Category Archives: AAC football

01.22.16
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Add Snowmageddon To Temple’s Luck

snowmageddon

Being a Temple sports fan, I’m used to a number of odd things happening at strange times that seem to stunt the Owls’ growth in the two marquee sports.

Add this latest Snowmageddon Episode to Temple’s dumb luck.

Arguably, it is probably the biggest recruiting weekend of the season with Temple trying to close the deal on some high-profile football recruits and the forecast of a crippling blizzard cannot help things. Sure, once in a blue moon you will find a kid from Florida who loves the snow and thinks it is the greatest thing in the world and decides to commit on the spot.

Ninety-nine percent of the other people living on the planet do not think that way.

templethings

It was a good idea in the first place because the Temple basketball team was going to host unbeaten AAC rival SMU on Saturday night in a game that figured to pack the Liacouras Center and show the recruits a packed house of spirited Temple fans. Now, that game is moved to Sunday and probably will not have nearly the same atmosphere.

Ironically, this snow is not going to be a good first  impression because it had not snowed all winter—not even a flake—and the winter had been relatively mild with quite a few 50- and 60-degree days. You can tell the recruits that all you want, but they see what they see.

Logistically, it is just not going to be a good thing. Even though the recruits will be on campus, other things are routinely planned on recruiting weekends that will just not go off—like trips to Lincoln Financial Field and Center City.

There is always the hope that things go well and the Owls pull in the haul they expected, but the snow will not be their friend this weekend.

In another development, Penn State–a place where it snows all the time–is hosting Temple recruit Dae’Lun Darien this weekend.

The forecast there is a coating to an inch.

12.12.15
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5 Other AAC Bowl Matchups Worth Watching

USATSI_8974880_149008644_lowres

Where is the T, M and P?

 

Just four months ago, the AAC was lumped as just another Group of 5 football conference trying to make its way in a Power 5 world. Then the AAC won some big games, with Temple beating Penn State and Memphis beating Mississippi, finished 4-3 against a P5 conference (the ACC) and separated itself from the pack. Now it can enhance its image by winning these five bowl games.

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  1. Miami Beach: USF vs. Western Kentucky

The big storyline in this game (2:30 p.m., EDT, Dec. 21, ESPN), is Willie Taggart’s old recruits, the ones who play for 11-2 WKU, going up against his newer 8-4 South Florida recruits. Despite the game being played in South Florida, the Hilltoppers are slight favorites and a lot of that has to do with the motivation on one side against an less-motivated group on the other. Plus, WKU’s Jeff Brohm probably is a better game day coach than Taggart.

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  1. Birmingham: Memphis vs. Auburn

The fact that the 9-3 Memphis Tigers are a slight underdog against the 6-6 Auburn Tigers is a product of this being a home game for Auburn. In reality, Memphis is a team that beat Mississippi by 13 points and should have no problem handling an overvalued Auburn team that has an edge in SEC name recognition and little else. The game is Dec. 30th on ESPN at noon.

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  1. Hawaii: Cincinnati vs. San Diego St.

The Bearcats have one of the best quarterbacks in the country in Gunner Kiel, who has played significantly better in the second half of the season since coming off a concussion. The 7-5 Bearcats’ most impressive showing was a 33-30 loss at champion Houston. SDSU, which is 10-3, is a slight underdog in this game (Dec. 24, 8 p.m., ESPN).

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  1. Military Bowl: Pitt vs. Navy

In what is a home game for 9-2 Navy, played at Navy-Marine Corps Stadium, this game serves as a showcase for someone who should have won the Heisman Award, Navy Midshipmen quarterback Keenan Reynolds, against a successful Power 5 team in 8-4 Pitt. This is probably too tough a spot for the four-point underdog Panthers.

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  1. Peach Bowl: Houston vs. Florida State

The one takeaway from Houston’s 24-13 win over Temple in the title game was two takeaways, an interception and a fumble, which were really the difference between Temple being there and Houston taking the spot. The fact that the Owls had to play a perfect game to beat the Cougars probably bodes well for the touchdown underdog in the Dec. 31 game (noon, ESPN). The AAC can make its ultimate statement winning this game.

12.06.15
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Two Ways to Look at This

pitchtwo

Look how far off the boundary corner is. One 3d and 3, Anderson had the same cushion on the other side  later in the game. Take it, and Owls have a new set of downs with 7:18 left and a possible 24-21 deficit.

 

There are two ways to look at Temple’s 24-13 loss to Houston on Saturday.

There is the Kumbaya view and the real world view. The Kumbaya view seems to have carried the day in the post-game Matt Rhule press conference and on much of social media. You know, “I’m proud of the kids” and “this is one of the greatest days in Temple football history” and “we’ve gone from point D to point A.”

real

That’s born out of T-ball mentality. You know, there are no losers and everybody gets a trophy for participation. Little Johnny goes home with a pat on his head. The coaches are great. The kids are great. We’re all just so darn proud of everybody.

Kumbaya.

Ugh.

Then there is the real world view. You know, the “what the hell is going on out here?” view.

The last quarter was a cluster, err, bleep that made you wonder what goes on at the $17 million Edberg-Olson Complex the other six days of the week. In the last seven minutes, Temple showed itself either unwilling or incapable of running a functional two-minute drill that every high school, college and pro team seems to run efficiently.  (If you don’t believe it, take a look at the way St. Joseph’s Prep runs it. The offensive line sprints to the ball. Plays are called at the line, not looking over to the sidelines, with the emphasis on a short passing game to get out of bounds and stop the clock. Prep coach Gabe Infante is only seven blocks away. Invite him over this week.)

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That was a blown opportunity to win a championship due to a number of brain cramps by the coaching staff.  There is no guarantee that the Owls will be back in the title game next year and, if they aren’t, the coaches have no one but themselves to blame for a number of perplexing offensive miscues.  With four minutes left, they seemed incapable of running a true two-minute offense, taking precious seconds off the clock on every play by having the kids stare over to the sidelines for plays. Those 20, 30 seconds a play add up and, before you know it, the game is over.

That wasn’t the worst. This is the worst.

After closing the gap to 24-13 with 7:18 to go in the game, the Owls had a 3d and 3 at the Houston 38 but inexplicably attempted a long pass into the end zone. The call was made even more confounding because Houston was playing 10 yards off Temple wide receiver Robby Anderson on the play.  A simple pitch and catch would have moved the sticks.

Moving the sticks then would have cured a lot of earlier self-imposed ills. Early on, the players had just as much to do with it as the coaches did but after fighting back they deserved a coaching staff that was more focused. The Owls have been a team all year whose motto was to not beat themselves by turning the ball over, but on their first drive of the game, quarterback P.J. Walker threw an interception. That resulted in a 7-0 lead. The Owls were driving for a tying touchdown when Anderson—who caught 12 passes for 150 yards—was fighting for yardage and fumbled the ball on the Houston 5-yard-line. That led to a 10-0 lead.

Had the Owls moved the sticks on 3d and 3, instead of taking the shot into the end zone, they might have scored to make it 24-21 and that would have left seven minutes to bleep around with the dog stare offense. Instead, they followed that botched call with a clinic in mismanaging the clock and never had a chance to find out what would have happened.

While the physical errors by the unpaid amateurs could be forgiven, the mental ones by the well-paid professionals cannot.

Tomorrow:  Thoughts on the Bowl Lotto

Tuesday: …. But the Big Story on Action News Is …

Wednesday: Houston Photo Gallery

Thursday: One Wacky Throwback

Friday: Matakevich’s Special Moment on ESPN

Saturday: A Look at the Other AAC Bowls

Sunday: Welcome Criticism

Monday (12/12): 5 Things the Owls Have to Clean Up

Tuesday: The Fallacy of the Fall Off

Wednesday: The Problem With Watch Parties

Thursday: The Pitt-Navy Monkey Wrench

10.28.15
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Early Bird Gets Worm; Procrastinators Get Tapeworm

Matt Rhule talks about the terrific job he and his staff and his kids did on a short week.

One of the most amazing things about these past few weeks was reading posts on facebook and twitter from unfamiliar handles saying they were long-time Temple fans and asking if anyone has an extra ticket.

Helloooooooooooo?

One of the many benefits of a Temple education is that the bullbleep antenna is very well-honed. First of all, they made this announcement of a Temple vs. Notre Dame game to be played in Philadelphia in 2011.

Not 2012.

Not 2013.

Not 2014.

Two thousand and eleven.

That was more than four years ago and a lot of thoughts floated around in my mind about this game. None of them were, “Geez, I can wait until there are two weeks before the game to get a ticket.”

A lot of these requests are from Notre Dame interlopers. It doesn’t take more than deductive reasoning to come to that conclusion.

In other words, I knew it was going to be sold out. You knew it was going to be sold out.The only shock to me was that the sellout did not occur in the days after the historic 27-10 win over Penn State, but weeks later. Those who waited that long were lucky to get tickets. Those who waited until oh,  like about now, are SOL. S*it out of luck, if  you do not know what that means.

The tickets on the secondary markets are off the charts but get your tickets for the Memphis game now.

The tickets on the secondary markets are off the charts but get your tickets for the Memphis game now.

Now this is what we do know. Temple vs. Notre Dame is the biggest college football game in the history of the city of Philadelphia, if you do not count the 1943 game that featured No. 2 Army vs. No. 6 Penn State. (I do not because I’m shocked Penn was able to keep so many able-bodied men in the school in the middle of an undecided war. Penn should have been investigated for some sort of recruiting violations.) That game ended in a 13-13 tie.

This game will not end in a tie and everyone who has a ticket in their hands right now should consider themselves incredibly fortunate. The early bird gets the worm. The procrastinator gets the tapeworm.

If you say you are a Temple fan and cannot get a ticket, shame on you. You had a chance to get one a long time ago. The other fans, the ones we see every week, deserve this incredible experience.

09.29.15
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Temple’s Area No. 79

That's a lot of valuable land recently cleared.

That’s a lot of valuable real estate recently cleared.

My late father, an old Navy officer, knows all about things in the water and one of his favorite sayings was “if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck.”

If you take a close look at a map that will be introduced as part of a City Council bill, you can see a lot of quacking going on at the corner of 15th and Montgomery.

UFO enthusiasts have Area No. 51 in the Nevada desert to point to as the center of a conspiracy theory. Temple’s on-campus stadium advocates now have Area No. 79.

150145 Map Set, As Introduced (1)

Area No. 79

Area No. 79

Well, look at building No. 79 on this map of something Temple University is introducing in Philadelphia City Council. It is listed as a “proposed building.” That’s an awfully big “building” for that spot right at the corner of 15th and Montgomery. There are three dates on that bill and the next time it is on the docket is for Sept. 30, 2015 which, in case you’ve noticed, is tomorrow. City Council Bill No. 15014500 looks like a you-know-what.

It’s not quite large enough for a stadium, but it is almost twice the size of the current Liacouras Center parking garage. Since the rumored stadium location is an east-west grid that includes Norris Park, Geasey Field, the tennis courts, the Student Pavilion, it looks like the “proposed building” is a parking garage for the new stadium. To me, it would make just as much sense to knock everything down from Montgomery North through Norris and put the stadium right there, but I’m not an urban planner.

Already, some land has been cleared as you can see from the above photo. A few months ago, the Triangle Apartments were knocked down at Broad and Norris, creating a lot of open space between Broad Street and, err, Area No. 79. Throw in the fact that the Student Pavilion is scheduled to be knocked down and that creates more space.

Some big contributors have said that they have been shown a mock drawing of a potential stadium. The rumor going around on Cherry and White Day was a Power 5 invitation was possible only when Temple announced an on-campus stadium.

Temple officials like athletic director Pat Kraft have been playing it coy, saying a stadium would be nice but it was above their heads. Maybe they were talking about the Board of Trustees; maybe it was City Council.

It’s certainly not a done deal yet, but it appears that people are at the table. Someday, someone is going to have to say what Area No. 79 is and that day could be closer than we think.

12.16.14
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Temple’s Hype Machine Needs to Get Grinding Now

Owls need to get Tyler (8) and Kyle's (79) name out there now and let their play do the rest in 2015.

Owls need to get Tyler (8) and Kyle’s (79) name out there now and let their play do the rest in 2015.

There can be little doubt that Tyler Matakevich and Kyle Friend will be the two best players on the 2015 version of the Temple Owls. Heck, they were this past season.

Temple promotions hit a home run with this comic book since it was written about all over the country.

Temple promotions hit a home run with this comic book since it was written about all over the country.

Today’s release of the All-American team was a perfect illustration of why both guys need to be heavily promoted for the Rimington and Bednarik Awards for the nation’s best center and linebacker, respectively.

You cannot tell me that there are nine linebackers in the country better than the Owls’ Tyler Matakevich or nine centers better than his teammate, Kyle Friend, who manhandled a first-round NFL draft choice from Notre Dame two seasons ago. Yet that is precisely what the Associated Press’ All-American team release was telling me today.

Active career tackle leaders in all divisions. Source: NCAA

Active career tackle leaders in all divisions.
Source: NCAA

Heavily promoting both for the nation’s top award at those positions would help solve that problem. Temple did the same in 1986 for Paul Palmer, when it came up with a clever comic book idea that promoted Boo-Boo for the Heisman Trophy. He did not win it, coming as close as possible—losing to Miami’s Vinny Testaverde and ahead of such luminaries as Oklahoma’s Brian Bosworth and Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh.

The Owls’ promotion department—not the sports information arm led by Al Shrier–mailed the comic book to all 1,056 of the Heisman voters at the time and, since many of the Heisman voters were members of the national press corps, a few of them took the time to write a column about it and Palmer’s name was out there in places it would have not normally been.

One mile from history but 1,000 miles from making a national impact is how this BP I-95 billboard campaign failed.

One mile from history but 1,000 miles from making a national impact is how this BP I-95 billboard campaign failed.

The Owls’ mounted a half-hearted campaign to get Bernard Pierce the Heisman, but put it up only on billboards in the Philadelphia area and it drew little notice across the country.

Shoot for the top and settle for something less or shoot for the top and get to the top. It’s up to Temple now. They have the ball and a chance to score big now. Let’s hope they don’t use three wides and ignore the running game here, too.

The Owls’ 2014 running game might have been a joke, but copying the comic book idea for these two guys would not be.

12.06.14
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Plenty to Play For, Just Not a Bowl

Sadly, the final gameday of the season.

Sadly, the final gameday of the season.

There are a lot of people who live in a fantasy world who believe that a team without a significant fan base and no bowl tie-in is going to somehow magically appear in a bowl if it becomes qualified because of things like TV ratings and conference affiliations.

Count me out of that group.

There’s plenty to play for, though, tonight when Temple travels to Tulane (7:30).  The game is on a real ESPN network (the duece), not ESPN3 or ESPN News or ESPNU so there will be a significant potential audience out there. The Owls will be playing to avoid a third-straight losing season and that is important.

The fact that Temple has done nothing about an abysmal punt return game is symptomatic of a larger overall leadership problem.

The fact that Temple has done nothing about an abysmal punt return game is symptomatic of a larger overall leadership problem.

There is just not a bowl game on the line.

Temple is not going to a bowl game with a win on Saturday, even if it is a 63-point effort like the one it had three years ago in West Point. Temple’s elimination game was two weeks ago, not today, and the Owls rolled out an uninspired offensive game plan against Cincinnati that belied that sense of urgency. Forget the calls for a play-action passing game and some semblance of a running game. Why didn’t Temple even TRY to use a slippery punt returner like Nate L. Smith instead of John Christopher to at least artificially pump some juice into the team?

Temple got zero yards from its punt return game … again.  It got nothing from its run game … again.

Those are two things fans should hope at least are addressed tonight.

Temple’s bowl chances might have been dashed before the season even started when American Athletic Conference Commissioner Mike Aresco “sold” the rights to the conference’s sixth bowl tie-in to none other than CUSA. It was a monumental blunder.

The irony of this is dripping.  Temple’s 8-4 team did not get into a bowl because the MAC had too few tie-ins and its 6-6 team will not get into a bowl because conferences like the MAC and CUSA have too many. This kind of stuff happens only to Temple. You cannot make this stuff up. Temple’s major reason for leaving the MAC was getting more opportunities for a bowl and now the conference they go to sell a bowl where Temple would have appeared.

Any Temple fans up for a couple of winter days in the Bahamas? Sorry, we sold that bowl.

In the same category was UCF’s miracle win over ECU on Thursday night. Temple had a slight chance of backing into the fifth tie-in if Memphis moved up to a BCS game but, for that to happen, Memphis would have had to win the league outright and Fresno State would have had to knock Boise State out in the Mountain West title game. A head-scratching UCF Hail Mary allowed UCF to share the title with Memphis and eliminated even that sliver of Temple hope.

So, in a sense, Temple was beaten again by a Hail Mary pass, leaving winning tonight and at least some momentum into next season as the best the Owls can reasonably hope to accomplish.

Even given that, only a backroom Hail Mary in a smoke-filled room on Bowl Selection Sunday can extend this season beyond today and those kind of plays never go Temple’s way.