Category Archives: football

10.26.13
by

Rocket scientists, they are not

How this guy didn't get the ball 25 times against that defense with a 28-7 lead, I'll never understand.

How this guy didn’t get the ball 25 times against that defense with a 28-7 lead, I’ll never understand.

Today was the first time I’ve ever NOT been excited to have a 28-7 lead late in the first half.

“You watch,” I said to the people I was watching the game with, “with the rocket scientists we have running this team, we’ll lose.”

I never hated being right so much before, either.

Given the gift of 28-7,
you pound and ground so much
you make Steve Addazio
look like Air Coryell

Football is not rocket science. You have a 28-7 lead, you run Kenny Harper inside behind a 305-pound (average) offensive line against a defense that had trouble stopping people all year. Just to mix things up, you run the “read option” and pitch the ball out to Zaire Williams, who rarely fails to get around the end or, if nothing is there, have your talented quarterback turn the ball up inside. If you HAVE to throw, allow P.J. Walker to drop deep, draw the rush to him, and dump off safe screen passes to Williams, who is unstoppable on that play.

You accomplish two things by that strategy: Move the ball, score points, and keep the ball away from an uber-talented quarterback, Garrett Gilbert. Score points, chew some clock. Given the gift of 28-7, you pound and ground so much you make Steve Addazio look like Air Coryell.

Click on Dave Clawson for a blueprint on how to build three winning programs.

Click on Dave Clawson for a blueprint on how to build three winning programs.

Score points, chew some clock, move the ball. Fortunate enough to get a 28-7 lead, that should have been the mantra. You might not get seven every time, but I saw no indication that the SMU defense was able to stop Williams the (too) few times he had the ball.

It should not take a rocket scientist to figure that out, but there is not an accomplished head coach on the staff among the rocket scientists running this program.

Heck, the only guy with head-coaching experience on the Temple staff, Ed Foley, was a failed head coach at Fordham. Dave Clawson was a much better coach there before him and Joe Moorhead a much better one after him (see inset story on Clawson).

I wish Clawson (my choice at the end of last season) would come here to fix things, but that’s water under the dam.

Damn.

Matt Rhule’s not getting fired. Temple’s got no money. No money. Fans who want to fire coaches have to understand the financial reality involved in hiring one. That’s a big commitment. When you make a decision to hire a coach, you stick with him until the contract runs out because this is a state-related school and Bill Cosby doesn’t pick up the tab for head coaches anymore (like he did with Ron Dickerson).  Hopefully, it’s a year-to-year, but I doubt it.

Make that 9 carries a 25 and Temple wins going away.

Make that 9 carries a 25 and Temple wins going away.

The reality is that Temple has lost to two teams it should not have lost to (Fordham and Idaho), beat a team it was supposed to beat, Army, and had 59 points scored on it by a two-win team.

Unacceptable, even for a first-year head coach.

When are we going to beat someone we’re NOT supposed to beat?

I’m not holding my breath.

Phil Snow’s not getting fired, either. I think Matt Rhule is “too nice a guy” to make the hard decisions he has to make at the end of this season and that’s not a hard decision for us, but it is for him.

A lot of that has to do with lack of talent on defense and poorer coaching schemes (geez, if the guy is going to throw 600 yards on you, might help by sending the best tackler in the nation straight ahead on blitzes instead of having him cover Deion Sanders’ kid … just a thought). People who preach patience have got to know that this team returned eight starters on offense and nine on defense, won four games last year, and was expected at minimum … minimum … to either match or improve that.

It’s not going to happen and I don’t think it’s Steve Addazio’s fault. That’s a damn shame because as good as P.J. Walker is, I see his career developing along the same lines as Henry Burris’ career did under Ron Dickerson: Plenty of yards and TDs, but plenty of losses. A 1-11 record is going to lose a lot of recruits and Temple is going to get caught up in the same losing spin cycle Burris did under Dickerson and players like Dan Klecko and Walter Washington did with Bobby Wallace. It’s a vicious cycle and I see no way of avoiding it other than getting someone in here who knows what he’s doing and that, sadly, is above Temple’s pay scale given they already have to pay this guy.

More reality: Temple was outscored, 45-21, in the second half. In three other games (Houston, Notre Dame and Cincinnati), Temple had zero points in the second half. If you get the idea that not much work is getting done at halftime, you get the right idea.

Good work before halftime, though.

Too bad college football doesn’t have a 14-point Mercy Rule.

Related:

http://www.rantsports.com/ncaa-football/2013/10/12/5-coaches-who-would-deliver-a-winner-to-temple-football/

10.26.13
by

One thing is certain: It won’t be a tie

Not my ticket. Two things that struck me about this. The game kicked off at 8:30 p.m. on a Friday night on the East Coast (and I don't think TV had anything to do with it) and 31 seats in one row is a lot of seats.

Not my ticket. Two things that struck me about this. The game kicked off at 8:30 p.m. on a Friday night on the East Coast (and I don’t think TV had anything to do with it) and 31 seats in one row is a lot of seats.

Most people agree that Temple’s football game at SMU today (3 p.m., ESPN3; 97.5, The Fanatic) will be a high-scoring one, very unlike the last two meetings between the teams.

One thing it will not be that the other two games were are ties: SMU and Temple tied, 6-6, in 1942 and 7-7 in 1946. In the 1946 game, SMU was called for offsides on a missed Temple extra point that enabled the Owls to kick a second extra point.

Temple was the only team from the "traditional East" the Mustangs played that year.

Temple was the only team from the “traditional East” the Mustangs played that year.

I’m old enough to remember college football games that were tied and I’ve never really understood them. I became a Temple football fan while sitting through a Temple tie with visiting Villanova, 13-13, in the early days of coach Wayne Hardin.

At the time, I was just a young kid who was a fan of both teams: Villanova, because my dad went there; Temple, because its games were on Philadelphia television (Al Meltzer play-by-play, Charlie Swift color).

The SMU team Temple tied in 1946 played in the Cotton Bowl that same calendar year.

The SMU team Temple tied in 1946 played in the Cotton Bowl in a regular-season game against Texas A&M that same calendar year. Cotton Bowl was SMU’s home field back then.

When Villanova coach Lou Ferry took three knees to avoid a loss deep in his own territory, I saw all I needed to see. I became a Temple fan for life.

Temple, in my mind, was the team that always tried to win. Against Penn State years later, the Owls lost, 31-30, because they eschewed the extra point on the final play of the game. Temple also played a 17-17 tie at Cincinnati. To me, a wasted trip.

I’ve never understood the concept of ties. They didn’t settle for them in basketball and they should not settle for them in football.

While I like the new overtime rules better than the old ties, I’d still prefer to see an extra quarter before going to them. They must have had their reasons, though.

Another theme about today is the back-to-the-future aspect of TV-watching. I thought those days of being in the MAC and watching the game on the computer were over, but they are not. No local TV station chose to pick up the ESPN3 feed, but why not Temple TV (Channel 50 on Comcast)? Today, on Channel 50 between 3:30 and 6:30 is the following programming:  Campbell’s Comedy Show, Jock Joint, The Grog Show, Temple Smash and a rerun of Temple Update. Seems to me like it would not take much to plug in the HDMI feed of ESPN3 and broadcast it over the air, with permission from ESPN. Maybe Cal and Lucille Rudman can look into this for the future. The last two games I watched on computer did not have a good ending: Temple at Bowling Green (2011) and Temple at Idaho (2013).

At least this Temple-SMU game will not end in a tie and hopefully the Owls will have this one wrapped up before they have to play an overtime. If they do, I will take back all of the bad things I said about Matt Rhule.

Err, at least some of them.

Early TV. I think the Rutgers-Houston game will be on Channel 6, even though the current listing says "to be announced."

Early TV. Unfortunately, we get UConn-UCF  on Channel 6 instead of RU-Houston.

09.19.13
by

Throwback Thursday: Temple 28, Virginia Tech 24

Click on headline for complete story

Click on headline for complete story

In an effort to lift myself out of a deep depression caused by losing two winnable games in consecutive weeks, this week’s Throwback Thursday is an effort to recall that all things are possible.

Interesting that there is no video of this game anywhere on the internet, but you can get a lot of video on Virginia Tech 62, Temple 7 and Virginia Tech 35, Temple 13 and Virginia Tech 20, Temple 10. Frank Beamer must have confiscated all film and had it destroyed.

Hopefully, the Owls can get their act together by Idaho and put a good season together. Gosh, I’d just like to see one DB step in FRONT of a pass and intercept it, rather than let the receiver catch it. That’s a concept I haven’t seen (seemingly) since the days of Anthony Young, Bob Mizia, Marc Baxter, Todd Bowles, Eddie Parker, Terry Wright and Kevin Ross. I think all but one of those guys was coached by Nick Rapone.

09.17.13
by

Einstein’s theory of Owl-tivity

Albert Einstein talks Temple football.

Albert Einstein talks Temple football.

Got to wonder what the smartest man in the history of the world would be thinking right now about Temple football.

Since the 30-minute conversation I had with Wayne Hardin on Saturday was pre-game and not post-game and I lost coach Hardin’s number, I can only move on to the second-smartest man, Albert Einstein.

I think our conversation would have gone something like this:

TFF: Mr. Einstein, you saw the Fordham game, how would you fix this Temple team?

AE:  Simple mathematics, my friend. Ten plus 5+5+5 + 20/12 and 20/23=6, maybe 7.

TFF: Huh?

AE: Look, your No. 10 can catch, throw and run, right? You only have him catching once or twice now. That’s just not maximizing his output.  Have him come around — what do you call it?

TFF: The end?

AE: Yes, the end, and have your No. 12 pitch the ball backward to No. 10  five times and then have No. 10 throw the ball. That’s the first part of the five equation.

I guess only Einstein knows Coyer can run, catch and throw.

I guess only Einstein knows Coyer can run, catch and throw.

TFF: What’s the second?

AE: Keep him at, what do you call it, tight end and throw him the ball five times.

TFF: What’s the third?

AE: Have him come around the end and toss it to him like he’s going to throw the ball, but make it a running play behind that  big guy who blocks well — what do you call it?

TFF: A pulling guard?

AE: Yes, a pulling guard. That No. 63, what’s his name?

TFF: Pete White.

AE: Yes,  have No. 10 follow Pete White and take off through the secondary. There you have it: Five throws, five catches and five runs. The defense won’t know what No. 10 is going to do when he’s got the ball in his hands. It’s called deception. Works a lot in all kinds of endeavors. Mix it up. Run these 15 plays alternately with your normal regular plays. What do you call them?

TFF: The Tennessee-Chattanooga plays.

AE: Yes, the Tennessee-Chattanooga plays.

TFF: What’s the 20/12 mean?

AE: Twelve, the man who throws the ball, is your  what?

Khalif Herbin meets the media on Tuesday and talks about his time in witness protection.

This could be Khalif Herbin meeting the media on Tuesday and talking about his time in witness protection. It’s been so long since we’ve seen his dynamic skills on the field we forget what he looks like. He’s 100 percent healthy, thank God.

TFF: Quarterback.

AE: Yes,  quarterback. He throws the ball 20 times. He’s pretty good at it. Have him do that about 20 times a game.

TFF: What does the 20/23 mean?

AE:  That number 23 is fast and he’s got some nifty moves. When 12 isn’t throwing the ball, give it to him about the same number of times 12 passes it. Also might help to have 12 drop back, draw the rush to him and then dump it off to 23. What do you call that?

TFF: A screen pass.

AE: Yes, a screen pass. Get No. 23 in space … and I don’t mean intergalactic space — just in the space behind the defenders and watch him go.

TFF: What’s the six, maybe seven, part mean?

AE:  Six wins, maybe seven. But listen. It all starts with getting No. 10 five carries, five passes, five catches. Nothing else works without that baseline formula. That way, you control the ball, create deception, score a lot of points. Let me ask you a question.

TFF: Shoot.

AE: You know about E=MC2, right?

TFF: Yes. It’s your Theory of Relativity.

AE: Yes. Do you have anyone on your team who matches the C part of the equation, someone with the speed of light?

TFF: Nobody that fast, but Khalif Herbin is the closest thing we have and he’s been on the bench.

AE: Well, get him on the field then and isolate him in situations where he can best use that speed, like quick passes and reverse. If he’s having trouble catching the ball, hand it off to him as a change-up running back.

TFF: Got it. Gee, thanks, Mr. Einstein. I’ll get this off to Matt Rhule and Marcus Satterfield as fast as I can. One more question.

AE: Anything.

TFF: What do you do to fix the other side of the ball, what we call the defense?

AE: Tough question. Who do you think I am, Einstein? That’s a joke.

TFF: Yeah, I figured that.

Thursday: Throwback Thursday

09.14.13
by

The Blackest of Black Saturdays

Don’t look, OK look. This should have been more than one guy putting pressure on QB.

Many of you are too young to remember Black Friday.
Phillies fans of a certain age remember it too well.
Phillies up, 5-3, two outs, two strikes on Davey Lopes in a key NLCS game on a Friday. Larry Bowa picks up a  ball and throws out Lopes. Game over.

guys

No, the Lopes is called safe (he was out), Phils lose game and series and the day will forever be known as Black Friday in Phillies history.
For a Temple football program that has had a lot of Black Saturdays, this was unquestionably the worst.
Call it the Blackest of Black Saturdays.
You can’t lose to Fordham after coming back from a 19-7 deficit to take a 29-24 lead.
You just can’t.
Walking out of the stadium –heck, even at halftime – I told my friend, Matt, “This is what happens when you let the players and parents hire the coach.”

Those kids and parents will be gone soon, but I and the thousands of long-suffering Temple fans will remain and have to, as Emperor Hirohito put it post two nukes,  endure the unendurable.

I think I’d rather be nuked than go through another Bobby Wallace/Ron Dickerson/Jerry Berndt Error.
I was for Matt Rhule to get the NEXT head coaching job at Temple, not this one. My reasoning was simple as well as brutally logical. Have him go somewhere like Kent State and prove he can win (like Darrell Hazel did) and THEN he could come to Temple. Why did no other school consider Matt Rhule?  I wanted Mike MacIntrye (now at Colorado) to be head coach or Dave Clawson (now at Bowling Green). The Owls could not have outbid Colorado for MacIntyre, a former Temple assistant, but they sure as hell could have gotten Clawson.

clawson

Helluva nice guy, Matt Rhule, but you know what Leo Durocher said about nice guys.

Jensen was right ... both times. ...

Jensen was right … both times. …

The coaching these first three games has been beyond underwhelming:

  • How come Chris Coyer has yet to throw a pass off a fake?
  • How come Coyer, who has Bernard Pierce-like instincts running the ball in the open field, has yet to get a carry? Mystifying.
  • Why hasn’t Nick Visco kicked earlier, when the kid never missed an extra point in high school? A strong argument can be made that had Visco kicked from the jump, Temple would be 2-1 now instead of 0-3.
  • How come 6-foot-6 Deon Miller doesn’t get a fade EVERY time the Owls get into the red zone (he got his first fade Saturday and it resulted in a pass interference).
  •  How come only one screen pass ALL YEAR to Zaire Williams, when it’s obvious no one can stop that play?

Crazy, stupid, stuff.

Memo to Marcus Satterfield: If you want to have a winning season, mix 20 Zaire Williams runs and 20 Connor Reilly passes with these six plays on a continuous loop. If you want to go 0-12, keep running your Tennessee-Chattanooga bullbleep plays.

snowsnip3

TFF, Jan. 18, 2013

When the Owls got a first down deep in the Fordham red zone late in the game, I was screaming at the TV in the concourse (I couldn’t bear to watch it live), “GIVE THE BALL TO KENNY HARPER FOUR TIMES!” Instead, they throw it to Chris Coyer and get the touchdown right away.

The gentleman who was standing next to me will vouch for what I said.

Hey, I like Temple touchdowns as much as the next guy, but giving it to Harper to kill some more clock was the right call. There’s no doubt in my mind Harper would have scored, maybe a play or two later, but he would have scored. When it comes to keeping the ball away from a Phil Snow-coached defense, that’s the only call.
The day Rhule hired Snow to be his defensive coordinator, I noted the only reason I could think of was because he was Rhule’s old buddy at UCLA. This is what a I wrote that day: “I’m all for hiring old buddies, but not old buddies who give up 38 points a game.”
That was against FBS competition.
Now he’s given up 30 points against FCS competition.
That’s worse.

Heck, we all know Rhule is a nice guy but he may be too nice a guy and the hiring of Snow is a perfect example of that. Another example is sticking with Cooper after two missed FGs and an extra point against ND. Visco should have gotten the start against Houston, period, end of story.

Back to Snow:

snowsnip1

TFF, Jan. 18, 2013

snowsnip2

If you guessed I’m not a fan of Phil Snow, you’ve guessed right.
Heck, you look at the entire Rhule staff and the only qualifications they have are they are all Rhule’s buddies.
This is why businesses, when they are looking for professionals to fill a key management position,  go through a grueling selection and interview process and pick the best guy for the job.
The new boss doesn’t say, “Gee, a guy who helped me when I was 21 needs this job, I’ll go hire him.”
That’s what happened at Temple.
We already had a guy who WAS a great defensive coordinator at Temple, Nick Rapone, who was interested in the job and had the best recommendations from the people who should matter most (former Temple players) and he was given a brush off. Now Rapone is the DBs coach of the Arizona Cardinals, but he would have stayed at Temple had he been offered the job by Rhule because his daughter is a Temple student.  Arizona head coach Bruce Arians loves him and called him the best DC in the country when Rapone was a 30-year-old DC at TU.  Arians put his money where his mouth was by hiring Rapone. Rhule could have handed over the keys to the Temple defense to Rapone and would not have had to worry one minute of one day. Now Rhule has to take the keys back from Snow and do something and fix a vehicle that has been totaled and can only be used for scrap metal now.
Ugh.
I guarantee you the Temple defense would be 10x better off with Rapone as DC than Snow.  Guarantee. So do these guys:

formerowlsrapone

Related:

http://articles.philly.com/1996-10-06/sports/25664940_1_owls-coach-ron-dickerson-football-coach

http://articles.philly.com/2012-12-06/sports/35650038_1_matt-rhule-steve-addazio-scot-loefler

http://www.fresnobee.com/2013/09/12/3495093/buffaloes-embrace-spartan-ethicex.html

http://temple.scout.com/2/1326496.html

09.13.13
by

Respect everyone, fear nobody

"I think I might have been adopted." Photo by Howard Smith

“I think I might have been adopted.”

When it comes to Saturday afternoons, the mindset I’ve always hoped Temple football would adopt is this:
Respect everyone, fear no one.
I hope this team respects Fordham and plays up to their ability for once. Fordham has a very good team. Temple has very good players but has not played like a good team yet.

Click on the photo of Juice for a preview of the Fordham game.

Click on the photo of Juice for a preview of the Fordham game.

I don’t think this team has played up to their ability in the first two weeks.
I thought there was a little too much “satisfaction” following the 28-6 opening-game loss to Notre Dame.
I was not happy or even encouraged by that performance.
A major college football team has got to make extra points and chip-shot field goals. A major college football defense should know to how to play a deep zone and keep everything in front of them with 1 minute, 14 seconds left in the first half. A major college football team should be able to complete touchdown passes.
I haven’t seen any of that in the first two weeks.
There should be no “coddling” of players who don’t perform. Next one in should be the standard.


There should be no “coddling”
of players who don’t perform.
Next one in should be the standard.

Did I expect Temple to win at Notre Dame? No, but I didn’t expect 28-6. Why do schools like Tulsa, UConn, Navy and USF go into Notre Dame SINCE 2009 and come away with wins and Temple gets blown out?
Not acceptable. It’s just not.
When does it get to be Temple’s turn to win one of these marquee games?
It all starts with playing well against some of the “lesser” opponents and building momentum from there. For Temple this year, it will all have to start on Saturday against Fordham and hopefully lead up to better things like an upset of Louisville on Oct. 5.
When Bruce Arians played defending national champion BYU at the Vet, his teams slugged it out toe-to-toe with the best in college football. Temple lost to BYU, but it was 26-24, not 28-6. The Arians’ teams played with a swagger. Did they care that was BYU? No.
Struggling to score against a Houston team that gave up 72 points to SMU last year and 30 points to Texas State (not Texas A&M, Texas Tech or even Texas-El Paso) is also unacceptable.
There are a lot of points left on the field because the players have not been put into a good position to score (see the six plays in the post immediately below that we have not seen this season for an example).
If there’s one thing Temple fans want to see this week, it’s getting the ball in the hands of the playmakers and those playmakers making plays.
Is it too much to ask? God, I hope not.

Tomorrow: Tailgate checklist (early) and game analysis (late)

09.11.13
by

The road to seven wins

Matt Rhule’s teleconference on Monday.

Before the season started, even Stevie Wonder could see how the 2013 season broke down for the Temple Owls.

There were five “probable” wins on the schedule in Fordham, Idaho, Army, Memphis and UConn and three “probable” losses on the schedule in Louisville, Cincinnati and Notre Dame.

Click on photo of George O'Leary for five possible college football upsets this week.

Click on photo of George O’Leary for five possible college football upsets this week.

The key to a winning season, then, comes down to holding serve in those five games and splitting two of the four remaining games: UCF, Rutgers, Houston and SMU.

Well, since Houston was a winnable game left on the table, the Owls have to win two of three. I think Rutgers is a very gettable game and maybe SMU. I don’t think the Owls beat UCF, even at home.

If they don’t utilize their offensive weapons better or fix the kicking game, it’s just not going to happen for Temple this season. I don’t see how when you have a Chris Coyer, a Zaire Williams, a Khalif Herbin and a Jalen Fitzpatrick, you can’t put those players in a better position to score than you have the first two games. (Although Herbin did not play the first two games.)

That has got to be fixed.


I haven’t seen very many good
offensive plays in the first two games.
Coyer running the ball off a pitchout
would be a good play.
Another is getting Coyer
a simple pitch out to throw
the ball downfield.
Heck, pitching the ball out
to Coyer 10 times a game
(five throws, five runs)
is a better play than any
10 I’ve seen so far this season.

Heck, even the probable wins might be in jeopardy if the Owls don’t start lighting up the scoreboard the way they are capable of going forward. This is a very good offensive line but some solid skill position people have been under-utilized so far.

The defense, which held Notre Dame to one touchdown in the second half, looks like it’s good enough to keep the Owls in the games against just about everyone left else on the schedule. Phil Snow has been a better defensive coordinator than I thought he would be.

So it’s mostly about fixing the offense now.

John Chaney became a Hall of Fame coach by consistently getting the ball  in the hands of his scorers. Matt Rhule is going to have to do a better job of getting the ball in the hands of his scorers.

You can talk all you want about the offensive coordinator, Marcus Satterfield, doing this but only Rhule knows what many of those guys have done in the past and he’s got to dictate the flow of the ball. When you have John Christopher throwing the ball, that’s a bad play and not just because it didn’t work but because Fitzpatrick and Coyer are better passers than Christopher is.

Islamabad checking in; uh-oh.

Islamabad checking in; uh-oh.

Satterfield might not know that, but Rhule certainly does.

I haven’t seen very many good offensive plays in the first two games. Coyer running the ball off a pitchout would be a good play. Another is getting Coyer a simple pitch out to throw the ball downfield.  Heck, pitching the ball out to Coyer 10 times a game (five throws, five runs) is a better play than any 10 I’ve seen so far this season. A reverse to Khalif Herbin probably will work, as well as a bubble screen with him behind a couple of blockers. A fade pass in the end zone to 6-6 wide receiver Deon Miller would be hard to stop. Getting the ball 20 times to a weapon like Zaire Williams behind this offensive line would also help put points on the board. None of those approaches have been used yet. Maybe they are saving all of that for the bowl game.

If so, there won’t be one.

09.07.13
by

No home run hitters

I hope the fans who came to this game keep coming back.

I hope the fans who came to this game keep coming back.

On a day when Al Golden got the first signature win of his coaching career, the players who lobbied so hard for an ex-assistant of Golden to be hired as a head coach failed to deliver one for him.

It’ll be awhile now before Matt Rhule gets his first signature win because wins in the next two are merely holding serve.

Click on photo for my story on game that appeared on Rantsports.com

Click on photo for my story on game that appeared on Rantsports.com

A three-point underdog at home has got to beat a Houston team that went 5-7 a year ago and lost (big) to Marshall, SMU and East Carolina. Heck, beating Houston should not be considered a signature win, just a must one. This team allowed 72 points to a 6-6 SMU team. Seventy-two. They didn’t bring a whole new group of players to Philadelphia. These were the same guys. The … same …  guys (minus an NFL player, who graduated).

The Temple offense has to score more than two touchdowns against that team.

Whether it was Rhule’s fault or the players’ fault is immaterial by now, but there were a number of curious developments or non-developments I felt contributed to the loss:

  • This team reminds me of the Phillies: A lot of singles’ hitters and no home run hitters. The Owls have a lot of guys who can catch an 11-yard out and fall down. They have a lot of possession receivers, but no “home run” threat, a guy who can take a bubble screen to the house (unless you are counting 4.34 sprinter Khalif Herbin, who must be in witness protection somewhere or Zaire Williams, who they never throw a screen pass to).
  • I’m not as fixated on the kicking situation as everyone else because this team should be scoring touchdowns, not field goals. Does Temple ever throw the ball INTO the end zone? I haven’t seen much evidence of that. You can’t score touchdowns if you don’t throw the ball INTO the end zone on a more regular basis than Temple currently does. Who knows? You might even get a pass interference call.

    According to Mike Jensen's story in Sunday's Inquirer, he writes "it sounds as if it might be Nick Visco" as the starting kicker against Fordham.

    According to Mike Jensen’s story in Sunday’s Inquirer, he writes “it sounds as if it might be Nick Visco” as the starting kicker against Fordham.

  • Speaking of the kicking game, we heard all summer that Jim Cooper Jr. was locked in a neck-and-neck battle with fellow true freshman Nick Visco for the kicking job. In the scrimmage at Neshaminy, only one kicker nailed two of three from beyond the 50, including one against the rush without a tee in six-inch grass and he wasn’t named Paul Layton or Jim Cooper Jr. Yet we didn’t see that kicker on Saturday.   Only one kicker in the history of Pennsylvania football has hit extra-point attempts at a 96 percent rate (minimum attempts 100) and he is not named Jim Cooper Jr. or Paul Layton. We haven’t seen him kick in a real game yet. They must be saving his red shirt.
  • Does it concern you that Temple didn’t score a point in the second half? Doesn’t bode well for the offensive adjustments being made by the Temple OC Marcus Satterfield at halftime. Just for giggles, I went back over Nick Rolovich’s  record while OC at Nevada. As I guessed, he was never shut out in any second half. Rolovich accepted, then turned down, the TU OC job, leaving the door open for Satterfield.
  • While on the subject of Nicks (Visco and Rolovich), add in Nick Rapone. No Temple defense has ever given up 524 yards of total offense when Rapone was DC. Now Nick is in Arizona working as DB coach with two Temple guys, Bruce Arians and Todd Bowles. Something tells me the Cardinals’ defense is in good hands. By the way, Rapone was “very interested” in the DC job before it was awarded to Phil Snow. Since Rapone, who was FCS defensive coordinator of the year at Delaware, has a daughter who currently attends Temple, he likely would not have accepted the NFL job in Arizona had he got the TU job first.
  • If you are going to try a wide receiver pass, why have John Christopher do it when you have two accomplished passers who already play the position (Chris Coyer and Jalen Fitzpatrick)? Just a thought.
  • Why on third-and-nine with Juice Granger coming in cold off the bench do you have him throwing a 40-yard bomb? How about an 11-yard pass just to move the sticks? Just a thought.
  • Now that Cody Booth, who owns the best pair of hands on the team, is a tackle, how come Temple never uses the tackle eligible play?
  • Now that Richie Leone hit 5 for 5 field goals against Temple, maybe recruiting somebody like Devonte Watson to block kicks wasn’t such a crazy April Fool’s Joke after all. watson
  • How come we haven’t seen Coyer throw one halfback (or H-back) pass off a simple quick toss from Connor Reilly? Are they saving that for Fordham?
  • Zaire Williams should get the ball 20 times a game just one game to see how many yards he racks up. I’m willing to bet it’s over 100.
  • I really like everything I see from Connor Reilly expect the dearth of touchdown passes. Maybe I’m crazy, but I think part of the job requirement of being a FBS college quarterback is to throw a lot of  touchdown passes.   I remember going to a game once and seeing a Temple quarterback throw five touchdown passes against a conference foe.  One game, five touchdown passes. Geez, I hope I see something like that soon. Maybe Saturday. Maybe.

It’s been a long time since Adam DiMichele played here. Or Bruce Francis.