Category Archives: Temple football

10.06.23
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Homecoming Must: Urgency to Win

UTSA coach Jeff Traylor pretty much tells you he’s not concerned with Temple here. Owls should take it as an insult.

Maybe it’s me, maybe it’s something else, but the way the Temple football Owls performed at the end of last season gave me significant hope for this season.

That’s pretty much all gone now.

At the end of the season, I wrote on this site that if the Owls got me a great running back from the portal (Western Michigan’s Sean Ryan and Ball State’s Carson Steele to name two) and two great FCS defensive ends to replace Darian Varner, the Owls were off and running not only to 8-4 but a possible AAC title.

Not having done any of that we recalibrated those expectations down to 6-6.

Stan Drayton needs to have a quick hook if E.J. produces zero or three points at the half again.

Now, with the biggest home game of the season less than 24 hours away (2 p.m., ESPN+), we might have to lower even those expectations.

Why?

The most disappointing thing about this 2-3 season so far is not the loss to Tulsa but the lack of urgency to win from this coaching staff.

I had us 3-2 at this point, not 2-3. Had the losses to RU and Miami but the loss to Tulsa came out of nowhere.

If this coaching staff really, really deep down inside had the urgency to win, they would not have handed the keys to the offense back to the driver who drove them into a ditch in the first half at Rutgers. After giving me 46 against ECU and 35 against Houston, no points there should have been a huge red flag.

If this staff really wanted to win, what was the same guy doing in the game down, 21-3, at half to a team that gave up 66 to Oklahoma and 43 to Washington and why were they allowing that to happen? I don’t get it.

They rolled the same guy out there expecting him to overcome a 21-3 deficit when it’s quite obvious he can’t move the sticks by running if a play breaks down or if he gets any pressure.

As the kids say today, “WTF?”

That cannot be allowed to happen. It just can’t. Next man up.

Our picks this week: Rutgers getting the 13.5 at Wisconsin, and the above four games, Rice blowing out UConn by more than 10, Texas State beating Louisiana, South Florida beating UAB by at least a FG and TCU winning at Iowa State. Season: 20-7 overall, 8-4 against the spread.

If the Owls only had a promising freshman from Ocean City, N.J., I can understand that. But they have a guy in the fold who not only beat North Carolina but engineered 47 points on them. They have a dynamic backup quarterback who can both run and throw.

Nothing would please me more than to see E.J. Warner turn the first-half scoreboard into adding machine against UTSA and, say, give the Owls a 31-14 lead at halftime.

Failing that, though, this staff has to show me inertia is not their middle name and show me another word that hasn’t been in their dictionary all season.

Urgency.

Get him out of there and at least show the fans you are trying to win by getting Quincy Patterson in there to create plays and move the ball not just with his arm but his feet.

Rally the defense and special teams around him.

Don’t wait to win.

Win now.

Or that biggest crowd of the season won’t come back this year or maybe even next.

Sunday: UTSA analysis

10.01.23
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The roster: Grasping at Straws

No doubt Jeff Traylor has seen this film and Tulsa gave him a blueprint of exactly what to do Saturday.

Those running backs on opposing teams who keep running through, past and over defensive linemen against Temple are an indictment of what Stan Drayton and company did this offseason.

Or didn’t do.

“OK, who here wants to switch to the DL?”

Hit the portal hard.

As a 40+ year Temple fan, I’m appalled by the ease of which Tulsa running backs hit the hole and gashed the Owls’ defense. It’s one thing to let Miami do it. It’s another to let Tulsa do it. They were grasping at running backs on Thursday night.

They might as well been grasping at straws.

Those big chunk passes Tulsa made all night were the result of the D-Line not getting to the quarterback. Temple might have to change its scheme and gamble with numerous all-out blitzes, using their most talented room (linebackers) to make plays like sacks, fumbles, fumble recoveries and interceptions. Do anything but sit back and get run over. That’s not Temple TUFF.

Not that we didn’t see this coming a mile away because we advocated many times for the Owls to get running backs from Ball State and Western Michigan and Liberty who remained in the portal and the Ivy League defensive lineman of the year from Harvard as soon as he entered it. You knew Darian Varner was leaving in December. The priority then should have been to get Temple fans two Darian Varners from the FCS ranks.

What did Temple do instead?

Hit the Junior College ranks for an offensive lineman and a cornerback and they’ve been pretty much the only help the Owls have gotten so far that has meant a damn.

Junior college should have been the last place Drayton and his staff looked because every year you see lower-ranked FBS teams knocking off P5 teams (Bowling Green over Georgia Tech on Saturday and Georgia Southern over Nebraska last year are just two of many examples).

Temple should have been able to talk some of those Georgia Southern and Bowling Green guys to come to Philadelphia in the offseason. Got to think one or two of those really good players who made impacts for those teams in those games would have given Temple some consideration.

We will never know.

Failing that, there are some great FCS teams. Albany beat Villanova, 31-10, on Saturday. You think there might have been someone from Albany who can help Temple now and who would rather play for Temple?

I do.

Owls have to put the playmakers they have in a position to make plays. D.J. Elliot did that. So far, Everett Withers has not.

There are great players on FCS teams who end up drafted by the NFL. Temple should go after those guys. Logically, a move up to Temple’s level would improve draft profiles. Instead, Junior College appears to have been their focus.

That’s two steps below where the focus SHOULD have been.

Now the Owls are caught between a rock and a hard place. There is an obvious need for talent especially on the defensive line and the Owls are out of big bodies who can stop the run and get after the passer.

There is no place to find those guys on campus now. They should have been found beating the bushes in the offseason.

Everybody knows what Jeff Traylor, a great head football coach, is going to do on Saturday: Run right at the Owls and dare them to stop him. Some FBS and FCS linemen in the portal last year could have helped them Saturday. Right now, the Owls have no choice to do it with the guys they have in the building. Having Layton Jordan drop five yards into pass coverage does nobody any good when he can create havoc rushing the passer. Increasingly, unless they figure out a gambling scheme that can cause more havoc and turnovers, the Owls need to win battles at the point of attack.

Although they didn’t show it at Tulsa, Owls may have the will to do it. They may not have the means.

Friday: Where’s the Urgency?

09.25.23
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Miami-Temple was sign of changing times

Had a conversion with a really good Temple fan in the parking lot on Saturday before the Miami vs. Temple game.

Told him I was really considering entering the fan transfer portal not from my beloved Temple–which I will always be a fan of–but to the NFL.

The reason was this NIL and transfer portal nonsense.

The big schools, who already have all the recruiting advantages, have now taken the sublime to the ridiculous where they not only already have the best recruits but now take away the players who the lesser teams have put sweat and toil into recruiting and coaching up. Players have no loyalty to the school that made them what they were and move on the next best thing. Schools with the wad of cash basically pick and choose who they want when they want. Screw the little guy. Trickle down economics? LOL. Jordan Addison was the national receiver of the year at Pitt and would have still been drafted in the first round if he stayed there but for some reason ($$$$) saw fit to spend his final year at USC. Dillon Gabriel was a perfectly good quarterback at UCF but had wandering eyes for Oklahoma. Most Temple players who leave learn the hard way they left a starting position at Temple to ride the pine elsewhere (see Jadan Blue and Darian Varner).

Tulsa fans were really excited to host rival Oklahoma until they realized they bought all the good players.

It’s really the opposite of the NFL where the organization gives a helping hand to the lowest of its group in the form of the draft with the idea being the entire business model benefits from everyone having an equal chance to succeed.

College football today is like a billionaire walking along skid row and pickpocketing whatever loose change the downtrodden have.

It’s going to get worse.

Mentioned to this gentleman that in past years I would have hopes of Temple springing the upset of Miami but held no such belief this year because the system is stacked against the Temples of the world and all of the G5. Sat next to him in the stands when Temple won at Maryland, 38-7, and that was a really fun day.

I want those days to come back. I’m not sure they ever will.

Unless someone (Congress, Courts, a strong NCAA governing body) can come in and give all 130 FBS schools an equal chance, I could see my interest waning in the so-called “amateur” side of football. The NCAA gave SMU the “death penalty” in 1987 for what pretty much is standard operating procedure in 2023.

The great Temple fan made a very good point.

“I live a mile from Lincoln (College) and I think I’m going to go see them more and forget about this,” he said.

I said I don’t blame him. I’m pretty sure a lot of G5 fans feel the same way.

That got me to thinking.

Why don’t the players from Lincoln get paid? Or West Chester? They put in the same work to be good that the players from Miami do. They play for the love of the game.

It’s a really skewed, unfair system and, because it has become more skewed in the past five years.

Gone are the days when a Temple can upset Virginia Tech and an Appalachian State can beat Michigan and those types of upsets are what made college football great. Those types of upsets still exist in March Madness but who knows for how long?

Now when a big-time P5 team plays a G5 team you pretty much know the outcome.

Temple lost to its P5 foes, 36-7, and 41-7. That didn’t use to be the case all that long ago. Temple beat Penn State, 27-10, one year and the next traveled up to Penn State to lose by one touchdown to the evenutal Big 10 champion. In years past, the Owls beat an SEC team 37-7 (Vanderbilt) and three times beat Maryland (38-7, 35-14 and 20-17). They played the No. 9 team in the country (Notre Dame) to a virtual standoff in 2015 before the largest prime time TV watching crowd in the history of the fourth-largest market.

Are those days over?

Probably.

The team Temple plays on Thursday night, Tulsa, lost to Oklahoma (66-17) and Washington (43-10).

It says something about how the nation views Temple football that TULSA–even after losses like that–is favored by 3 1/2 points over Temple. The Owls should take that as an insult but I’m not all that sure they will.

Temple has to do something to lift itself out of this morass and there doesn’t seem to be a solution in sight other than to win as many games as it can playing against a stacked deck.

The fact that Tulsa also has been dealt the same hand is small consolation.

Friday: Tulsa Recap

09.23.23
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Temple Football: Nothing special (yet)

After four games, Temple football is just about what everybody said they were a couple of months ago.

Two and two with the final eight games being the determining factor of the season. If the Owls do well, they could play 10 more games.

Disheartening, yes, because with the way the Owls and E.J. Warner finished a year ago (roughly 500 yards passing in the last couple of games against bowl teams), there was hope for a better start.

If Warner hit the ground running, he would not have gotten shut out in the first three quarters against Rutgers and he would have been able to put more than a score on the board against Miami. He would have put up a 40 burger on Akron.

E.J. Warner is playing more like 157-year-old Pop Warner than the E.J. we saw at the end of last season.

None of that happened.

Instead of hitting the ground running, he’s just hit the ground. Somebody needs to pick him up or Quincy Patterson should be warming up on the sidelines. Championship college football teams have quarterbacks who can run as well as they pass. Temple can get away with being one-dimensional only if the immobile quarterback throws 300+ with about 3-5 TD passes every game.

That hasn’t happened for Temple. Time for a sense of urgency with this program.

Maybe it’s too early to declare sophomore slump but there hasn’t been a natural progression from games 11 and 12 of last year to 1-4 of this one.

That needs to change starting Thursday night.

Nobody expected to beat Miami but a win over a RU team that the Owls lost to 16-14 a year ago would have been tangible proof that this was a better team than the one Temple fielded a year ago.

Now it’s an open question.

Warner gets a Mulligan for the Miami game because this is a team that is capable of winning the national championship. I was invited to go on a Miami fan call-in show Friday night and told them the Canes would probably win 35-21. I really believe that would have been the score if Temple played to its potential. It did not. There is no disgrace for losing to Miami 41-7 yet there is a nagging annoyance that Temple did not play that team significantly better than Bethune-Cookman did. Really annoyed that good guy Jordan Smith was open by 10 yards in the end zone and Warner threw it right to the numbers of the only bad guy the same number of yards away. That said, I would not be surprised if Miami was in the Final Four and won the whole damn thing.

Beating Miami, though, was never the goal of this season.

Winning the AAC championship at the maximum or at least making a bowl game was.

Nothing the Owls have done through four games indicates the former and even Temple homer radio seems to agree. I left the game so disgusted about the Owls being uncompetitive that I sat back in my car to warm up. Holding the steering wheel while reaching for the heater I turned on the radio and heard Temple play-by-play guy Kevin Copp tell analyst Paul Palmer this: “The idea is to get to six wins however you need to do it.”

Huh?

We will find out if those words are flowery platitudes or have substance by late Thursday night.

Now the goal is six freaking wins for a program that used to win eight on a regular basis for the decade between 2009-2019? Yippee. “We’re No. 80!” From playing in consecutive AAC championships, beating Penn State, Maryland (three times, 38-7, 35-14 and 20-17), and Vandy (37-7) to fighting for that No. 80 spot of 130 teams.

No thanks.

That’s not what Stan Drayton has said since the end of last year.

He said the goal is to win the AAC championship. If you can’t beat a Tulsa team that lost to Washington, 43-10, you don’t deserve to win an AAC championship. Guys need to play to the stats they put on the sheet last year, especially at the most important positions on the team.

By 11 p.m. Thursday night, we will find out if Drayton’s goal is within reach or the Owls will have to struggle, scratch, crawl and, yes, SETTLE to reach Copp’s minimalist goal.

Update on picks: Went 5-1 against the spread Saturday with the only loss being Memphis at Missouri. Correctly picked the Oregon blowout of Colorado, Marshall covering the five against VT, and Duke blowing out UConn in the key games.

Week: 5-1

Season: 8-4

Monday: College Football in Nutshell

Friday: Tulsa Recap

09.22.23
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Defying All Logic Would Be a Miracle

Depressed Ginger, an Ohio State fan, is more optimistic about Temple’s chances than I am but he’s done about 21 more hours of film study on the Owls than I have.

About a year or so before I matriculated down the road from Northeast Philadelphia to Temple University, Joanne A. Epps was a teenager working in the bookstore at Temple University.

That was a long damn time ago.

The rain will serve as an appropriate backdrop for the Owls’ first game in a long time without Joanne A. Epps in attendance.

She worked and sweated and studied her way from pretty close to the bottom to the top of the university as the school’s 13th President.

She embodied what Temple was all about. Upward mobility.

I’m sure if she worked in the bookstore two years later I would have talked to her then but I don’t remember. My guess is that she was on to the next thing by then. I didn’t really meet her until one of those alumni pre-game tent functions during the Matt Rhule Era and she asked me a ton of questions about Temple football and I hopefully supplied some answers that made sense. She was particularly interested when I told her I wrote every single member of the Board of Trustees and asked for Bobby Wallace to be fired instead of the nuclear option (dropping the program) they considered back then. I included a letter sent to me from a then current football player, Chris Harris. Temple’s BOT decided to part ways with Wallace, join a new league and hire a real head coach: Al Golden, who proved to be as perfect for Temple as he was imperfect for Miami.

Picks this week. Went 3-3 last week and now 3-3 for the season. Really like a Tulsa team beating an NIU team that lost to FCS Southern Illinois, UConn to be outclassed by Duke and Memphis getting six vs. a Missouri team coming off an emotional win. Oregon will burst Deion’s bubble in a big way.

President Epps was a true Temple football fan, loved the school and even before her death hit the radio and TV the other day my phone text messages blew up with the sad news that she passed away unexpectedly (and shockingly because I assumed she was in great heath).

In my mind, there couldn’t have been better choice to succeed Jason Wingard as President of Temple. She was Temple through and through, loved the school, loved the students, loved the alumni, loved the teams. If you were an alum like me, she wanted to hear your whole story and I’m sure I bored her with mine but she listened. (My advice to the BOT: Ditch the national search nonsense and pick a Temple person as the next President.)

In the Catholic Faith, you need three miracles to become a Saint and Epps must’ve have talked to The Really Big Guy to Provide Miracle No. 1. Tropical Storm 16 is about to pass only 13 miles south of Lincoln Financial Field by tomorrow’s 3:30 p.m. kickoff against the No. 20-ranked Miami Hurricanes.

True story. Before she passed this wasn’t even in the forecast. Every single bettor will tell you there is nothing that erases a talent disadvantage than bad weather.

Second miracle?

An Owls’ win over Miami because as much as I would like to believe the Owls have a chance tomorrow I really don’t and it all stems from the Rutgers’ loss. If this team let Kyle Monangai run over them (and they did) in the fourth quarter of a 36-7 loss, I don’t see them stopping better running backs from Miami. Miami beat Texas A&M and the other Miami and both are probably better teams than Rutgers.

So Temple winning is really out of the question.

Or is it?

Unless The Really Big Guy says “JoAnn that was a really good life. You need a favor?”

“Thanks for the Tropical Storm, God, but could you do one more thing?”

“You got it JE.”

“Make Miami fumble as many times as East Carolina did in 2014.”

This was how many times East Carolina fumbled.

This is what happened the last time it rained really hard at a Temple home game against a ranked foe

God: “I’ll do my best.”

We still don’t know what the third miracle might be but Miami losing only to Temple this season would certainly qualify. Temple losing only to Rutgers would be a bonus miracle. I will be there in the flesh and she will be there in spirit.

We know she’s a Saint and we’re giving her credit for Miracle No. 1.

Nos. 2 and 3 yet to be determined.

Sunday: Game Analysis

09.18.23
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Miami and Temple go way back

For a couple of schools who are separated by over 1,000 miles of prime East Coast real estate, Temple and Miami football have a lot in common.

The Owls and the Hurricanes go way back when Temple was the powerhouse team and Miami was a team lucky to get on the Owls’ schedule back in 1930. The Miami players were so grateful for the game that they brought the Owls coconuts as gifts.

In return, the Owls beat the Coconuts out of Miami, 34-0. That year the Owls finished 7-3 and somehow squeezed in a crowd of 16,000 to see that game at Atlantic City’s Convention Hall.

The Owls haven’t beaten Miami in the 13 subsequent meetings but will take another swing on Saturday (3:30 p.m., ESPN2) at Lincoln Financial Field.

If the Canes bring turnovers this time instead of coconuts, the Owls might have a chance. Miami comes into the game ranked No. 20 and the Owls are unranked but unranked teams have beaten ranked teams before and Group of Five teams have beaten Miami before. The Hurricanes lost to Florida International and Middle Tennessee in recent years and that fact has to give the Owls some hope.

Other things Miami and Temple have in common:

Vinny Testaverde and Paul Palmer with Brian Bosworth. All were wearing Cherry and White.

In 1986, the Hurricanes had the Heisman Trophy winner (Vinny Testaverde). The second-place finisher that year? Temple’s Paul Palmer.

Both teams tried to build on-campus stadiums. The Hurricanes’ proposed 8,000-seat stadium in 1926 was blown down by a literal Hurricane and plans to build it were scrapped. Temple held a meeting with the community to explain its Board of Trustees approved plan to build a 35,000-seat on campus stadium on March 18, 2018 and that was blown down by carbon dioxide emitted from the breaths of protestors at Mitten Hall. Plans to build that stadium apparently have been scrapped as well.

Both teams were originally members of the Big East Football Conference.

Temple’s field goal specialist, Camden Price, used to be Miami’s starting kicker.

Temple defensive lineman, Allan Haye, was once a defensive lineman for Miami.

Miami hired two Temple coaches, Al Golden in 2010 and Manny Diaz in 2018. Temple erected a billboard on Interstate 76 to welcome Diaz as its new head coach. Eighteen days later, Diaz reneged on his Temple contract to take the same job at Miami.

Temple almost hired current Miami head coach Mario Cristobal, who was considered the front-runner for the job in 2012 until he called then athletic director Bill Bradshaw from the Philadelphia International Airport asking “directions to Temple” for his interview. That call caused Bradshaw to pause and take the advice of then assistant AD Al Shrier who said, “Bill, listen to me. Hire Matt Rhule.”

Bradshaw listened and told Cristobal to get back on the plane. Rhule didn’t need directions to Temple and produced consecutive 10-win seasons for the Owls, including Temple hosting ESPN’s College Game Day on Halloween of 2015.

If the Owls beat Miami on Saturday, it will be the most significant thing they’ve done since that day.

If the Canes bring the turnovers, the Owls should return the coconuts. It’s the least they can do.

Friday: Defying All Logic

09.17.23
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Norfolk State: They were what Vegas thought they were

Amazing to me how much Vegas nails the line exactly and probably oddmakers’ best performance came on Saturday in a game it should have known little about.

The line for the Norfolk State at Temple game was not set until Friday when Temple was made a 30.5-point favorite.

By kickoff, the public moved that line up to 32 and that’s where it rested.

Thirty-freaking-two.

Temple won, 41-9.

That’s 32.

Two Super Bowl quarterbacks and one great T-shirt

Good news and bad news because by Sunday No. 22-ranked Miami should be a 30-point favorite over Temple before a much larger crowd. (Temple grad and Miami fan Howard Eskin will probably be there wearing Miami swag, sadly.)

The Owls have some work to do to bring that line down.

Or Miami will probably win 30-0, 40-10 or 50-20.

Maybe too much work.

The 41-9 win over Norfolk State exposed a lot of warts, mostly among the coaching staff.

Put it this way: The other home team that plays in that stadium, the Philadelphia Eagles, opened the season with a heavy dose of Kenny Gainwell on the first series of the year. Since he wasn’t stopped, they kept going to the (Gain)well and ended up with a touchdown.

Temple opened with a similar heavy dose of Florida’s top high school running back last year, Joquez Smith, on Saturday.

He was never stopped and the Owls had a 7-0 lead.

Correctly, head coach Stan Drayton went back to a diet of Joquez on the next drive. When they got down to the Norfolk State 20 or so, Drayton got the “great idea” of putting Edward Saydee back in the game.

Substituting the best high school running back in Florida with someone who wasn’t even the best high school running back in Roxborough is never a good idea and Drayton had to be kicking himself after Saydee fumbled.

Temple could have gone up 14-0 there and 21-0 after Quincy Patterson’s first touchdown. Halftime should have been 35-7, not 28-7.

Football is not rocket science.

If someone is doing the job for you that Joquez was doing for Temple (15 carries, 142 yards), feed the beast. Don’t bring in a pacifist to replace the beast.

No reason to put the failed running backs of the past back into the game.

That’s not the only coaching mistakes Temple made.

Stan Drayton taking Joquez Smith out for Edward Saydee caused Temple to trend nationally.

The kickoff guy they recruited from Purdue is not working out. He had one kickoff out of bounds against Rutgers last week and two more against Norfolk State. He either has a sore leg or a sore head. Either way, he needs to sit.

Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, fool me three times shame on everyone. There should be no fooling around next week and field goal kicker Camden Price should get those kickoff duties against Miami.

It’s one thing to be giving short fields to Norfolk State. It’s football suicide to be giving those same short fields to Miami.

The Temple kids–which the exception of stupid penalties–mostly did their jobs well.

The Temple coaching staff not so much.

Football isn’t rocket science. Temple has the best colors in the country (Cherry home, White away) and whoever picked black is a dufus.

It all goes back to decision-making.

If that end doesn’t improve, we will probably be writing about how amazing Vegas is again in this space next week.

It’s up to the coaching meeting room at Temple to change that dynamic. Playing Joquez and getting a new kickoff guy should be priority A and 1A. Not using Saturday to hone Quincy Patterson’s passing skills was also a coaching mistake. Patterson should have been given the opportunity to pass the ball at game speed now because, judging by the number of hits the offensive line is allowing E.J. Warner to take, he will need to do so later.

Even that might not be enough but the kids deserve the coaching staff’s best effort.

Vegas needs to be wrong sometime and next week would be a good place to start.

Monday: Similarities between Temple and Miami

09.15.23
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Biggest worry of the season: Big Bodies

This $10 million addition to the E-O was built to win titles and not to lose to an FCS team.

Normally in this space on every Friday of the football season you will read a “real” preview of the next day’s game.

No such preview is needed today.

If my beloved Temple football Owls don’t take care of business and destroy Norfolk State, there is no reason to open up the Edberg Olson Football Complex on Monday. The university spent $7 million to build that complex in 2005 and $10 more million on improvements five years later to win FBS titles, not to lose to an FCS team.

Daz hugs Bill Bradshaw after beating Maryland 37-7 in 2011. These are the kinds of games Temple needs to schedule and win.

The reasoning is simple: Any team who loses to Marshall 55-3 and James Madison 63-7 last year deserves to lose to Temple by 48-7 or worse this one.

If we are not getting that kind of business done we should not be in this kind of business.

I will not be at the game because I’ve said for years that Temple should not be playing FCS teams and I will not pay a dime to see Temple play those teams. We will be back in attendance against Miami (9/23, 3:30) and hope to run into a lot of Temple fans there. (Aside to KJ–we’re no longer in that corner you saw us a couple of years ago, we are now alongside the primo row where the team walks into the game. Thank you, Arthur Johnson.)

Really convinced FIU will win outright over a UConn team that loses its starting QB for the season. NIU would have passed the eye test with the win over BC but the loss to SIU was the last straw. Akron passed the eye test for me against Temple so should not lose by 30 to Kentucky. NW’s 38-7 win over a decent UTEP team sold me on the Wildcats.

This Saturday, though, this 40+ year Owl fan will be watching from home (ESPN+, 2 p.m.) tomorrow and I am confident we will be able to deliver on this site a decent post-game report.

Temple’s main goal should be getting into a P5 conference and beating FCS teams does nothing to advance that goal. Scheduling and beating P5 teams does advance the football in that direction. The Owls beat Vanderbilt, 37-7, in 2014. They beat Penn State 27-10 in 2015. They beat Maryland 35-14 in 2018 and 20-17 in 2019. Those are the kinds of games they need to schedule and win.

Meanwhile, more pressing issues are at hand.

The biggest worry of the season is what we saw in the first few games: Temple is running out of big bodies on the offensive and defensive lines.

The Owls defensive line in particular got worn down in the fourth quarter at Rutgers, where a less-than-mediocre Big 10 team was able to score 23-straight points on them. Blowing that possible win really hurt.

Who to blame?

Certainly, the current staff is first in line. They should have known the Owls needed a lot more big bodies in the program that they were able to attract in the transfer portal. They should have over-recruited like an airline overbooks but didn’t.

Will it come back to bite them?

Geez, I hope not.

A possible fix that might work is a 3-5-3 defense–two DEs, a nose guard, five LBS (which we have plenty of) and three DBs.

Meanwhile, say a prayer that no one gets hurt along either line until after the AAC championship game is over in December.

If those prayers are answered, the Owls have a shot at being in that game.

If not, 6-6 will be a monumental struggle.

Let’s beat Norfolk State like a drum, go to the 3-5-3 defense and hope for the best.

Picks: Started out slow (3-3 against the spread). Would have definitely been 4-2 had Michael Pratt of Tulane played against Mississippi State. This week’s picks are above.

When you schedule Norfolk State, you don’t appear on “regular” TV. The Akron-Kentucky and VT-Rutgers games should be of particular interest to Temple fans. Owls are on ESPN+ at 2 p.m.

Sunday: Game Analysis

09.11.23
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This is the week to avoid the trap

Down only 13-7 in the fourth quarter, Temple TUFF means grabbing this game and taking it away. That didn’t happen. Stan Drayton has to diagnose why and provide a pill to cure the Owls this week.

Most doctors will be able to diagnose a simple problem by asking you what the symptoms are, when did they happen and what changes in the diet might have caused the sickness.

Changing the lifestyle or a simple pill usually–not always–solves the problem.

Staying the course of a bad diet or habit usually exacerbates it.

The big temptation Temple head coach Stan Drayton has is to stick to the plan he brought into the season and make it work or determine if a 36-7 loss to a team that got shut out, 37-0, by Maryland two games ago is acceptable.

From this perspective, it isn’t. I’m not a doctor but I watched Wayne Hardin, Bruce Arians, Al Golden annd Matt Rhule work on some pretty sick teams so I’m confident that a change is needed right away. Watching Hardin coach all by himself was better than a 13-year stay at a Holiday Inn Express.

The symptoms are pretty clear, Temple has not been able to establish a running game and E.J. Warner subsequently has been under intense pressure.

The Owls have run out of offensive line pills but half the battle there was not having a running back with the ability to 1) Make people miss and 2) break tackles.

Temple has that pill in Joquez Smith. He separated himself from the other Temple backs on Saturday night. Take one Joquez and call me in the morning. That should cure the headache of a bad running game. This kid has the unique ability to get lost behind the offensive line and come out the other end. No other Temple back is that slippery. Put him in the game and give him 20 carries.

My guess is that he goes for over 100 yards against Norfolk State and gives Miami something to think about in two weeks.

The other “pill” is fixing the passing game.

Smith being in there certainly would open the lanes for Warner to throw deeper and that’s what he needs to do. Once Smith gets rolling, Warner can fake it into his belly and pull it out, freeze the linebackers and throw over the defense. Receivers like Dante Wright, Zae Baines and Amad Anderson need to get the ball in space downfield and work their magic. Five-yard outs ain’t doing it.

Temple has too many talented edge players to come away with just seven points against any team, even Big 10 ones.

If Warner can’t get these guys the ball with an improved running game, Quincy Patterson deserves a shot. Defenses will be looking for Patterson to run and with that threat, more lanes to throw will be open. If you can live with the stomach ache of five-yard outs all year, keep E.J. in the game. If you want a multi-dimensional offense, try a Quincy Patterson pill. It might be a placebo and it might not, but you will never know until you try.

Smith’s running will keep the defense off the field and nothing helps a defense that gave up 23 fourth-quarter points than an offense that controls the clock and moves the sticks.

Norfolk State will be the perfect game to make these changes. You can beat NS with Edward Saydee and doing the things you did to beat Akron but you can’t win an AAC title sticking to that plan.

It might be a bitter pill to take now but holding your nose and talking it gives your team the best chance to get over the malaise of a 36-7 loss that should have never happened. Bold changes are needed now, not next Tuesday.

Otherwise you fall into a trap that could lead to another 3-9 season.

Friday: The Biggest Worry of The Season

09.09.23
by

Rutgers: One Step Back, Two Steps Forward?

These days are over, unfortunately

We don’t like to say “I told you so” in this space but, at least in two specific instances over the last few days, we told you so.

Our last post was about Quincy Patterson coming in to “pass” the ball instead of running it. Even the headline of the post was: “HERE’S A THOUGHT: HOW ABOUT HAVING QUINCY PATTERSON PASS?”

What did Stan Drayton do in the first half of a 36-7 loss to Rutgers on Saturday night?

Do the same damn thing he’s done for 99 percent of the time he’s brought Patterson into the game: Try to run.

No. 24 is the future of an improved Owls’ running game.

It’s telegraphing the play to the opponent and Rutgers’ head coach Greg Schiano didn’t need a Navajo codebreaker to determine what Patterson was going to do. Drayton had Patterson run the ball–and like most coaches before him–Schiano was able to stop it.

Who knows had Patterson been allowed to pass if the Owls would have been seven points closer but it would have been something Rutgers would have been unprepared for and the Owls needed those points at that time. ECU sent the house in last year’s final game “knowing” Patterson was going to run it but Drayton fooled them by having QP take one step forward as to run and then one step back for a touchdown pass. Would have been nice to pull that ace out in the RU game.

As it was, the Owls were shut out in the first half, 13-0.

New Temple rule: If a quarterback gets shut out again in the first half, a new quarterback should come into the game.

Thirty minutes is plenty of time to score a point and that’s the quarterback’s job.

Patterson passes there and Temple maybe scores and goes down 13-7. Warner’s second-half touchdown pass would have made it 14-13, good guys. Since the TD pass came in fourth quarter, that’s a full 45 minutes of shutout football Drayton gave Warner.

Too much. Waaaaaaay too much.

The second “I told you so” moment came when true freshman Joquez Smith came into the game. Last week, we wrote that “No. 24 needed a shot” because none of the other backs displayed the ability to make a tackler miss in the opener against Akron.

He got his chance and proved that he was so much better than the upperclassmen options Temple has.

If Stan Drayton learns a couple of lessons here, it will be one step back and two steps forward for Temple.

If he trots out Edward Saydee as his feature back and brings Quincy Patterson in only for short-yardage runs at the goal line again next week, it will be three steps backward. One step for the blowout and two steps for not recognizing Joquez can run and Quincy can throw.

Three steps in the opposite direction Temple cannot afford to make.

E.J. Warner is a good college quarterback. He is not a great one. At least not yet.

He needs to develop a sense of urgency and having Patterson clicking at his heels gives Temple the kind of run/pass option most of the other good college teams have. You can’t allow any college quarterback that many three-and-outs.

Zero points in the first half should have been enough to pull the trigger on Warner and give Patterson a shot.

Drayton deserves some props for putting Smith in the game. He is the future.

If Warner keeps getting shut out in subsequent first halves, he will have to make similar hard and necessary decisions.

That’s the only way Temple takes two steps forward from this big step back.

Monday: This Is The Week