Author Archives: Mike Gibson

03.15.13
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BE split opens path to football title for Owls

Sources say this is the likely split in money.
Would the Philadelphia Inquirer do this for us?

The Big East and as-yet-to-be named conference have split.
Good riddance to the Catholic schools, I say.

According to some pretty good sources, Temple recently negotiated an upward swing in its cash payout.
The Owls were set to be lumped in with the new 2013 schools.
Temple wanted the same kind of split that Cincinnati, UConn and USF received, but those schools argued that they were here longer.
Temple argued that it was here longer than the newbies, so the above schools each chipped in to give Temple a higher payout than the newbies.
After UConn, USF and Cincinnati took the largest portion of the money and the Catholic 7 got $10 million, the rest had to be negotiated.
Since the payouts to UConn, USF and Cincy (and even Temple) are installments, that’s a further incentive to stay.
Temple is in a better place now and not just money-wise.
OK, so the Owls don’t play Villanova in a Big East  basketball game next year but what good was Villanova to Temple?

My original choice for the new conference name.

OK, it’s a decent hoop rivalry but that can be continued on a nonleague basis.
When you look at the big picture, this new conference (I kind of like the name BAM … Big America Conference, which was suggested by Kent in the post below) will be a better one for Temple.
My second choice is Metro America, which incorporates the big-city theme of the all-sports schools.
The Owls get to keep all of their old basketball rivals as nonleague games.
Playing Villanova, LaSalle,  St. Joe’s and Penn will continue. The Owls will just have to drop the Towsons,  Caniniuses  and Detroits of the world.  I don’t think anyone has a problem with that. The MAC affilation is basically over, although I’d like to see Buffalo added (big city, former quasi rival) should someone else leave.
This is about football and when you look at where the Owls were and where they are going, they become instantly more competitive. Heck, I could see them winning the title this year (‘chip, as the kids say) if everybody stays healthy. Since that rarely happens, I see seven wins within sight.
I thought they should have been competitive in the Big East last year, but I blame that on Steve Addazio.

Addazio blamed it on a youth movement, but the youth movement was of his making. In the home opener against Villanova, nine of the 11 starters on defense were either juniors or seniors. By the time they played Syracuse in the season finale, nine of the 11 starters were sophomores or freshmen.

People say he had MAC talent going up against Big East talent but Kent State had MAC talent going up against Rutgers, Toledo had MAC talent going up against Cincinnati and Ohio had MAC talent going up against Penn State and they all accomplished what Addazio wasn’t able to do:
Win against those same foes.
Could Addazio have AT LEAST been competitive? With better coaching and a more balanced offensive approach, I think so.
Addazio blamed it on a youth movement, but the youth movement was of his making. In the home opener against Villanova, nine of the 11 starters on defense were either juniors or seniors.
By the time they played Syracuse in the season finale, nine of the 11 starters were sophomores or freshmen.
Convenient excuse.
New coach Matt Rhule will throw the ball on first and second downs, which should immediately improve the whole structure of down and distance for four quarters. I only hope and pray that Phil Snow is as good as Rhule says he is.
Now while newcomers like SMU and Houston figure to be tough, Temple can be competitive against them.
Kent State beat Rutgers by blitzing its linebackers and putting constant pressure on quarterback Gary Nova, forcing him into six interceptions. Hint: Temple’s got fast linebackers.
A win over regional rival Rutgers, a going-away gift to the Big 10, would be nice.
Good riddance, and welcome.
The door is open for Temple to win a title now if it has the courage to walk through it.

03.13.13
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Here’s the kicker: Brandon McManus is one

Brandon McManus has some classy things to say about Temple fans.
The big story out of the March 3rd Regional kicking combine was that 47 reporters requested credentials.
Usually, it’s no more than four or five.
Reason?
Lauren Silberman was trying to make history as the NFL’s first female kicker.
She either paid $275 or was given $275 to make the trip.
She would have fared much better putting a 50-1 bet on the Temple men’s basketball Owls winning the NCAA championship.

CFPA winners
Year
Placekicker
School
2013
Brandon McManus
Temple
2012
Carlos Santos
Tulane
2011 (tie)
Caleb Sturgis
Randy Bullock
Florida
Texas A&M
2009
Brian Walsh
Georgia

As it stands now, and stood then, the bet on Temple cutting down the nets would have been much safer.
Her two kicks TOTALED 30 yards, one 19 and one 11.
All 47 reporters raced to her side to do the story.
Here’s the real kicker: Brandon McManus is one.
At the other end of the field, McManus was going 6 for 6, including 3 for 3 from beyond 50.
None of the reporters bothered to talk to him, but that wasn’t why he was there.
His stock immediately soared for the upcoming NFL draft.
Kickers are almost never picked in the draft but now it seems McManus could go somewhere in the middle rounds because of his performance at the combine on the heels of an outstanding season at Temple.
On Sunday, McManus received his CFPA as the specialist of the year for his performance while at Temple and got a rousing ovation from the 10,200 fans in attendance to watch the Owls top VCU.

France checking in, and we don’t mean former Soul
and Eagle kicker Todd France.

McManus ended his collegiate career as Temple’s career leader in scoring (338), punting average (45.4), field goals made (60), and field goals attempted (83).  The 2012 first-team All-BIG EAST punter and 2012 second-team All-BIG EAST kicker set the season record for field goal accuracy (82.4) and set game records at Army for extra points made (9) and attempted (9). McManus played in EVERY game of his collegiate career. In 2012, McManus led the Owls in scoring (74) and went 32-of-33 in PAT. He punted 54 times for 2,433 yards (45.1 average), including a career-long 68-yard punt against No. 19/17 Rutgers, while 15 punts longer than 50 yards. McManus went 6-of-7 on field goals of 40+ yards, including a 50-yarder in the win over South Florida. He also kicked the game-winning field goal at Connecticut in overtime and contributed 40 touchbacks on 56 kickoffs (71.4 percent).
McManus had a Temple connection long before he arrived on campus. His coach at North Penn High, Dick Beck, was the captain of the 1990 Temple team that went 7-4.
Jim Cooper, Jr., the kicker coming on board this year, has another Temple connection. His dad of the same name was the kicker for Bruce Arians in the late 1980s.
McManus proved that you can stay home and do great things at Temple, following in the, err, footsteps of his good friend, Bernard Pierce, of the Baltimore Ravens.
While the reporters were taking notes talking to Silberman, let’s hope future recruits were making mental notes watching McManus.
That’s the bigger story, after all.

03.09.13
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A look at the new foes

New Opponent
Recent common foes
Result
How Temple fared
SMU
Army, Navy
Army 16, SMU 14 (2010)
Navy 38, SMU 35 (2009)
Temple 42, Army 35
(2010)
Temple 28, Navy 24 (2009)
Houston
UCLA, PSU
UCLA 31, Houston 13 (2010)
Houston 30, Penn State 14 (2011)
UCLA 30, Temple 21 (2009)
Penn State 14, Temple 10 (2011)
Central Florida
Buffalo, Ball State
UCF 23, Buffalo 17 (2009)
UCF 24, Buffalo 10 (2011)
UCF 38, Ball State 17 (2012)
Temple 37, Buffalo 13 (2009)
Temple 34, Buffalo 0 (2011)
Temple 42, Ball State 0 (2011)
Idaho
Wyoming, Bowling Green
Wyoming 40, Idaho 37 (2011)
Bowling Green 32, Idaho 15 (2011)
Temple 37, Wyoming 15 (2011)
Bowling Green 13, Temple 10  (2011)

Chart shows that, with the exception of Houston, Temple has done significantly better against recent common foes.

A couple of years ago, the Princeton football team was about six games removed from winning the national championship based on the faulty theory of transitive property.
You know, if Team A can beat Team B and Team B beat Team C, then Team A can also beat Team C.
By now, every fan who handed in a losing slip at the football betting window knows that way of gambling is Fool’s Gold.
Still, transitive property is a useful exercise in getting a GENERAL idea of how a team might perform against another.

We all know about the Notre Dames of the world. The Irish just recruit in a


Bryant Rhule has a sister!
TFF congratulates
coach Matt Rhule and family
on the birth
of a new daughter
(below) football scoop
seemingly has
every scoop
ever uncovered

different stratosphere than Temple.
That one is going to be a rough go for the Owls, even if Khalif Herbin switches to running back and Kevin Newsome becomes a strong safety in a couple of weeks.
Cincinnati and Louisville also figure to be tough,
but I’m not conceding Rutgers.
I don’t think Matt Rhule is conceding any loss,

either, but beating a regional rival like RU on the road would be a nice statement well within his reach.
Temple returns everyone and Rutgers was relatively wiped out on both sides of the ball.
Had Steve Addazio used the pass the way it was meant to be used, even the young Owls would have been a lot more competitive against Rutgers in the second half and might have pulled that one out. A week later, Kent State showed what an effectively-coached team could do against Rutgers.
To me, seven wins against this schedule (Idaho, Fordham, Memphis and Army as the givens and three of the other eight) is realistic and attainable. (Army has had a more recent history of success than Memphis has had and Temple has handled the Cadets pretty easily.)
The key to the season is how the Owls do in the so-called America 12 toss-up games and, while teams like Houston, UCF and SMU have had more success in the past couple of years than Temple has, the Owls have not embarrassed themselves against common foes.
Rhule is guiding the program based on the principles (or core values) of Al Golden, not Steve Addazio.
Addazio was stubborn and Golden was flexible.
So that could mean switching a guy like Matty Brown to running back from slot receiver or switching a guy like Kee-Ayre Griffin from running back to cornerback. In Rhule’s case, it could mean Herbin to Brown’s role and Newsome as an upgrade over departed starter Justin Gildea at strong safety.
Nate L. Smith, the best playmaking defensive back in Pennsylvania high school football for Archbishop Wood two years ago, finally gets on the field at free safety and with Newsome and NLS back there maybe the secondary finally starts to make some plays.
It could also mean getting the team’s other best playmakers (linebackers) on the field by going from a 4-3 to a 3-4.
That worked for those guys and expect similar adjustments in personnel this spring.
While you can’t win them all, you can at least try. Things won’t be perfect when practice starts in 13 days, but you can rest assured they will be tweaked in that direction.
Let’s put it this way: Spencer Reid is a nice kid and a credit to the program, but I don’t expect to see him get 17 carries in the spring game again this year.

03.06.13
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Temple gets finalized football schedule

Date
Game
Time/TV
Saturday, Aug. 31
Temple at Notre Dame
TBA/NBC
Saturday, Sept. 7
Houston at Temple
TBA
Saturday, Sept. 14
Fordham at Temple
TBA
Saturday, Sept. 21
Bye
Saturday, Sept. 28
Temple at Idaho
TBA
Saturday, Oct. 5
Louisville at Temple
TBA
Friday, Oct. 11
Temple at Cincinnati
7 p.m., ESPN/ESPN2
Saturday, Oct. 19
Army at Temple
TBA/CBS Sports
Saturday, Oct. 26
Temple at SMU
TBA
Saturday, Nov. 2
Temple at Rutgers
TBA
Saturday, Nov. 9
Bye
Saturday, Nov. 16
UCF at Temple
TBA
Saturday, Nov. 23
UConn at Temple
TBA
Saturday, Nov. 30
Temple at Memphis
TBA

Instead of figuring out a couple of flight connections and picking up a rental car for another 50-mile trip, Temple football fans can fly out of Philadelphia directly and relatively cheaply to any road game this year.
That’s tangible progress in this shifting conference landscape.
The only difference is Moscow.
Idaho, not Russia.

Idaho listing Temple game as Homecoming where the Owls will have to 
face the best students that uni can find (below).

If the Owls were playing in Russia, they’d have a direct flight.
Temple fans who have been waiting for the last few months to book trips can start booking now.
Road trips to Ypsilanti, Oxford and Muncie _ venues all too familiar to Owl supporters in the not-so-distant past  _ will now be replaced by trips to Chicago (Notre Dame), Cincinnati, Moscow, Dallas, Piscataway and Memphis.
Still think leaving the MAC was a bad idea?
I don’t think many Owl fans will be making the trip to Moscow anyway. Cheap Flights.com will be able to get you in there Thursday, Sept. 26, for $587.89. It’s a six-hour, 59-minute flight to Boise with a stop in Chicago. You get a rental car in Boise and drive to Moscow. That’s 298 miles.
Probably the better way to go is fly from Philadelphia to Seattle, with a stop in Houston, and take an Alaskan Air Propeller plane from Seattle (after an overnight stay) to Pullman. From Pullman, it’s just a 10-mile drive to Moscow.
Good luck. I hope the game’s on TV.
Other than that, the trips look spectacular for the Temple one-percenters.
I’m not going to get into a game-by-game scenario here.
Those never work.

The official BE schedule release used LFF as the background.

Just ask the Temple basketball fans who put a W next to Duquesne, St. Bonaventure and Canisius and an L next to Syracuse.
Suffice it to say this is a much more manageable schedule than last year’s in football, with Maryland essentially replaced by Idaho and the high profile Penn State game being replaced by a higher profile Notre Dame game.
Villanova figured to be a much tougher D1AA (FCS) foe than Fordham, so maybe this is Phil Snow’s best opportunity to get a shutout as a DC since 1996.
SMU and Houston should be tough foes, but I don’t see those resumes being significantly more impressive than Temple’s has been over the last five years. Houston had the great year a couple of seasons ago, but Temple has been bowl eligible four of of the last five years. Matt Rhule was here in all of those four years and was away the non-bowl eligible season. Just sayin’.
If Temple can’t beat Memphis (losers to Tenn-Martin and Middle Tennessee last year) it probably should get out of the football business and I don’t think that’s happening any time soon. Even Bobby Wallace beat Middle Tennessee.
Idaho, thinking it scheduled the Temple of 2003, not 2013, has slotted Temple has its Homecoming Day game.
So did UConn last year and look how that turned out for the Huskies.
The days of other teams immediately putting HC next to the Temple game should be over very soon.

03.05.13
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The final word on Steve Addazio

In about a year, only the fan bases from Florida, Temple and BC will understand this video.

In an effort to keep my blood pressure from elevating to dangerous levels, I’ve avoided the final word on Steve Addazio until now.
Before Matt Rhule takes over on the first day of spring practice (it’s now three weeks away), though, I think it’s a useful exercise to put the Steve Addazio Era to rest.
Although he wasn’t my first choice then (Bruce Arians was), I liked Steve Addazio when I got to know him at Temple.

I had a long talk with him in New York City and he gave me some good stuff and asked me not to use it and I kept both my mouth and laptop shut. In any meeting with Temple alumni, he had us all ready to strap on the pads. Vitamin A was that addictive. There was much to like.
He was 51, but had the vim and vigor of a 21-year-old.

Matt Rhule in today’s Morning Call
Keith Groller of The Morning Call wrote this great story on Matt Rhule that appeared in today’s paper. For this cool bumper sticker above and to support Temple Football Forever, anyone who contributes at least $20 via the pay pal donation option on the sidebar (in the Support TFF section) or $20 to the address (in the help TFF afford a pair of shoes section) gets it exactly as it appears above (3 inches high, 11 inches wide). Please allow two weeks for pay pal orders and one month for postal orders. Thanks.

He was “National Recruiter of the Year” not once but three times and I thought this was just the kind of guy Temple needed. I could easily envision a recruit putting down Penn State hat, an Alabama hat and putting on a Temple one on ESPNU under Addazio’s watch (if you don’t think that’s possible, the same thing happened for a New Mexico football recruit two years ago).
On the day Addazio was hired, a Florida fan emailed me the video above and warned me about Addazio. He told me the firesteveaddazio.com website was available if I wanted it.

I dismissed it as poppycock.
I’d like to apologize to that fan today.
Everything Hitler, err that Florida fan, said about Addazio’s one-dimensional, hare-brained, offensive scheme turned out to be true in 2012.
He turned an explosive, otherwise productive, quarterback in the 2011 season into a caretaker of a Woody Hayes’-type, run-first, scheme. Chris Coyer was limited to handing off on almost all first and second downs and that’s an offensive recipe for disaster.  After pounding his head against a brick wall for most of four quarters against UConn, Addazio was forced to unleash Coyer in a two-minute drill that won the game.
Did he learn a lesson that would carry over to the rest of the year?

Not surprisingly, confidence in Daz’s future waning.

No.
Truth is, Addazio is a stubborn former offensive lineman who always wants to run the ball. He was that way at Florida and (sans Scot Loeffler’s one year as OC) was that way at Temple and probably will be that way at BC.
After that UConn win, he went back to pounding his head against the wall and about 20,000 of my fellow Temple fans joined him.
Now we can get back to watching football.
There’s a lot we don’t know about Matt Rhule but he does believe in making defenses defend the whole field and, for that alone, we know he will do a better job that Daz did.
My blood pressure will be better off now that Daz is gone and hopefully that means my life expectancy has just been extended by a couple of years.

03.02.13
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Conference shifting puts Temple in no Jeopardy

Temple was the answer to a Jeopardy question last night.

In honor of Temple being the answer to a trivia question yesterday on Jeopardy, we have a question:
“What does all of this conference shifting mean to Temple?”
“What is everything and nothing, Alex?”
Alex would have said that is correct.
First, yesterday’s question, which appeared under the category of “Texas Towns” and a contestant got right.
“1-95 goes through it; it’s a university in Pennsylvania or a synagogue?”
“What is Temple?”

Cliff: “Alex, I object, I-95 doesn’t technically run through Temple.”

Alex: “Correct.”
I would have pulled a Cliff Clavin since the I-95 part of the question threw me off.
Back to the conference shifting, though.
There’s so much landscape shifting out there that the average Temple fan’s head has to be spinning like Linda Blair in the Exorcist.
What does this really mean for Temple football?
Everything and nothing is the correct answer.
Everything because Thursday, March 7, is the one-year anniversary of the date the news broke that Temple was joining the Big East.
The conference Temple signed up for then certainly isn’t the one it signed up for now.
At the time, visions of a packed Liacouras Center for games against Georgetown, Pitt, Villanova and Rutgers had to dance through the heads of the Board of Trustees.
Those visions are now gone.

Temple fans have to get in the mindset of going to watch Temple, not the bad guys

Nothing because if Temple sports people keep doing their jobs and Temple fans do their jobs, Temple will end up in a better place.
Temple football certainly IS in a better place than the Purgatory that was the MAC, sentenced to years playing Tuesday and Wednesday night games against directional mid-western schools having little or nothing in common with Temple.
Now, at least, there is the familiarity of Cincinnati and UConn and, for a year, Rutgers.
There are exciting road trips ahead to be made to places like New Orleans, Tampa and Dallas ahead, a far cry from the puddle jumpers and buses needed to get to places like Yipsilanti and Oxford.
Temple has a nationally known basketball coach who is admired and respected by his peers, if not a small but vocal group of his team’s own fans, and who just posted his sixth-straight 20-win season.
Temple has an energetic young football coach who is following a successful business model established by Al Golden, his mentor.
Temple fans have to get in the mindset of going to watch Temple, not the bad guys. When Penn or Belmont come to Cameron Indoor Stadium, do Duke fans whine “get some decent opponents in here” or do they say thank God for another chance to see the Blue Devils?
Advertising to a Temple-centric audience certainly helps.
Today should be a good crowd because the last time we streamed an ad for Hooter’s Birthday across the top of this website, 9,323 fans attended an end-of-the-season game against Duquesne in 2011.
That’s what Temple fans have to do for the product these outstanding coaches provide.
If those guys keep doing work, and the fans start voting with their feet and season-ticket money, Temple will be a respected player on the national stage and there is always a nice role for an actor like that.
For final Jeopardy the category is NCAA business:
“Is the conference shifting done?
“What is no, Alex?”

02.27.13
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The best running back nobody is talking about

My favorite photo of Montel Harris as a Temple Owl, sharing a moment
of respect with Army linebacker and captain Nate Coombs after going for
351 yards and seven touchdowns in a 63-32 win.

My favorite Montel Harris moment this year had nothing to do with what he did during a game, but it had a lot to do with what he did on the field.
After the Army game, both Montel  and Army linebacker Nate Coombs shared a few words after Temple’s 63-32 win at Michie Stadium.

Draft expert Matt Waldman was talking about Harris.

After it was over, Montel and Nate shook hands, laughed and walked off the field.
That’s what sports is all about. It was a great sportsmanship moment between a future NFL player and a guy who is going to put it all on the line for our country.
We can only imagine what Nate told Montel, but we can guess it went something like this:
“Man, I tried to tackle you, but it was like tackling air out there.”
After a fairly good performance in the recent NFL combine, draft expert Matt Waldman called Montel “the best running back nobody is talking about.”

The thing the combine can’t measure is start/stop ability and Harris is the best I’ve ever seen 

I think they will be talking about him on draft day.
Last year, I predicted Bernard Pierce would go in the third round. I think Harris goes in the sixth, no lower than the seventh.

How Harris and Pierce compared at the NFL combine:
40 time
Bench Reps
Vertical Jump
Montel Harris
4.68
19 (at 225 pounds)
32.5 inches
Bernard Pierce
4.49
17 (at 225 pounds)
36.5 inches

How Harris and Pierce did in best single season:
Carries
Yards
Longest Run
Montel Harris (2009)
308
1,457
72 yards
Bernard Pierce (2011)
273
1,481
69 yards

After watching Harris last year and Pierce the three years before that, the difference is simply this:
Pierce is faster and can do more damage on the outside but Harris is much better between tackles and starting and stopping to get out of trouble.
The only reason Harris drops three or so rounds below Pierce will be his knee injury history, but his knee held up pretty well at Temple despite the workload.
To me, the combine numbers are nowhere near as important as these numbers:
Career Carries
Career Yards
Average  (2012)
Career Long
Career
TDs
Montel Harris
973
4,379
5.7
72
39
Le’Veon Bell
671
3,346
4.7
69
31
Montee Ball
924
5,140
5.1
67
77
Ray Graham
595
3,271
4.1
78
32
Gio Bernard
423
2,481
6.7
68
25
Jawan Jamison
486
1,972
4.2
64
13

To me, what you do on the field is a lot more important than what you can do at the combine and Harris’ numbers stack up very well against some of the top running backs in the group above.
Remember, Harris never fumbles while Eagles’ seventh-round pick Bryce Brown fumbled a lot. You can gain all the yards in the world and have all the speed and the vertical leap and bench press, but if the ball ends up in the hands of the other team after the play is over you are worthless.

How cool would it be for Montel Harris to introduce himself on Sunday or Monday night football by saying, “Montel Harris, Temple Football Forever”

That’s another metric that can’t be measured at a combine.

How cool would it be for Montel Harris to introduce himself on Sunday or Monday night football by saying, “Montel Harris, Temple Football Forever.”
Heck, if Mo Wilkerson or Bernard Pierce beat him to the punch, that would be cool, too.

Whatever questions that some may have had about his character were answered with a season as a solid citizen and terrific teammate at Temple.
I wish him all the best.
My guess is that Army’s Nate Coombs does, too.

02.23.13
by

Frankford’s DiGiorgio a Diamond Tim

Love the way the Frankford announcer calls the first TD five yards into the pattern.

Little wonder why Tim DiGiorgio wants to become an accountant.

He should fit right in at Temple’s nationally ranked Fox Business School. He’s spent the last couple of years being very good with numbers.
Tim DiGiorgio gets ready to throw the ball.
The Frankford quarterback is headed to Temple as a “preferred walk-on” after breaking a few calculators putting some eye-popping stats together.
After throwing for 2,357 yards and 30 touchdowns as a junior for the Public League champion Pioneers, he added 1,704 yards and 14 more touchdowns as a senior.
He was the third player in the 97-year history of the Public League to pass for 3,000 yards and did it in only his 15th varsity game, the first to accomplish that feat.
My good friend, Donald Hunt, of the Philadelphia Tribune (he co-wrote the book “Winning is an Attitude” with John Chaney) asked Temple coach Matt Rhule a question at his first press conference about what he would do to keep the talent from the Philadelphia Public and Catholic League here and Rhule answered that recruiting would start from here and head on out.
In DiGiorgio’s case, Frankford High School is only 5.1 miles from 10th and Diamond.
DiGiorgio, a 6-foot-3, 185-pound lefty, is the very epitome of what Rhule was talking about when he said Temple was all about finding Diamonds in its own backyard, to borrow founder Russell Conwell’s theme.
He did so well when he attended a passing camp at Penn State that assistant coach Ron Vanderlinden told him they would offer him if highly rated recruit Christian Hackenburg backed out of his commitment. Surprisingly, Hackenburg remained true to Penn State and four years of playing behind suspect offensive lines and Temple could be the beneficiary.

Imagine this billboard on I-95 with a slightly different spelling and the
word “not” replaced by “a” and the pizza replaced by a throwing TU QB.

DiGiorgio had some feelers from other places, but wanted the chance to play Division I (known as FBS football now).

Temple should offer him that chance. The Owls are very thin at the quarterback position for the 2014 season.
So far, only incoming recruit P.J. Walker and DiGiorgio have significant playing time over the last couple of years. Connor Reilly, the starting holder on extra points and field goals, hasn’t thrown the ball in a real game since high school (although in 2011 he handed it off in a 42-0 win at Ball State). Those are your 2014 Owl quarterbacks.
For now at least.
If DiGiorgio can play, and all indications are that he can, he will be given every opportunity by Rhule, walk on or not.
Rhule played at Penn State.
As a walk-on.
And you don’t have to be a future accountant to know that adds up to a fair shot.
The Tim DiGiorgio File
Completions
Attempts
Yards
Touchdowns
2011
136
237
2,357
30
2012
107
215
1,704
14
02.20.13
by

Matty Brown’s replacement? How about Herbin?

“Jerry Jones’ Money, you a running back” comes up at the 2:12 time stamp. That’s song lyric perfectly describes Khalif Herbin in my book.

Matt Brown’s career took off after being switched to RB.

As the crow flies, where both Matty Brown and Khalif Herbin played their final years of high school ball is separated by only 50 miles of I95 and Garden State Parkway highway in New Jersey.
Brown played his final year at Peddie School in Highstown. Herbin played at Montclair.
To me, that’s really the only thing that separates the two players.
The highest compliment I can pay Herbin now is that, used properly _ the way Brown was _ he can be just as good and maybe even better.
I really believe that.
Going into this 2013 season, I am not worried about too many areas of Temple’s football team this upcoming season, but I was worried about finding the next Matty Brown.
Until the light bulb went on in my head yesterday.
The next Matty Brown is sitting right there in the Edberg-Olson Complex.
You know, that shifty, elusive guy everybody else underestimates until he’s putting up six points on a regular basis?
Instead of wearing No. 2 or 22, he’s wearing No. 27.

In 2009, Matty Brown started the seson as a slot receiver until a similar light bulb went off in Al Golden’s head and Al gave Brown a chance to carry the ball. It turned out to be a stroke of genius

Khalif Herbin is my choice. Heck, he’s got the talent to be better than Brown. He’s faster (4.39 to Brown’s 4.44). He’s even bigger (5-7, 170 to Brown’s 5-5, 150). There are a lot of intangibles about Brown that make him the toughest son-of-a-gun I’ve seen play for Temple in a long, long time (maybe ever) but I’d like to see what Herbin can bring to the table with the same opportunity.
Herbin was an unbelievable talent with the ball in his hands (check out the film above, just from his first five high school senior games).
He just didn’t get the ball in his hands enough last year. As a 5-7 slot receiver, it’s just not possible.
That was one of the many problems with Steve Addazio. He didn’t maximize the talent of his players. To me, one of the best athletes on the team should not be a third-team quarterback nor should a guy as elusive as Herbin be a slot receiver. A guy who both runs and throws the ball as well as Chris Coyer does should not be spending the first two downs of every series handing of to a running back.
In 2009, Matty Brown started the season as a slot receiver until a similar light bulb went off in Al Golden’s head and Al gave Brown a chance to carry the ball. It turned out to be a stroke of genius.
The position move led to a nice chapter in Temple football history.
Not that Brown is gone, Matt Rhule should consider doing the same for Herbin.
Temple found Brown while playing for Peddie School in Blairstown in 2009 and could find his replacement in a Montclair, N.J. product.
The Owls need a game-breaker like Brown and Herbin could be all that and more. It’s definitely worth a shot.

The Khalif Herbin File

2011
Carries
Yards
Touchdowns
139
1,940
43
2010
176
1,488
15
2011 Punt Returns*
12
245
3
2010 Punt Returns**
4
133
1

*Also returned 7 kickoffs for 243 yards and 2 TDs
**Also returned 9 kickoffs for 385 and 2 TDs
02.18.13
by

One fan’s take on how the season will go

The Big East’s original color-coded schedule.

Any day now the Big East will release the schedule for the upcoming football season.
A guess on how Temple will do at this point is just that.
Too soon for me. Last year, I didn’t post my prediction until August and I’ll probably wait until that same time this year.
Too many things can happen between now and then.
That doesn’t mean I discourage other fans from playing a preliminary numbers’ game.
One of those fans, Steve Sipe, actually gave a pretty optimistic rundown below:

Steve Sipe’s early game-by-game analysis. I’ll sign for that now. Unfortunately, Charlie Strong is still at Louisville.

He only has the Owls down for two losses, one by a touchdown to national runner-up Notre Dame, the other at Tommy Tuberville’s Cincinnati.
When it comes to Temple football, I always hope for 12-0 and settle for winning seasons.
While many might view Steve as being a little overly optimistic, I’ll sign for it now.
Maybe that view is tempered by the fact that I had Steve Addazio going a base 6-6 (with a bowl win) or as optimistic as 8-3 in 2012. No way did I ever dream that he would come up with a hare-brained one-dimensional offensive scheme that would add up to 4-7.
Right now, though, I feel better about  Matt Rhule’s offensive acumen but I’m waiting on how the defense shapes up.

Cherry and White Day Special
From Feb. 16 through Cherry and White Day, get this cool Temple Football Forever bumper sticker.
Anyone who contributes at least $20 via the pay pal donation option on the sidebar (in the Support TFF section) or $20 to the P.O. Box address (in the help TFF afford a pair of shoes section) gets this cool bumper sticker exactly as it appears above (3 inches high, 11 inches wide). Please allow two weeks for pay pal orders and one month for postal orders. Thanks.

I feel confident about the kicking game (Paul Layton, Jim Cooper Jr., Nick Visco) and I’m a big Chris Coyer  guy so I feel good about those areas. I would like to see Zaire Williams on the field  but that’s not going to happen until August. I hope Jamie Gilmore has a big spring. He’s the only legitimate tailback on the roster now.  Heck, even fullback Wyatt Benson, the best blocker I’ve seen at Temple since Shelley Poole, might even get a few carries.
If Phil Snow is as good a defensive coordinator as Matt Rhule advertises him to be, maybe 10-2 is a good prediction. I’d love to see Kevin Newsome or Nate L. Smith  roam the middle of the field as a free safety and Kenny Parker moved to strong safety and the Owls go to a 3-4 defense to take advantage of their nose tackle depth (Averee Robinson, Hershey Walton and Levi Brown) and terrific linebacker speed. Sean Daniels is going to have to become the push-rusher I know he can be at one DE and the Owls are going to have to find another speedy pass-rusher on the other side. If all those personnel moves pan out, the Owls could cause enough turnovers to become an efficient, maybe dangerous, Big East defensive team. Right now, without knowing, I have the Owls losing to ND, Central Florida (a better team than Steve might think), Rutgers, Cincy and Louisville for a 7-5 record.
Praying for 12-0, would sign for 10-2 right now and grudgingly accept 7-5 at this point.
Anything less would be disappointing.
Spring practice starts March 22.