Category Archives: K.C. Keeler

10.04.25
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It’s official: Keeler is ahead of schedule

Leave it to first-year Temple head football coach K.C. Keeler to set the bar high and then do a Fosbury Flop over it by the fifth game.

As early as mid-summer, Keeler said he wanted his team to be thinking about championships this year, not some far-off year in the future.

Owls sing the school fight song afterward holding the best helmets (Cherry) in college football. (Photo Courtesy of Zamani Feelings.)

It’s official now. Keeler and the Owls are ahead of schedule because, while many had the Owls beating UMass and Howard, nobody had the Owls beating Oklahoma, Georgia Tech or UTSA in the pre-season prognostications.

By this week, though, some pretty knowledgeable college football observers–Gary Segars, Bud Elliott, Colby Dant and Ryan McIntyre–had saw enough of how hard the Owls played and how well Keeler coached in that first four to pick them to win outright today (see our Friday post for the receipts).

And they did, 27-21, at Lincoln Financial Field, rallying from a 14-3 halftime deficit to pull it out against a pretty darn good team.

How good?

UTSA hung with Texas A&M before losing, 42-24, and, at the time Keeler said he wanted his Owls to be thinking championships, some people actually picked the Roadrunners to win the American Conference. After that loss to the Aggies, UTSA head coach Jeff Traylor said: “We have championship fiber.”

It’s one thing to say you have championship fiber and it’s another thing to show it and the Owls were the team who showed it in the second half, outscoring the Roadrunners, 21-7.

They did it with an offensive line that kept Evan Simon clean and a defensive line that put the other guy on his backside and running for his life on the few occasions they didn’t. Going into the season, Keeler said this was the best defensive line he’s ever had and he won 271 games as a head coach coming into the season so he had some good ones.

Then he said he “never saw a group improve as much” as his offensive line, the product of “iron sharpens iron” for both spring and summer ball. They opened holes for both Jay Ducker (the MAC’s leading rusher in 2021) and Hunter Smith (the Sun Belt’s leading rusher in 2023). Smith’s 54-yard run for a score put the Owls up, 17-13.

That aged well.

On a beautiful 82-degree afternoon in South Philly, the Temple fans who made it found out that Keeler wasn’t blowing smoke. Nothing wins more football games than putting the other guy on his ass and the Owls did that in the second half.

Going into a two-game home stretch that included UTSA on the front end and Navy on the back end, the thought process was this: Split the two and the Owls have a chance at a bowl. Sweep both and the Owls have a chance to face Memphis in the league title game.

Might as well set that bar a little higher in one week and jump over it. That’s all Keeler ever wanted and that’s more than Temple fans could have ever expected.

Monday: What We Don’t Care About

10.03.25
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Temple-UTSA: Some educated guesses

Only a couple of things are certain around 1 p.m. or so at the Sports Complex in Philadelphia on Saturday.

The Philadelphia Flyers will be playing indoors next door and the Temple Owls will be hosting UTSA outdoors at Lincoln Financial Field on a jammed packed day of Philly sports. My guess is 17,000 plus fans in both places. Between 1-4 while things are being settled in those two places, about 45,000 Phillies fans will arrive on the scene for some pre-game tailgating.

They will probably find Lot K closed and all Temple parking. Those fans can make a difference by making noise and standing on third down when the Owls are on defense.

If anyone tells you they know what the outcome of the football game will be, they are lying. The ball is a funny shape and takes odd bounces and this one figures to be close. If those balls bounce Temple’s way and the fans can make a difference, everybody leaves happy.

In between, there are some educated guesses on both sides.

It’s amazing to me that two separate betting sites have this game at a projected 28-27 Temple score and the line has remained with USTA a 6.5-point favorite. Both Gary Segars of Winning Cures All and the guys at The College Football Experience (including Colby Dant and Ryan McIntyre) like Temple.

TCFE has gone as far as to lock things up for Temple.

Bud Elliott of CBS Sports “The Cover Three” Podcast picked Temple OUTRIGHT on the Moneyline.

This can go either way but this win is right out there on the table for Temple to taste and so the Owls must do what they have to do to put a fork in it.

This is just the kind of game first-year Temple head coach K.C. Keeler has preached about for the last nine months. Almost every day Keeler said the conference games are going to be a “50/50” ball and the team that plays the cleaner game will come out on top.

Should be a beautiful day for a good chunk of the 250,000 Temple alumni living within an hour of LFF to make the trip to support the Owls.

So far, Temple has played pretty clean. It is one of only three FBS teams with no turnovers through four and there are 129 other FBS teams.

Now it’s time to move on to the next thing as former Temple head coach John Chaney famously said:

“Take care of the known and don’t worry about the unknown.”

So far, the “known” about UTSA is that it can run the ball with Robert Harvey, Jr. (is there a Robert Harvey Sr. of any note?), who is the leading rusher in the country.

So Temple needs to stop that known and do its best against the unknown.

That element is in good hands with Temple DC Brian L. Smith, who has had major success against UTSA. Last year, Smith held UTSA to 13 points through three quarters in a Rice win. Contrast that to former Temple DC Everett Withers “holding” UTSA to 51 points in that same season. To me, that’s the biggest improvement of the K.C. Keeler hire: Bringing in a DC with a history of success versus the handicap that Temple had the last two years, a DC (Withers) with a history of failure just because he was a friend of the head coach at the time. In 2021, Withers gave up nearly 40 ppg as DC at FIU. In 2023-24, Withers came pretty darn close to that at Temple (38.7 ppg).

Smith has revamped the scheme and put personnel in positions to win.

The other known is that UTSA is terrible against the pass and Temple quarterback Evan Simon is pretty good for the pass and the Owls must exploit that secondary.

Temple must also continue to run the ball well with the 2021 MAC leading rusher (Jay Ducker) and the 2023 leading Sun Belt rusher (Hunter Smith) controlling the game and the clock, all the while keeping Harvey and company off the field.

That’s the way we think things will go down. Because we don’t know for sure is the reason why we will show up and support and will be standing and making noise on third down.

All other Owl fans should do the same.

Very Late Saturday Night (pushing 11 p.m.): Game Analysis

Monday: What We Don’t Care About

Friday: Navy Preview

09.28.25
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Game Week: How good is UTSA?

UTSA has had an up-and-down season but hasn’t faced the quality of competition Temple has.

In between worrying about getting a parking pass and navigating traffic on Saturday, the next-in-line question for Temple fans should be this:

How good is UTSA?

Evan Simon cuts last year’s game down to one score with this bomb to Dante Wright. With Jay Ducker and Hunter Smith being able to establish a running game, Temple should be in this thing until the end. If the players take care of things one play and a time and not watch the scoreboard, Temple could win handily.

For fans, not players nor coaches because it would behoove the Owls to practice and prepare for the Roadrunners like they are as good as Georgia Tech or Oklahoma.

Spoiler alert (players, please turn away): They are not.

Even though Vegas has the Roadrunners as a 6.5-point favorite, I fully expect that to be bet down to 4.5 Wednesday and maybe a field goal by kickoff.

Let’s examine what they’ve done so far:

They got blown out by Texas A&M, 42-24. The Aggies are a good team, maybe as good as Oklahoma and slightly better than Georgia Tech.

However, UTSA’s last game–a 17-16 win at Colorado State–might provide more clues. Off that result, you can pretty much say the Roadrunners are on a par with the Rams and the Rams are really not good. Colorado State got blown out by Washington (38-21) and barely beat Northern Colorado–Northern Freaking Colorado–and that score was 21-17. They also lost to possibly the worst P4 team alive, Washington State, 20-3. Northern Colorado barely beat Houston Baptist and lost to Indiana State, two teams I think most college football experts would agree are far worse than anyone Temple’s played, including Howard and UMass.

So however good UTSA looked against Texas A&M and that wasn’t much, that was canceled out by how bad it looked at Colorado State.

If UTSA lets a team like that hang around with it, that bodes well for Temple. Temple has to sell out to stop the run because Robert Henry Jr. is the leading rusher in the country, but TU DC Brian L. Smith understands that a lot better than we do so we think that will be part of the gameplan. He understands a lot about UTSA and has beaten them before at Rice, something UTSA head coach Jeff Traylor acknowledged this week.

“I know the defensive coordinator is from Rice, who’s given us a pain in the rear end for the past five years.”

On the other side of the ball, it should be interesting to see how Temple’s new Mr. Outside (Hunter Smith) combines with Temple’s Mr. Inside (Jay Ducker) to both control the clock and set up deep play-action passes for Evan Simon. With the departure of Terrez Worthy over the weekend, Ducker is now No. 1 on the depth chart and Hunter Smith is No. 2. That means Temple has the 2021 leading rusher in the MAC and the 2023 leading rusher in the Sun Belt topping a deep running back room that also includes Joquez Smith.

This is not Oklahoma coming to town (1 p.m., ESPN+) on Saturday. It’s not even Georgia Tech.

Temple has been sharpened by that iron and, other than one Texas A&M game, the Roadrunners have been sharpened by, let’s say, plastic.

What Temple learned in its Georgia Tech game was that, after spotting the Yellowjackets a 21-0 lead, the Owls played even with that team the rest of the way.

If the Owls have learned their lesson and applied it in the bye week, this is win No. 3 for Temple.

If not, it’s another disappointing loss.

Stan Drayton might let that happen. I’m guessing K.C. Keeler won’t.

Friday: UTSA Preview

09.25.25
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Temple’s Secret Sauce: The American

Anyone who watched East Carolina dismantle defending American Conference champion Army on Thursday night had to come to the same conclusion I did:

This league–outside of Memphis–is nowhere near as good as it was last year.

Get rid of these white helmets and the Owls win 6 of their remaining 8 games.

Temple has eight games left, all in this conference. The secret sauce for the Owls’ success includes four things:

One, the AC isn’t as good as last year;

Two, Temple has the best head coach in the league;

Three, Temple might not have the best quarterback in the league (I think it might but the experts don’t) but it unquestionably has the best 1-2 QB combination.

Four, Temple doesn’t play Memphis (until, hopefully, the championship game).

Mix, stir, and this could be tasty.

What does this mean?

My glasses are not completely Cherry and White and I know some things can and will go wrong. That’s why no matter how well the Owls play in the final eight, I give them at least two losses.

Going into this season, nobody thought the Temple at Army game was in play.

I trust this guy with my team.

Now I think it is. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if Temple is the favorite going into that November game.

First things first, though.

Here’s how the season will break down (and remember you read it here first):

If Temple is able to split the next two games at home (UTSA and Navy), it finishes 6-6.

If Temple is able to sweep those next two, it goes 8-4 and has an outside–really outside–chance of making it to the title game at Memphis.

Best helmets in college football

Either way, it’s a complete culture change to what we’ve seen the last six years.

The biggest news out of the Edberg Olson Complex this week was that RB Terrez Worthy, one of my favorite Owls, quit due to “mental health issues.” That came six months after one of my other favorite Owls, John Adams, quit due to pretty much the same thing.

I didn’t know that was a thing that you could self-diagnose but I have to respect those two guys.

I go to the doctor twice a year and am always shocked when one of the questions is: “Do you ever think of killing yourself?”

Err, no, but if Temple kept either Rod Carey or Stan Drayton more than three years, ask me next time.

This is the burden of Temple fans. Why do we have starters leave for “mental health issues” and never have walk-ons do the same?

Fortunately, both the mental and physical health of this team other than my favorite RB seems to be OK. Temple will not face a team nearly as good as either Oklahoma or Georgia Tech this year. How they handle that next level down determines the Owls’ fate.

Mix in the best head coach in the league and some magic can happen. Not going to say eight wins or six wins but, given the competition ahead vs. the competition behind, color me optimistic.

That means Cherry helmets, not White ones.

Monday: Game Week

09.20.25
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Some old Stan Drayton habits die hard

K.C. Keeler has preached the difference between Temple competing for an American Conference championship this year and being an also-ran is playing a clean game.

Keeler: “You can’t spot anyone 21 points.”

In many respects, he and his coaching staff have cleaned things up.

They played four games without turnovers and forced at least one turnover in every game, which is something that cannot be said for any of the last three years.

Yet the challenge in the bye week is breaking those bad Stan Drayton habits that creeped up again in a 45-24 loss at No. 18 Georgia Tech on Saturday.

Speaking specifically about a linebacker who shall remain nameless going five yards offsides on a blitz. Said linebacker was upset with everyone but himself and Keeler gave him not one but two reaming outs on the sideline.

Temple had a 15-minute time of possession advantage and won the turnover battle but still lost.

Both were well-deserved and both reminded Temple fans (at least this one) of a late hit at USF that was the difference between a 22-20 Temple win and what turned out to be a 27-22 Temple loss two years ago in Tampa.

Another Stan Drayton-type mistake that a player made was grabbing a facemask in a sack of GT quarterback Haynes King that would have gotten Temple off the field. The replay clearly showed the Temple defender could have easily brought King down by the shoulder pads without grabbing the facemask. A third is letting a punt go without a fair catch on the 15 only to see it land on the 1.

Those were just a few of many.

Drayton tolerated those mistakes. Keeler will not.

In a league where every game is expected to be razor close, those types of mistakes cannot be made going forward or Temple will blow its chance to be a contender.

Against a ranked team, they let what could have been a close game get out of hand.

The game was closer than the final score not only because of Temple’s mistakes because the ACC refs made a complete blunder (maybe intentionally) and a 4th-and-1 first down that Evan Simon clearly got (and both announcers said he did). That in itself was potentially a 14-point swing and certainly a 7-point one because Georgia Tech scored its last touchdown on that officiating faux pas. Another blunder came on a 52-yard punt return by JoJo Bermudez when a Temple player was called for an illegal block that both announcers said was perfectly legal. Having ACC refs work games involving the ACC against another conference is problematic at best and corrupt at worst.

White helmets are now 0-2. Cherry helmets are 2-0. Just sayin’

Back to the drawing board.

Fortunately, there are two weeks to fix things that are fixable. The talent is there. The thinking part is not quite up to Keeler’s standards yet.

Keeler might have fixed one of them with two in-game reamouts.

There are more to come in the film room the next two weeks.

We will see if the kids get the message starting with the Oct. 4 home game against UTSA.

Monday: 5 Things We Noticed

Friday: How The American Looks

Monday (9/29): Game Week

09.18.25
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GT-Temple: Only one more chance to meet the moment

Another scoop and score for the Owls against Georgia Tech would be nice, maybe two.

From a conference standpoint, there are plenty of chances for Temple to meet the moment this year.

From a reality standpoint, there is only one and that one is Saturday (4:30 p.m., The CW Network) at Georgia Tech.

Why?

Let’s finally see that throwback pass to Kajiya Hollawayne, who hits JoJo Bermudez for six. That would qualify as a Trojan Horse.

Simply because even if Temple is only able to do something that is a 7.5 percent possibility (according to ESPN) and win the American Conference championship, there will always be a “yeah, but. …” aspect to it.

“Yeah, but they were blown out by the only two big-time teams on their schedule, Oklahoma and Georgia Tech.”

I will take that “yeah but” knowing that still the storyline of what could be a remarkable season includes the chapter which will be written Saturday.

Here’s what it could be:

“Amazing season for Temple. It not only won the American Conference championship it beat Georgia Tech, which went on to win the ACC.”

Scratched my head all week wondering how that could happen and came up with the Troy theory.

In my mind, Temple is a better team–maybe MUCH better–than Troy, which went into Clemson and took a 16-0 lead before falling, 27-16. GT had to have a Herculean Effort to beat Clemson, 27-24.

There are a lot of fans out there who think Georgia Tech is closer to Oklahoma in roster talent than it is to Troy yet there is a lot of evidence to the contrary.

We will see come around 8 p.m. or so Saturday.

The “wise guys” in Vegas say this will be a 24 or 25-point game which projects to a probable score of 34-10 or 35-10.

Hmm.

Temple is the only game in the country in the 4:30-7:30 TV window. Click over for better view.

Not if GT is closer in ability to Troy than it is to Oklahoma.

Maybe Temple is GT’s “Trojan Horse” which was a legendary tale of subterfuge that marked the end of the Trojan War. After a prolong siege of 10 years, the Greeks devised a clever plan to gain entry into the heavily fortified city of Troy. They constructed a large wooden horse, hiding a select group of soldiers inside and left it at the gate as a supposed offering of peace. The Greeks pretended to sail away and the Trojans brought the gift horse into the city. While they slept, the soldiers inside the horse opened the gates for the rest of the Greek Army and a surprise upset occurred.

That’s where the Troy-Temple comparison comes into play.

I will admit my theory about Temple being better than Troy is out there but so was the Trojan Horse a dozen or so centuries BC.

Maybe that’s a sign that new OC Tyler Walker should try a few trick plays because going at Oklahoma conventionally did not work.

This is Temple’s one chance to meet the moment from a national perspective. The season can still be good with a loss, but this moment is out there to be had so why not seize it?

Late Saturday Night: Game Analysis

09.14.25
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Keeler: Owls didn’t meet the moment

This Cherry helmet is the best in college football. Let’s stick with that going forward.

In the grand scheme of things, this is about the 147th-most important thing that happened on Saturday but seeing Temple football come out in those God-awful-looking white helmets certainly didn’t meet the moment.

Not when you have the best helmet in college football sitting back home in the equipment room at 10th and Diamond.

Georgia Tech’s stadium with Atlanta as the backdrop is one of the best homefield advantages in the country.

When you look sharp, you play sharp and the Owls certainly didn’t look sharp.

Then the game started and it wasn’t long before first-year Temple head coach K.C. Keeler made the most perspicacious statement of the day.

Doing a first-quarter interview on ESPN2, Keeler said: “I thought we didn’t meet the moment.”

This time, he wasn’t talking about the equipment room.

There were plenty of moments the Owls didn’t meet but a few of them came on defense early when they hit Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer early and didn’t bring him down. Other times they touched him and he spun away.

A decent crowd on Saturday at the Linc would have looked way more impressive if Temple had an on-campus stadium like GT has.

A lot of that is traced to Mateer’s talent but when the Owls were touching quarterbacks–good quarterbacks with FBS starts under their belts in the first two games–they were bringing them down.

That was meeting the moment. Albeit the moment became bigger against better players on Saturday getting to Mateer and not putting him down didn’t meet the moment. He’s human. If hit hard enough, he goes down, too.

The Owls had a minus-6 deficit in the turnover battle in last year’s game and lost, 51-3. They stopped Oklahoma on third downs 13 of 14 times in that game and still lost by 48.

The Owls cleaned things up this year to have no turnovers and still lost by almost the same margin. That does not compute except that they didn’t do as good a job getting off the field defensively as last year’s team.

The formula to win wasn’t there against Oklahoma but the formula to stay in the game certainly was and the Owls didn’t have the right mix. Limit turnovers. Check. Repeat last year’s performance on third down. Not check.

Throw some trick plays in there to keep Oklahoma off-balance.

Definitely not check. Would have loved to seen Evan Simon toss a throwback pass to Hollawayne and have the former UCLA QB hit JoJo Bermudez for six on that first series. That would have fired everyone up. Instead, a couple of boring handoffs to Jay Ducker got nowhere.

OC Tyler Walker–who had a fantastic first two games–didn’t meet the moment, either.

You won 55-7 with these home helmets. Don’t mess with Karma. (Photo Courtesy Zamani Feelings)

A lot of national type guys–Chip Patterson of CBS sports and Kirk Herbstreit of ESPN–thought the Owls had a chance to stay in the game against the Sooners. Now that those national guys saw what happened, they are off the Owls. The Owls showed in the first two games that they are deep and talented along both lines but allowed themselves to get bullied by the Sooners.

I didn’t see that happening. Maybe neither Patterson nor Herbstreit did.

Maybe that’s what Keeler meant by not meeting the moment but they really have one more big-time moment to meet on Saturday at Georgia Tech.

Like Oklahoma, the Yellowjackets have a big-time quarterback in Haynes King. The lesson of Saturday is when they get their hands on him, they have to put him down.

That’s meeting the moment on the field.

Off the field, leaving the White helmets home might not help, but it certainly couldn’t hurt.

Friday: Georgia Tech Preview

09.11.25
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Huge Temple crowd expected Saturday

Everyone please subscribe to Gary’s website. This is the best college football prediction website.

By now, everyone should know that artificial intelligence is pretty much ahead of the crowd.

In Temple’s case, literally.

KJ predicts Okie 31-3. This was his prediction two days before Temple beat Penn State, 27-10. Sorry KJ.

Without knowing anyone in the Temple ticket office or the Philadelphia Eagles ticket office, I took to chat GPT and Grok and asked how many tickets were left for Temple hosting Oklahoma (high noon, ESPN2).

Here’s what they were able to tell us.

One, there are only a couple of thousand tickets left in a 70K-seat stadium. Two, only five percent of the tickets sold are from outside the tri-state (Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware) area.

What AI didn’t say was how many sections were open for sale but, given the demand, it only makes sense to open as many sections as possible.

We won’t find out until Saturday but what we do know is that given the proximity of the ticket sales to Lincoln Financial Field and the unlikelihood of Oklahoma fans living in the nation’s fourth-largest TV market, it will be a heavily pro-Temple crowd. Lot K–the largest Philadelphia Eagles’ parking lot–sold out by Wednesday. Even for the 2016 opener against Army, which drew 34,271, that didn’t happen until the day of that night game. Lots M and O are open for now. Since the Phillies are playing a night game on Saturday, CBP lots should be open also.

Now it might be 60K or it might be 35K, but we do know it will be loud and proud.

No one expected this result, either.

We don’t know if that’s enough to push this team across the finish line but it can’t hurt. There are many things that make me like Temple’s chances but one indicator is that Temple’s defense–with the worst head coach in history–was able to limit Oklahoma to 1-for-13 on third downs last year.

Another is that the Temple quarterback responsible for five of the six turnovers in last year’s game between the teams is on the trash heap of history and the guy who was denied that chance, Evan Simon, will get a chance to make history.

Who knows?

Desmond Ridder blaming Cincy’s first loss of the 2017 season on the loud Temple crowd.

They might even let him conduct the world-famous Temple University Diamond Marching Band again if he’s able to do it.

Temple is two-deep in quality along the defensive line and, yet, K.C. Keeler called his offensive line the most improved unit on his team.

These lines won’t be bullied.

No predictions but I will not be surprised if Temple wins outright because Oklahoma is expecting to play in a high school-like atmosphere and has no idea that a 7-0 Cincinnati team in 2017 came into LFF and came out with an overtime loss because it couldn’t hear its signals.

This stadium can be very loud and unfriendly for visitors and it needs to be on Saturday afternoon.

After that, let the chips fall where they may.

Late Saturday Night: Game Analysis

09.05.25
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Temple home opener: Gameday is fun again

This should be the gameday film shown in the EO team meeting room Friday night.

Not very many new Temple head football coaches have accomplished what K.C. Keeler has in his 261 days on the job.

He’s made gamedays at Lincoln Financial Field fun again despite never having coached a game in that stadium.

I will be grabbing one of these bad boys.

Oh, yes. There was some excitement with Geoff Collins taking over for Matt Rhule after an American Conference championship season, but nothing like this.

Nothing like Temple fans will experience at 2 p.m. on Saturday afternoon against visiting Howard University.

Why?

Because Temple is coming out of six dark years into the light. Temple was already in the light the year after Rhule won the league championship.

Things fell apart somewhere between the time Collins left and the time Keeler arrived.

There are doubting Thomases out there but don’t count me among them. What Keeler has done so far is very impressive. In addition to convincing most of the “good guys” on the roster to stay, he’s added some key pieces to the puzzle that only enhanced the roster and bolstered this team’s 2025 chances.

Then came June and Keeler–despite the handicap of four-straight 3-9 seasons–was able to convince the third best recruiting class in all of G5 football to come to Temple.

The students need to answer the call and become the 12th man for the Owls on both this Saturday and next week against Oklahoma. SEPTA is no excuse for not attending this game.

Mix in a 365-day offseason and no vacations for head coaches to Texas–like we had two weeks in the summer for three-straight years–and this team is primed and ready.

They demonstrated as much in the opener at UMass, finishing the game on a 35-0 run to beat the home team 42-10. Many in the “real world” of college football expected that game to be a 3.5-point Temple win. Not me. I predicted 24-10 and hoped for a blowout.

My most fervent hopes were realized.

Now let’s hope a lot of the fans buy in because they won’t all buy in unless the Owls are able to either give Oklahoma a good game next week or win it outright.

That’s not important now.

What’s important now is to get the largest-ever Temple student freshman class into the habit of both attending the game and enjoying the experience once they arrive in South Philadelphia. That means giving them a fun pre-game experience and convincing those same kids to get into the habit of going into the stadium and cheering their heads off. This isn’t Tulsa, which only has 3,432 full-time students. This is Temple with over 30,000 full-time students, including the largest incoming class ever.

Get those kids into the habit of going to the games.

For the team itself, it also means not overlooking anyone. When you’ve gone 3-9 for four-straight years, that shouldn’t be an issue but knowing that Howard–as a 40+-point underdog only eight years ago–shocked the world should get their attention.

For me, this is a Gevani McCoy game. Either sit Evan Simon at the jump (my choice) or play him one series and get him the hell out of harm’s way. Earlier this week, Keeler said he’s told the Owls many times they are a good football team and if they play clean, they are a tough out.

According to the great Cecily Tynan, there are no weather concerns for the Temple game on Saturday.

He didn’t mean a tough out against Howard. He meant a tough out against Oklahoma and the other good teams remaining on the schedule.

Play hard. Play clean. No spitting on anyone in the pre-game and no excessive celebrations after any good play.

Win the game and only then let the dice roll against Oklahoma.

Temple football is fun again in South Philadelphia.

It’s been a while.

Very Late Saturday Night (since I will be at the game until 8 or so): Game Analysis

09.01.25
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5 Takeaways From the Temple Game

OL shows the improvement Keeler spoke about by blowing UMass off the ball here.

Controversial take here but I’ve thought about it long and hard since the end of Temple’s 42-10 win at Mass on Saturday.

Put Evan Simon in bubble wrap for one game only and sit him against Howard this Saturday.

My thinking is this:

You can beat Howard, 40-0, with both Simon and Gevani McCoy so why not start McCoy? If the game works out like it should, McCoy gets a nice game under his belt and faces live ammunition that can’t be duplicated in practice.

You probably don’t even have a puncher’s chance against Oklahoma if Simon turns an ankle (or worse) against Howard. For those of you who don’t think Temple has a chance against Oklahoma anyway, this is your periodic reminder that fellow AAC member Navy beat Oklahoma last year.

Who did Navy lose to, 32-18, a couple of years ago?

Temple.

You can hear a lot of cheering for Temple when Peter Clarke catches this touchdown pass.

Beating Okie after going 2-0 would make a huge statement for the program and the conference itself.

Okie beat Illinois State, 35-7, on Saturday. Hard to believe that Illinois State is as good as UMass so Temple does indeed have a chance. They need Simon healthy to do it and getting McCoy up to game speed with an extended look against Howard wouldn’t hurt either. He was inserted into the game deep in Temple territory with the Owls up so big that all he did was basically hand off.

Allowing him to throw the ball downfield and utilizing the entire playbook would be a win/win for Temple. To do that, he needs to play an entire game.

That’s our first takeaway from the game. Here are four more:

Keeler was right about the lines

Two weeks ago, Keeler said he “never had a defensive line this deep. We have 9-10 guys who can really play.” Turns out he wasn’t blowing smoke. The Temple DL dominated, and all 10 guys played well. A week later, Keeler said, “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a position group improve as much as our offensive line.” He credited that with an intensive strength program and new OL coach Al Johnson. UMass went to a goal-line defense, selling out for the run, when Temple had the ball on its 1 and the Temple OL blew a hole so wide open a truck could run through it. Instead of a truck, Jay Ducker went for 55 yards.

The Tight End Room is Stacked

Peter Clarke and Ryder Kusch emerged as the top two tight ends, both catching a pair of TD passes. Yet Daniel Evert, who scored a long touchdown against Army last year, is also very good and will make an impact. Despite all that, Jake Woods might have been the star of summer camp and he will be heard from as well.

K.C. Keeler should consider put Evan Simon in bubble wrap for one week only. He can play all the rest starting with Oklahoma.

Ducker and Worthy Should be Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside

Got the distinct feeling that if Terrez Worthy went through the hole at the goal-line, he would have taken it to the house. Worthy runs a legitimate 4.4-40 and is the fastest guy on the team. He’s a home-run hitter and few linebackers have the speed to cover him out of the backfield. OC Tyler Walker probably noticed that from the booth and will take advantage of that mismatch.

Two Dante Wrights are better than One

Temple was expected to miss the oft-injured Dante Wright but Kajiya Hollawayne and JoJo Bermudez proved to be up to the task with the former catching a touchdown pass and the latter catching 7 balls for 78 yards. Yet Colin Chase was pretty much the WR star of the summer camp, much like Woods was with the tight ends, and although he had a spectacular catch near the goal-line, was not targeted like he will be as the season goes on and, once he gets those targets, should show fans in the stands what he showed his teammates in the summer.

While Saturday was exciting and a lot of players performed well, there will be a lot of other players making an impact over the next 11 games.

Or if they are as lucky as they appear to be good, a dozen or more games.

Friday: Howard Preview