Category Archives: Temple football

05.30.22
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Three-month sprint to Duke

Now the summer begins, the fastest three months of the year for almost all of us except the few cold-weather lovers.

For Temple football, it’s a sprint, too.

In roughly 90 days, the Owls will travel to Duke for a shot at redeeming the national perception of the program which was good three years ago but reached nearly Bottom 10 status the last two.

The last guy dropped the baton and the Owls have a lot of running to get to the finish line but the line will be there whether they beat Duke to it or not.

Temple head coach Stan Drayton has pushed all of the right buttons so far, upgrading the two areas of need in quarterback and running back. He’s probably not done in the talent acquisition department, either.

Owls were 4-15 the last two years and that did not sit well with anyone around here.

Is it enough to beat Duke?

The Blue Devils have their own problems they have to fix and, like Temple, a new head coach. They lost to arguably a team with less talent than Temple, UNC-Charlotte, so they are beatable.

Ironically, one of the storylines during the opener would be surrounding that coach, Mike Elko, who was Pat Kraft’s first choice to replace Geoff Collins. Elko turned down the Owls to get a pay raise in Texas.

Since Kraft has made two horrible choices for that job since (Manny Diaz and Pat Carey), Elko’s hiring for Duke could bode well for Temple.

Maybe Elko would have been an equally bad hire for Kraft as Diaz and Carey turned out to be.

If that trend holds up in September, Stan Drayton could look very good in comparison.

Any Temple fan has to hope so. Whatever the case, will win find out in a blink of an eye because these next three months usually go like that.

05.27.22
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What the Dandridge commitment means for Temple

Ten million percent committed is a pretty solid commitment but that’s what Richard Dandridge, one of Florida’s top receivers, gave Temple on Wednesday.

What does “10 million percent” mean?

For starters, it’s a lot more than 100 percent or 1,000 percent or even 10,000 percent.

It probably means come early signing day in December even an offer from Alabama or Clemson or Ohio State will be turned down or that’s too much credibility going down the drain for any young man to tinker with.

This will probably be the shirt Richard wears to the LC to watch future AAC Player of the Year Khalif Battle play for the Temple basketball Owls.

Beyond that, it’s just another indication that new Temple head coach Stan Drayton continues to push all the right buttons as we wrote in this space last week.

Put it this way: Drayton obviously feels some pressure to produce this year so stacking the roster with transfer portal talent better than the talent in the building has been job one.

All signs point to that job being near complete with the addition of probable starting quarterback Quincy Patterson a week ago yesterday. In just a few short months, Drayton has upgraded the quarterback room from a guy who started the 2021 opener for 2022 National Champion Georgia to a guy who led Virginia Tech to a win over a North Carolina roster that hammered Temple, 55-13.

You can talk all you want about Patterson’s passing but his throwing ability was on display against Mack Brown’s Tarheels and it was good enough.

At least for me considering the guy on the short end for Temple against UNC was statistically one of the four best quarterbacks in Temple history.

Patterson has two years of eligibility left at Temple and Dandridge will be one of the guys he will be able to throw to in 2023. Dandridge is a guy who had 10 touchdown receptions and over 1,000 yards receiving in one of the best leagues in the very best high school state.

That’s an explosive combination.

Even more so, Dandridge’s commitment is an indication that Drayton understands that the way to build the Temple program is the same way Al Golden and Matt Rhule did … by establishing strong relationships with great high school players that lead other great high school players to want to join that first guy.

That might not be a 10 million percent improvement over Rhule or Golden but it certainly is a 100 million improvement over the last CEO here and just watch where that leads.

Dandridge might be the first high-level recruit, but all indications are he won’t be the last.

Monday: A Three-Month Sprint

05.22.22
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Temple’s brush with a Golden Voice

Sometimes greatness is the result of being in the right place at the right time.

Such was the case for John Facenda’s long stint as the voice of NFL Films.

One night Facenda, already the first “Jim Gardner of Philadelphia” in 1965 visited a tavern in Center City. On the TV was NFL Films. Facenda marveled how impressive the footage was and Ed Sabol, the founder of NFL films, was at the other end of the bar and heard Facenda, who was the anchor of Channel 10’s then top-rated newscast.

“What if I give you a script to read?” Sabol said.

The rest is history.

Sabol said that the three key hires who made NFL Films as good as it was were: Facenda, his son, Steve, and musical composer Sam Spence.

NFL films did only produced only one college film, a 1980 short about Notre Dame called “Wake Up the Echos.”

Out of that, the local school, Temple, asked Facenda if he had time to do the voice over of a Temple vs. Pitt game two years later.

Facenda did it and it appears at the top of this post (and thanks to Zamani Feelings for converting it into the YouTube video).

“I could watch this a billion times just to hear that voice,” said former Temple All-American safety Anthony Young, who makes an interception in the above clip.

Due to his other duties, Facenda politely declined to do any more college videos and he died two years later.

The rest is history, too.

Facenda did hundreds of classic NFL films, but only college voiceovers for that Notre Dame special and that Temple vs. Pitt game.

That’s pretty good company and long after we’re all gone, this is a pretty good video to watch but, most of all, listen.

05.20.22
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Quincy Patterson: Season-changer

About a year ago at this time, I was absolutely convinced the 2021 Temple football Owls would finish 2-10 and you could not move me off that block.

As excited as I was about Stan Drayton replacing the old guy for this season, I looked at six wins as the absolute ceiling for the 2022 Temple football Owls.

Even looking at it eight optimistic ways, doubling last year’s win total seemed the best we could do.

With the news on Wednesday, the freaking sky is the limit.

Stan Drayton broke the good news to Temple fans in New York City on Thursday night.

We speculated in this space very recently that Drayton promised an upgrade at the quarterback position but did not see it. We said a week ago that Drayton was “bringing in a couple of guys” to compete for the starting quarterback job with D’Wan Mathis and I said that even given “one of those guys was Elijah Warner, who is the other guy?”

That “other guy” is Quincy Patterson with his recent signing at Temple.

This is a game-changer. Hell, it’s a season-changer. This has moved the needle from “ceiling of six wins” to a winning season.

A winning season needs to happen this year. I’ll take 7-5 but I’m much more into 8-5 and 9-3 or better.

Patterson now makes that possible.

Owls were “acceptable” on defense, offensive line, wide receiver and even running back but Mathis’ history of fragility and his underwhelming first year with the Owls made quarterback the No. 1 priority.

Prior to last week, Florida Gator transfer Emory Jones and Pitt Panther transfer Davis Beville were considered slight upgrades Temple could get over Mathis.

Patterson (who seemingly came out of nowhere because he entered the portal last week) is a huge upgrade and Drayton seeing the flaws in spring practice and getting upgrades since at running back and quarterback is the biggest indication that this guy is pushing all the right buttons.

Patterson is just what the doctor ordered for Temple football.

Consider this: This man singlehandedly led Virginia Tech to a 6OT win over a North Carolina team that beat Temple, 55-13. That was an 8-5 Temple team that beat No. 21 Maryland, 20-17. (That Maryland team hammered Rutgers, 48-7, four weeks later.)

This is no Re’Al Mitchell or even a Mathis.

I hope Mathis is Temple TUFF enough to accept the challenge and compete for a job I feel he will eventually lose but, if he wins it, Temple is better off with the competition.

The reality is that since both Mathis and Patterson have now entered the portal twice they are both committed to Temple for another year or will have to sit out before transferring to the next school.

For that reason, the Temple quarterback room has morphed from the thinnest to the deepest in the AAC and that’s a very good thing for all of us.

Monday: The Golden Voice

05.16.22
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Addison’s story is a cautionary tale for Temple

Jordan Addison

One of the best low-key stories in college sports is happening right now.

Columbia’s baseball team is on a 19-game winning streak, the longest in the nation.

Great story. Ivy League school becomes a legit threat on the national level, if it can beat out Philadelphia’s Penn for the title this coming week.

Temple used to have a baseball team. Made it to the College World Series twice. Finished third in the nation once. Defied all of the laws of “Eastern” teams and “cold-weather” teams not doing well in that sport in championships.

Also a great story.

Temple stopped writing that story when it dropped the nation’s past-time almost a decade ago. Drexel has a baseball team. So does Villanova and St. Joseph’s. Penn thrives in the sport and is the only threat to Columbia in the Ivy League. Temple does not but it still has a pretty nice stadium in Ambler, nicer than any of the city rivals.

Right now, tiny Arcadia College has the best college baseball stadium in the metropolis only because it rents Skip Wilson Field from Temple.

Columbia baseball, St. Peter’s basketball–at least in my mind–are the two best sports in college sports in the last couple of months, not in that order.

We’re running out of great stories in college sports and the chief reason is greed by the rich guys, not the poor ones.

That means terrible stories are obfuscating the good ones on a recurrent basis.

One such story is the Jordan Addison one currently happening.

Addison won the Fred Biletnikoff Award for being the best receiver in college football in the 2022 season while playing for Pitt.

That wasn’t good enough for Addison to continue playing at Pitt.

You would think Pitt football is big-time. The Panthers are coming off a Power 5 Conference championship and the Biletnikoff Award the school made possible for Addison has set him up for a nice pro career.

No.

The transfer portal and the NLI rule made Addison look around and it appears he is headed for the highest bidder, likely USC.

If Pitt is negatively affected, what does it mean for cross-state rival Temple?

Not good.

Something needs to be done about both the transfer portal rule and the NLI rule sooner than later but neither appears on the immediate horizon. I’m praying that some structure returns to college football but actually doing something is needed over thoughts and prayers at this point.

Addison leaving Pitt for greener (money) pastures is like Temple having a Heisman Trophy finalist leaving for another school after appearing in New York and finishing second. Fortunately, Paul Palmer never had to make that decision since he went immediately from the New York Athletic Club to the NFL but if both the transfer portal and the NLI existed (and Paul had some eligibility remaining), what would he have done in 1986?

Pitt doesn’t have the greenbacks to keep up with USC.

Temple doesn’t have the greenbacks to keep up with Pitt.

As far as a level playing field, which we once had, we can kiss that goodbye.

That’s the worst story in college sports these days and the NCAA needs to do something.

05.13.22
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Temple running out of time on a new quarterback

“You’re out of touch
I’m out of time
But I’m out of my head when you’re not around”

_ Temple grads Darryl Hall and John Oates in a 1984 No. 1 hit.

With the untimely departure of Lew Katz in an airplane crash and Bill Cosby in a scandal, Temple grad John Oates is probably the richest person alive who has publicly stated he cares about Temple football.

In a 2015 interview, Oates–who lives in Colorado and is reportedly worth $30 million–said he “watches every Temple game on TV” and is “thrilled with how far the program has come since I went there.”

Katz, who loved Temple football more than any rich guy ever, amassed a personal fortune of $467,000,000 before he died. Cosby’s last fortune estimate was made in the 2008 Time Magazine piece when “America’s Dad” had $365 million in his checking account. Katz’s son, Drew, is on the Temple Board of Trustees but doesn’t share the same enthusiasm for Temple football his dad did.

That leaves Oates.

Had to think about John, who was basically the lyric writer in the famous music duo, when researching Stan Drayton’s post-Cherry and White game promise about bringing in “a couple of quarterbacks” to compete for the job with current starter D’wan Mathis.

Even if Elijah Warner is one of the “couple of guys” Drayton promised to bring in to compete for the QB job, that leaves out a guy. Who is that guy?

“I’m out of time but I’m out of my head when you’re not around.”

Back in mid-April, had to be thinking about Florida portal guy Emory Jones and Pitt portal guy Davis Beville looking for a team where they could start right away.

They were available for Temple then. They are not now. Jones signed with Arizona State and Beville went to Oklahoma, where he might be the starting quarterback at Temple in 2024.

Temple?

Holding an empty bag so far.

What, exactly, did Drayton mean when he said “I’m bringing in a couple of guys” to compete for the starting job?

Even if you concede one of those guys was incoming freshman Elijah Warner, son of the current richest Temple football dad (Kurt, who, like Oates, has $30 million stashed away) that leaves us short a guy.

Listen, I like Mathis. I love his skill set.

I don’t like his history of fragility nor do I like what Temple currently has behind him.

Without insulting those kids by name, they are Villanova-level backups, not Temple-level starters.

Surely, Drayton must realize this.

That begs the question: What does Drayton have in mind?

We will find out soon or not at all. It’s the next big story on the Temple football horizon and it needs to be written.

We are running out of time and they (or he) is not around.

I’m not out of my head yet but will be if he’s not around on September 2.

05.09.22
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Still within reach for Temple: An AAC title

Temple will need to hit the local high schools to come away with a recruiting haul.

Plenty of things that were once not only possible in sports but actually occurred have no shot of happening again.

Fortunately, horse racing proved that a $30,000 claiming horse with an 80-1 shot can beat the 4-1 and 7-2 shots and still win the Kentucky Derby as Rich Strike did on Saturday.

That was a great moment in sports history.

Other great moments, though, are slip-sliding away.

Robin Roberts’ 28-straight complete games for the Philadelphia Phillies?

No shot ever since somebody came up with a pitch count.

Maury Wills’ 104 stolen bases for the 1960s Dodgers?

No way.

Ted Williams’ .406 batting average?

Err, no.

Baseball, though, despite declining impressive stats is infinitely fairer to the have-nots than college football is.

Because college football is controlled by the big-name, big-conference, schools, the likelihood that we will ever see another Group of Five football team in the playoffs is as remote as all of the above baseball records being broken.

Heck, there is even talk of the Power 5 splitting away from the rest of the NCAA and starting its own version of March Madness.

That means no more terrific stories like the ones crafted by schools like Butler, George Mason, Loyola of Chicago, and, most recently, St. Peter’s. They were the Rich Strikes of college basketball.

If that happens, the basketball tournament loses much of its appeal. Hell, Mike Leach makes a good argument here as to why college football should be more inclusive, not less, after the Kentucky Derby result. Gotta give that guy credit because he is one of the few haves to advocate for the have-nots.

Temple football came within 16 points of a 12-0 season in 1979 and a likely national championship if they were able to find those points, but that kind of ceiling got raised so high it’s in another galaxy by now.

What is the current Temple football ceiling?

Certainly, an AAC football title is within reach, probably not this year, but certainly 2-3 years down the road.

The Owls will have to use their advantages (located in a big city with plenty of NLI opportunities) plus having a charismatic head coach who should be a great recruiter. By then, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF will be gone and, if Temple can’t compete for titles with the Memphises, Tulanes, USFs and Tulsas, the administration will have to do some serious soul-searching about its football future.

Heck, even with Cincy, Houston and UCF to compete against, it wasn’t all that long ago that Temple appeared in consecutive football title games and won one of them.

The formula remains the same: A committed, enthusiastic, head coach who can attract only 25 great players in a recruiting area that holds 46 percent of the nation’s population within a five-hour drive.

That standard existed roughly five years ago. For the future to mean anything, it must be revisited.

Friday: Your Next QB?

05.02.22
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Breaking up with Illinois not hard to do

Jakari Norwood shows here that you can’t teach speed.

The transfer portal giveth and it also taketh away.

When it comes to Illinois football and Temple football, it giveth.

Don’t know why Temple is a destination for Illinois players, but as a Temple fan, I will take it.

When you have a head coach with all the charisma of a dead fish (and not all that long ago, Temple did), the portal door only seems to have an exit sign.

Now that Temple has a charismatic head coach, like Stan Drayton, the entrances seem to outnumber the exits.

That’s a good thing.

The latest Illinois’ running back to pick Temple is Jakari Norwood, who committed after a visit to Temple this weekend. He is second Illinois running back to commit to Temple in the last three years, with Ra’Von Bonner picking the Owls in 2020.

Jakari Norwood gets robbed of a touchdown vs. Nebraska here.

Game-changer?

Yet to be determined but arguably Bonner had better numbers at Illinois (822 yards, 10 touchdowns) than Norwood (49 carries, 244 yards, no touchdowns) and Bonner did not make much of an impact here.

That fact has to be tempered by the last coach’s history of failure in getting the entire running game at Temple to work no matter who carried the ball and that this coach is a highly touted run game specialist.

We shall see.

Bonner and Norwood were both starters at Illinois (Bonner started 10 games and Norwood one). Another one-time Illinois starter, Jacob Hollins, is a current linebacker at Temple.

The acquisitions show that Drayton is taking a hard look at the roster. Running backs did not make an impact in last month’s Cherry and White game the chief reason appeared to be the lack of breakaway speed among any of them and that includes sprinter Darvon Hubbard, a Texas A&M portal transfer.

Norwood, a 100- and 200-meter state champion in Florida, does have breakaway speed.

When he graduated from Deerfield (Fla.) High, he was ranked among the top 100 running backs in the country. Temple almost never gets that kind of recruit.

If he wins the job, he will have two years left to show why he was rated that highly and probably will bring a chip on his shoulder to prove it.

04.25.22
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The Next Big Thing: Fixing the WR position

The first aftershocks coming out of Stan Drayton’s inaugural spring practice at Temple are starting to be felt and it should not be surprising.

Drayton said several times early in the process that “nobody has taken a leadership role” at the wide receiver position and “that is something that needs to happen.”

Adonicas Sanders comes recommended by former Temple OC Dave Patenaude: “His work ethic is amazing.”

Translation: It didn’t happen so Drayton is making it happen.

Drayton is bringing in Michigan State’s Ian Stewart and Georgia Tech’s Adonicas Sanders at least one of them looks like a leader, if not both.

Sanders appears to be that guy.

A lot of the Duke players are still seeing Sanders’ game-winning catch against them in their nightmares and, if he does it again in the opener for a Temple win, that’s the kind of deja vu Owl fans would love to see.

As far Power 5 players transferring to Temple, the Owls haven’t seen this kind of productivity on the big stage in North Philadelphia since pre-season ACC Player of the Year (as chosen by that conference’s media), Montel Harris, arrived exactly 10 years ago. Then Temple coach Steve Addazio was looking to make a big splash because star running back Bernard Pierce left for the NFL draft, where he was selected by the Baltimore Ravens in the third round.

Harris delivered, rushing for over 1,000 yards that season, including a Temple-record 351 yards in a 63-32 win at Army.

Now Drayton is facing a similar leadership hole as Jadan Blue has left for Virginia Tech and Randle Jones embarks on a pro career soon.

Sanders’ P5 numbers aren’t quite as good as Montel’s but he has 14 Power 5 starts and caught 29 passes last year for 362 yards and three touchdowns. Pretty comparable to the 36 catches for the exact same amount of yards (362) it took current teammate Amad Anderson to compile in three years at Purdue.

So the Owls have a couple of guys, if both start, have produced during games in the ACC and Big 10. Add Stewart in the mix to a reliable holdover like Jose Barbon and the Owls are starting to build some depth for whomever the starting quarterback turns out to be.

Speaking of that, Sanders attended Charleston’s Burke High School in South Carolina. Matt Duncan, a backup quarterback at Temple who recently told Drayton he was entering the portal, is from Summerville, S.C.

One of the Owls’ rumored quarterback targets is Pitt transfer portal guy Davis Beville, who is from Greenville, S.C.

Maybe the South Carolina guys know something Temple fans will find out about soon.

Either way, whoever wins the Temple quarterbacking job will be inheriting a sure-handed group thanks to Drayton being proactive.

Friday: Networking

04.22.22
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Quarterback help is on the way

Sometimes it’s the thought that counts.

Judging by the thinking in the coaches’ room at the Edberg-Olson Football Complex, there is a plan going forward and that’s a good thing.

At least from a Temple fan perspective.

From this seat in the stands and on the sidelines the last year or so (including the spring game a couple of weeks ago), what we’ve seen so far of D’wan Mathis is promising but not enough.

We speculated in this space 18 days ago about the availability of Florida transfer Emory Jones and said he was “open to going anywhere” and Temple is one of those places now.

He is just off a visit to Arizona State so the Owls getting him is not assured but they have shown interest and are also interested in Pitt transfer portal QB Davis Beville.

If they can get one, they will be better off. If they can get both, it’s hitting the jackpot.

To me, Mathis is a guy who needs a fire lit under him to excel and either/or of the above two qualify as kindling.

If Mathis excels with the competition, Temple’s offensive productivity is better off. If either Jones or Beville beats out Mathis, then Temple is better off. Being the Temple quarterback is a job worth earning, not one that should be given.

Remember, Mathis came in here with more interceptions than touchdowns thrown at Georgia and his six touchdowns vs. four interceptions in his inaugural year with the Owls didn’t represent the kind of productivity we were looking for.

Former head coach Rod What’s His Name staked his future on Mathis, replacing a guy who had thrown 21 touchdowns and 11 interceptions in his last full regular season with a guy who went 6/4.

Not good.

Before the uneven Cherry and White performance of Mathis, head coach Stan Drayton said he was “bringing in guys” to compete and now it appears, as with most things Drayton, he is hell-bent on keeping his promise.

Jones and Beville are two interesting guys but, if they don’t come here, there are still several FCS starters in the portal looking to move up. Scholarships are running out and Temple appears to be making room for quarterbacks as deep sub Matt Duncan announced his intention to enter the portal.

Jones threw 19 touchdown passes at Florida and that was 17 more than Mathis did at Georgia and Beville was 14-for-18 in a 2020 game for Pitt.

Bring one of those guys to Temple and things really get interesting here.

The best-case scenario would be for Mathis to accept the challenge and win a starting job that was given to him a year ago. The worst case would be to keep things as they are now and have no viable AAC-level backups.

The new guy seems to understand that a whole lot better than the old guy and that means the Temple brain trust is using their heads for more than a hat rack, a welcome change from the most recent past.

Monday: The Next Big Thing