitable and causes a couple more years of suffering.

Temple, though, works with a different, err, template.

The history of the Owls with major coaching hires has been this: Temple has no stomach to pay two big coaching salaries at the same time and will wait until the contract is up and just not renew it. The one outlier to the process was eating a couple of years of Rod Carey’s salary to get him the hell out of here.

That was a different time with a different administration.

With a new anti-football President coming on board Nov. 1, that’s probably not going to happen with Drayton so while he can stand another 3-9 season, Temple football might not. There’s been a rapid decline in fan support since the big 2022 Homecoming Crowd against Rutgers and the 2024 Homecoming Crowd against FAU will probably been the smallest one since Al Golden’s first year (2006).

When the BOT votes to keep football or not in one or two years, that kind of math is most unhelpful.

It’s too late to get those crowds back this year but it’s not too late to show the powers-that-be football can thrive at Temple. Finish 5-1 and making a bowl is the way to do it and that means no bonehead decisions like doing a tush push with a 160-pound backup redshirt freshman quarterback. Fake it into the belly of Torrez Worthy who does the leap into the end zone, have the QB put the ball on his hip and with an option walk in and toss a short pass to one of five wide-open guys.

That’s probably one game too late.

For the most important sports equation in school history to add up for Temple now means rising to the occasion over the next six games and nothing that happened in the first six supports that hypothesis.

Friday: Five Guys