Category Archives: Temple football

10.02.20
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5 Improvements that need to be made

Matt Rhule didn’t win a title at Temple until he put emphasis on the run game and special teams. Rod Carey is going to have to make the same kind of commitment for his Owls to do the same.

All you have to do on any given NFL Sunday to see the winners and losers is thumb down to the turnovers section of the statistics.

Invariably, the team with the more takeaways than the other one comes out on top.

That’s the NFL where there isn’t a wide gap in overall talent. In college football, it’s a little different. The team with the talent and recruiting edge usually comes out on top and, instead of turnovers, it’s protecting the quarterback and getting to the quarterback that determines wins.

At Temple, much of the success under Matt Rhule was due to him ditching the spread after the first two seasons and going to a run-oriented approach with a heavy dose of play-action passing.

Simple formula that the Owls have strayed from the last few seasons. It shortens the game, keeps the clock running, and limits the number of possessions the bad guys get.

I’ve got to think Anthony Russo would have thrived more under Matt Rhule’s pro-set offense than under Carey’s RPO-based one. Maybe in Carolina in a couple of years.

In order to get the bad taste of North Carolina out of their mouths, the Owls are going to have to do all of these things and more.

  1. Run game

Although Ray Davis got over 900 yards in a breakout season, the run game was spotty enough that, in the most important game of the season, the Owls schemed 26 passes in their first 34 plays from scrimmage at Cincinnati. When they got back to the run in the second half, it worked but was too late. Behind a very experienced and talented offensive line and a top running back, the Owls need to establish the run a lot better. That would make wideouts Branden Mack and Jadan Blue more dangerous than they already are and they have elite edge talent.

Protecting the passer

Nine of Anthony Russo’s 11 regular-season interceptions came as a result of him being hit while throwing. The other two were perfectly-thrown tipped balls that landed (1) in Isaiah Wright’s hand and (2) that bounced off Randle Jones chest. The Owls are going to have to do a better job of protecting Russo.

Only 1 more Saturday without the Owls

Rushing the passer

Losing AAC Defensive Player of the Year Quincy Roche to Miami stung in this area but there is hope in that the two starting interior tackles, Ifeanyi Maijeh and Dan Archibong, return and the Owls got a P5 player, Manny Walker, to replace Roche. The Owls are going to have to generate an edge rush or make up for it with an interior one.

Special teams

This used to be an area of strength for Temple and, last year, the Owls looked like the Keystone Cops more often than not when it was time to punt, kick or return a punt. It’s worth noting that Ed Foley wasn’t around last year. Maybe his departure didn’t make a difference but Foley’s special teams did not false start on any field goals this season at Carolina, something that could not be said for the Eagles’ special teams this week or the Owls special teams last year.

Game Planning

The aforementioned 26 passing plays in the first 34 at Cincy was just one area of concern. The game plan at Buffalo last season was atrocious as well. Buffalo was one of the worst run defenses in FBS football in 2018 and the Owls should have exploited that weakness instead of throwing the ball all over the lot. Those are two of your four regular-season losses last year. The Owls will have to do a much better job attacking the weakness of the opposition than they did a year ago. If Team A is terrible against the run and Team B is terrible against the pass, you run a lot against Team A and throw the ball on Team B. Owls pretty much had the same game plan in all 12 of their regular-season games a year ago and that reflected staff tunnel vision.

That must change to get back to the Temple football we all know and love.

Monday: The Other October

09.28.20
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5 Temple Newcomers to Watch

It’s pretty hard for a newcomer, where it’s a true freshman, a redshirt freshman or a transfer to make a difference in college football these days.

The culture and the systems are usually so firmly entrenched it takes a year or two to make an impact.

Temple had at least one, running back, Ray Davis, make a big breakthrough last year and this year there could be at least five more. Not many predicted Davis would get more than 900 yards, but that’s the great thing about college football. Someone always breaks through and makes an impact.

At least five could do the same for the 2020 football Owls.

All five of them come in areas of need (kicking game, offensive line, defensive end) so we’ll just concentrate on those areas because guys like Nazir Burnett (wide receiver) and Muheem McCargo (linebacker) probably will need injuries at deep positions to get on the field and show their stuff.

Kicker (both No. 47)

Will Leyland and Rory Bell. Not much to chose between the Wilmington (Ohio) Bell and the Souderton (Pa.) Leyland so this is an interesting battle to watch. Bell was first-team all-Southeast Ohio and Leyland was on the roster of the Big 33 game as the kicker for the East team before that game was canceled. Both have pushed three-year starter Will Mobley for the starting job and, should the Owls need to kick a field goal from distance expect one of the two to get the shot. It’s been a long time since the Owls have been a threat from distance (Boomer, Austin Jones and Brandon McManus come to mind).

Offensive line

C.J. Perez (center) and Michael Niese (guard) are accomplished transfers from Northern Illinois and Dayton who should upgrade an offensive line that was battered in the 55-13 bowl loss to North Carolina. One of the reasons why it was battered was because one of the two most reliable performers, Vince Picozzi, was out with an injury. He’s back and they are here and the Owls should establish a running game that will make Anthony Russo that much more an effective passer. It will also help the passing game if these guys provide Russo with an extra second or two to throw and they should.

Defensive End

When Quincy Roche left for Miami, that meant the Owls had to replace the AAC Defensive Player of the Year and a double-digit sack guy. So the Owls dipped into the P5 and got Manny Walker out of Wake Forest. Will he get double-digit sacks? Doubtful, but if he applies enough pressure on the outside, expect NFL prospects Dan Archibong and Ifeany Maijeh to get better numbers in that area than a year ago. Roche was getting the attention last year. Walker will have to earn some of it this season.

Friday: 5 Improvements We’d Like to See

Monday: The Other October

Friday (Oct. 9): Finally, a Game Day

Sunday (Oct. 11): Game Analysis

09.20.20
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All systems go: Why not The Citadel?

Now that all systems are full go for football practice at Temple University, getting a non-conference replacement to prepare for the AAC opener should be the highest priority.

Navy is going to have plenty of tuneups prior to the most important game on the Temple football schedule.

Temple has really one perfect shot at a tuneup for Oct. 3 and that’s The Citadel. Otherwise, the Owls have a chance to look as rusty as a 1959 Rambler in Annapolis on Oct. 10.

Why take that chance when there is an option to stop the option?

The Citadel plays exactly the same offense Navy does and it would give the Owls a chance to practice against one at game speed.

When we last saw The Citadel on Saturday it lost 49-0 to Clemson. Dabo Sweeney graciously offered to keep the clock running in the second half but Citadel declined.

Citadel’s reasoning was this. They only have four games scheduled and would like more. They wanted to play as many minutes as they could. Citadel’s league game with Mercer, originally scheduled for Oct. 3, has been canceled. Temple isn’t doing anything on Oct. 3, either.

A rusty 1959 Rambler in 2020.

One year ago, Citadel went into Georgia Tech and beat the overly verbose Geoff Collins so a 49-0 loss to basically an NFL team like Clemson cannot be held against them. Temple won’t beat them 49-0 but if Temple is afraid of playing The Citadel it probably should get out of the football playing business.

Citadel wants a game. Temple needs a game. Going into Navy by practicing against an RPO offense is a recipe for disaster. We’ll play there or they can play here. Temple needs the game that much. Plus, since no fans are allowed at the Linc, it would give the Temple kids the treat of playing in front of real fans, many of them wearing Cherry and White.

Someone in the athletic office named Fran at The Star Complex should be making a call to South Carolina today. That’s assuming Fran is showing up for work.

The guy to contact is athletic director Mike Capaccio. His phone number is 843-953-4806. His email is mcapaccio@citadel.edu. There is no time to waste.

Friday: The Hardest Part

09.18.20
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5 Ways This Season Won’t be The Same

Road closures for tailgating around the Linc this year

In another bit of what this space believes is governmental overreach, the City of Philadelphia announced Wednesday that four streets will be blocked off on Eagles’ Game Day so that fans cannot tailgate around Lincoln Financial Field.

No announcement was made about Temple, but they probably don’t feel the need to do so when it comes to the Owls. In other words, don’t expect to tailgate.

For a couple of weeks I was thinking about how this season will be different from all the rest and came up with five (out of about 100) off the top of my head:

5. Above-mentioned tailgating

All over in the first couple weeks of the season, we’ve seen places where people have been allowed at the games. Mostly, there’s been spacing with appropriate mask-wearing. The few shots of tailgating we’ve seen have shown the same. Not in Philadelphia, though. There won’t be fans or tailgating in Philadelphia this fall. Sad, because what worked at grocery stores and gas stations–appropriate social distancing and masks–can work at games and pre-games as well. Maybe next year.

4. Interesting non-conference matchups

So rare almost to be non-existent, a nugget will show up on the screen this weekend–UCF at Georgia Tech. Almost all of the conferences will be like the Big 10 this season, games almost exclusively against conference opponents. It’s a shame because I think Temple would have put a huge beatdown on Rutgers and the Owls even opened at a 12.5-point favorite on VegasInsiders.com this week (don’t know why VegasInsiders even listed the game because it’s non-existent) but the UCF at Georgia Tech probably will be one of the five best non-conference games this year. UCF is an 8.5-point favorite, but I would stay away from this game due to 10 UCF players opting out and uncertainty over whether GT’s win at FSU was due to GT being impressive or Mike Norvell facing unique first-year challenges.

3. Power 5 Dominance of Playoffs

The Power 5 might grab its usual four spots in the Final Four but, if there is one year the G5 can break through, it’s this one. How so? Say, UCF wins at Georgia Tech, goes unbeaten, and GT finishes no worse than second to Clemson in the ACC. It would be hard to deny Central Florida under that scenario, particularly if there are only two other unbeaten teams. Still, would prefer Temple to go unbeaten and UCF have that one loss but, if the Owls aren’t the team, Owl fans certainly would root for UCF in that scenario. Sadly, since the Owls did not seek out a P5 opponent (Pitt?) due to city practice restrictions, there is virtually no chance an unbeaten Temple team makes the playoffs.

2. Tuneups

In the early part of September, P5 teams like to schedule so-called cupcake games for tuneups prior to the conference season. The Big 12 thought it had three against the Sun Belt when Kansas hosted Coastal Carolina, Kansas State hosted Arkansas State and Iowa State hosted Louisiana. Those turned out to be tuneups for the Sun Belt, which now at least has a compelling argument it is the best G5 conference. At least this year.

  1. Stats

Asterisks in sports are always annoying but this will be the year of the asterisk. With eight games, it’s going to be hard to get a 1,000-yard rusher or a 20-touchdown passer. Doubtful any team season records will be broken this year. Say, though, with eight games instead of 12, Anthony Russo throws for more than 21 touchdown passes and fewer than the 11 interceptions he threw last year. That’s a pretty impressive accomplishment. Harder, though, for Ray Davis to hit 1,000 yards in eight games if he could get 900 yards last year in a dozen. Still think he can do it but the bar gets higher. To me, Babe Ruth’s 60 homers in a 154-game season will always be more impressive than Roger Maris’ 61 in 162 games and that’s the prism we will view these 2020 football stats as well.

Monday: All Systems Go

09.14.20
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CFB: More Chess than Checkers

The beauty of college football is that often a less talented team can beat a more talented team due to brains over brawn.

Take Louisiana’s Group of Five win on Saturday against Power 5 and No. 23-ranked host Iowa State.

The Rajun Cajuns won because of several well-designed plays. Iowa State relied too much on Brock Purdy’s arm and trying to run over the G5 team.

This P.J. Walker throwback pass across the field against USF (where he rolled right and threw across his body) worked for an easy six to Colin Thompson.

A few well-designed plays can be the difference between evenly matched teams and many more can be the difference in an upset. That was evident not only in Louisiana’s win, but Coastal Carolina’s 35-17 win at Kansas and Arkansas State’s 35-31 win at Kansas State.

There’s no way to convince me that the three winning teams had more talent than the three losing ones so it had to be coaching.

Such was the case on Saturday and such should and could be the case for Temple going forward this season. Under Wayne Hardin–and, to a lesser extent, Bruce Arians–Temple was able to win a lot of games by outsmarting teams.

Hardin used things like the wraparound draw, the halfback pass, the shovel pass (which worked for a touchdown for Coastal Carolina on Saturday) and the tight end to completely fool the opposition.

The times it didn’t work usually came against teams with overwhelming talent but most times it did because the Owls were 80-52-3 under Hardin.

Arians brought his own style of innovation to Temple and the play above where he completely fools Rutgers in 1988 was a perfect example. Arians had the tailback block down, leaving the fullback completely open in the flat for a touchdown. Because fullbacks usually block for tailbacks, and not the opposite way around, Nelson Herrera was left unaccounted for in the flat.

That brings me to Temple football recently which has been more like checkers than chess, a lot more brawn involved than brain. With only slight exceptions, I don’t remember Temple outsmarting many people in recent years. The First Philly Special–a throwback from wide receiver John Christopher to P.J. Walker–worked for a crucial first down in the 2015 Penn State game. The throwback pass to Kenny Yeboah in last year’s game was another and the fake out to Ventell Byrant (that resulted in Yeboah being wide open for six) in the 2018 Maryland game was a third.

That’s it.

Hopefully, the current Temple staff is using this extra time to go over some old innovative plays in the Edberg-Olson archives.

Putting them to work this season could not hurt and probably could help checkmate a few foes.

Of the things we want to see improvement on this year, innovation in the play-calling is near the top of the list.

Friday: 5 Ways This Season Will Be Different

09.10.20
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Everybody plays before Temple

As I write this, I’m watching the UAB Blazers taking on the Miami Hurricanes in a college football game and shaking my head in the process.

You remember the ‘Canes. That was supposed to be Temple’s opener five days ago. That game was scrapped as the ACC decided to postpone the opening of the season.

Rumors were a month ago that Temple and Pitt tentatively agreed to play a game this weekend but that was also tabled because of the City of Philadelphia’s practice restrictions on Temple.


Imagine all of the
Penn State players
and fans sitting
home watching TU-Pitt

 

That’s the same city that placed no such practice restrictions on the other Lincoln Financial Field tenant, the Eagles, who are playing this weekend. COVID-19 must be much worse in North Philadelphia than South Philly. There really has not been a satisfactory answer to the question why the Eagles get different treatment from the city than the Owls in the area of practice restrictions. Pittsburgh, a city in the same state, placed no such restrictions on the Panthers.

The last time the Owls opened in October did not turn out well.

UAB’s athletic director is Mark Ingram, who was rumored to be a leading candidate for the Temple job before Fran Dunphy was chosen as a stop-gap measure. It seems to me that Ingram, who is familiar with Temple having been here before, would have been able to navigate the dilemma facing the Owls and facilitated a temporary practice move to Ambler so the Owls could get ready for Pitt.

Dunphy probably doesn’t think outside the box like that.

That game would have been a terrific middle finger to a rival of both teams, Penn State. Imagine all of the Penn State players and fans sitting at home watching Temple and Pitt play. That would have been sweet. It would have been, in my mind, a terrific game, with former Temple commit Kenny Pickett battling Anthony Russo in nice quarterback battle.

Another missed opportunity by the Temple administration.

Now with the Navy game moved to October every single AAC team will have played before the Owls. The record will show that the first fumble of the season will have come not in the Navy game, but in the AD’s office at the Star Complex, 15th and Montgomery.

Whether the Owls will recover is a question yet to be answered but the last time they started a season in October it didn’t turn out well for the Cherry and White. They finished 0-8.

Let’s all pray similar circumstances lead to opposite results this season but from where I sit, watching UAB and Miami and wondering why Temple isn’t playing, does not give me the warm and fuzzies.

Monday: Checkers and Chess

09.07.20
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Did You Ever Get the Feeling?

Figuring out Temple football gave Matt Rhule this kind of living space

Every comedian has a shtick, a routine, style of performance associated with that particular person.

Temple football today reminds me of a 1950s and 60s comedian named George Goebel. He started a series of jokes with “Do you ever get the feeling?”

He had the whole comedy thing figured out in how it would work given his circumstances. He knew the room.

Matt Rhule definitely did not have the Temple football room figured out until after his first two years and, largely to figuring it out, he’s sitting on millions of dollars and, on top of that, trying to sell at $2.5 million home in Waco after moving on to the Panthers.

Rod Carey would do well taking notes.

Do you ever get the feeling that this is the year Carey figures how to succeed at Temple? I have my doubts but we shall see.

How did Rhule figure Temple out? After the first two years, he scrapped the spread and went to a more conventional pro offense using two backs. In this interview with USA Today’s Paul Myerberg, Rhule capsulated the Epiphany beautifully. The scheme fit the school. Temple TUFF, 10th and Diamond, run the ball, with two backs, make explosive plays off the play-action passing game, play great defense and special teams.

This the key quote in that story:

Said Rhule, “How do we differentiate ourselves? How do we make ourselves hard to prepare for? Put two backs on the field. Put two tight ends on the field.

“This is what your roots are. These kids have made themselves really tough. And that’s the only way we’ll ever win. By being a really, really tough football team.”

Let’s analyze that. What does “put two backs on the field” mean? Two halfbacks? Two fullbacks? Three quarterbacks? It means exactly what he did: Put a fullback in front of a tailback, establish the run, bring the safeties and the linebackers up in run support and use deft play-faking to the backs in throwing to wide open receivers for explosive downfield plays. It was what we were pleading for him to do in this space for the first two years of the Rhule Era.

Carey, to me, is a good coach but Rhule made the leap to great when he went from to a more traditional NFL-style offense.

Temple has the offensive line to run such an offense, experienced, talented and averaging 300 pounds across the front. Use, say, Tayvon Ruley (6-0, 216) as a fullback in front of Ray Davis and that’s even an extra blocker at the point of attack for a shifty cutback runner. Throw one more blocker in the area of defenders and Davis has a bigger hole to cut through. The Owls have a quarterback known for an accurate and big arm and not for his legs. Those are the essential elements of a play-action focused offense, not an RPO one. Great coaches adjust to their personnel; they don’t make the personnel adjust to them.

Is Carey comfortable with just good or does he want to be great?

This season Temple fans should find out if the Owls play at least nine or more games. If Carey is still living in a modest home in South Jersey next year and driving a pickup truck, he will have done things his way and gone 4-4.

If, on the other hand, he reads the room better than a year ago, he will be 9-0 or 8-1 looking for a $2.5 million mansion somewhere, maybe even Waco.

It’s the difference between being good and great.

Now let’s go have a season and find out.

Friday: The AAC After Week One

09.04.20
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Special Teams are Like Umpires

Whether he wants to admit it or not, Rod Carey cannot say his special teams by delegation produced better results than any of Ed Foley’s special teams at Temple.

Special teams are like umpires. If you don’t notice them, they are great. If you do, they are like Angel Hernandez.

Terrible.

If you don’t notice them, they are John Libka–generally considered the best balls and strikes umpire in the game today.

Last year, Temple football’s special teams were closer to Hernandez than Libka.

After Brandon McManus kicked this game-winning field goal against UConn, head coach Steve Addazio said: “Our goal was to put the ball in the center of the field and let the best kicker in the country win it for us.” He did.

For about a decade before that, nobody really noticed Temple’s special teams. Maybe not coincidentally, that started in 2009 when head coach Al Golden also assumed the head coach of the special teams’ role.

When Steve Addazio took over for Golden, he promoted tight ends coach Ed Foley who made Temple’s special teams legendary for excellence. Foley was a guy who rose to his level of competence. He’s a very competent special teams’ coach, one of the best, but as an interim head coach he proved to be a bridge too far. There can be little doubt if Foley, say, won either the Wake Forest game or the Duke game as an interim, his chances of being Temple head coach today would have been far greater than they are now.

Last year, in an administrative move, Rod Carey took Foley from the field to an off-the-field role and that caused Foley to go to Baylor and now the Carolina Panthers.

The Owls were the Keystone Cops of AAC special teams and that stung Temple fans were used to Owls making big plays in that third of the game.

“If we’re great on defense and special teams, we’re going to be in every game,” Golden said in 2009. “That’s two-thirds of the team. I really felt that special teams was an area I had to take charge of myself.”

Maybe it was Carey’s fault for letting Foley go. All we know is that, under Foley, the kicking and return coverage games were great. With pretty much the same personnel last year, they were terrible. In order to gain trust of Owls fans, it’s going to have to improve this year.

Will we ever see this stat again under this staff? Got to hope so. In this case, we’re from Missouri (show me state) and they are from NIU.

Last year, the Owls couldn’t make a routine extra point at Cincinnati and that might have cost them the East title. A block was missed. Was that the fault of the new special teams “coaches” (Carey has a couple of coaches in charge)? Maybe not. But it didn’t happen on the regular under Foley.

Under Foley, Isaiah Wright was a dynamic punt and kickoff returner in 2018. Under Carey’s coach by committee in 2019, he was just another guy. Temple always flipped the field on kickoffs. Too often last year, the Owls started drives deep in their own territory. Maybe Foley would have been able to communicate how important it was for Wright to eschew the fair catches for the reward of a big play.

The Owls were aggressive on special teams for a decade, going after blocked punts and field goals. High risk, high reward. The philosophy changed to no risk no reward last year. Disappointing. If you’ve got no athletes, that’s probably the way to go but Temple has always had athletes out the wazoo, notably but not limited to 6-5 wide receivers like Branden Mack with a 91-inch wingspan who liked to block punts. They played scared on special teams. That might be the NIU way but that’s the opposite of Temple TUFF.

Now the rebuilding of the Owls’ special teams begins. The Owls recruited a couple of high-profile kickers and Will Mobley’s job appears to be in jeopardy. Rory Bell has a longer leg (Mobley a very reliable extra point kicker) and a pedigree for success at the high school level.

Looks like to me Bell is the guy for kicking. For punting, Adam Berry had his moments and most were not good. Did not like his body language after failing to field a snap or shanking a punt. Hopefully, he has matured but thanks to recruiting, the Owls now have some other options.

Golden was right. This is 1/3 of the team and deserves attention. It did not get that last year. If the Owls are going to be successful in this department, we will not notice this aspect of the team at all.

Monday: Did You Ever Get The Feeling?

08.31.20
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Temple starting defensive projections

They said it couldn’t be done, but we have college football in 2020

We’re getting thisclose … thisclose … to a real football season judging my the weather patterns.

Almost always the weather moves from West to East and, if the Austin Peay football game over the weekend was an indication, it’s going to be raining footballs at Navy on Sept. 26.

Austin Peay made sure the guy who wrote this has egg on his face this morning

The players there proved you can play a fun game and it can still be fun and the fans there showed that, if you can wear a mask and do high fives six feet apart, you don’t have to sacrifice a season. Look at it this way: If you can wear a mask and shop for groceries, you can wear a mask and go to a football game.

Gasparilla Bowl defensive MVP William Kwenkeu (35) had two sacks in the win over FIU in 2017.

So I’m feeling better for the Temple football Owls today. If the city allows the Owls the same rights the other birds in town, the Eagles, have, then Temple should be ready for a football season. If not, as Al Golden said in the past, all the Owls need is to-find a 100-yard patch and the will be ready. Owls have two of those at Ambler.

What we do know is that this team is in relatively good shape on offense.

Defense is going to be a little more challenging. The Owls have to replace their best pass rusher, Quincy Roche, who pulled a Benedict Arnold and transferred to Miami. The coaches did their best to replace him, grabbing a P5 transfer in Manny Walker, but he would have to be awfully impressive to replace the AAC defensive player of the year. He should line up where Roche did. It’s up to him to match the production.

Owls held their preseason camp at The Cherry Hill Inn (1974 here) and finished 8-2, proving all you need to get ready is a field, goal posts and permission to hit.

Our defensive starting projections:

DE: Manny Walker (6-4,250) and Layton Jordan (6-2, 210); DT: Dan Archibong (6-6, 300) and Ifeanyi Maijeh (6-2, 285); LBs: Isaiah Graham-Mobley (6-2, 225), Audley Isaacs (6-1, 227) and William Kwenkeu (6-1, 230); S: Amir Tyler (6-0, 195) and DaeSean Winston (6-2, 200); CBs: Christian Braswell (5-10, 178) and Linwood Crump Jr (6-0, 175). For the mathematically challenged (and we had one of those last week), that’s two DEs, two DTs=4; plus 3LBS=7; two safeties=9 and two corners=11.

First impressions: That’s a lot of inexperience to create an edge rush but the Owls also have another defensive end, Arnold Ebiketie, who was a healthy part of the end rotation last year and could challenge for a starting spot if one of those falter. Pretty good depth at the corner position as Ty Mason and Freddie Johnson both have AAC starts under their belts behind the even more experienced duo of Crump and Braswell. Both Mason (Tulsa) and Braswell (UConn) have pick 6s on their resumes. Safety Amir Tyler is a solid single-digit player and Kwenkeu was the defensive MVP of the Gasparilla Bowl win way back in 2017. IGM might be the best NFL prospect on the team, even though Dan Archibong is a solid DT and fellow DT Maijeh is a returning AAC first-teamer.

Second impressions: Depth is better in years past because of people like Mason, Johnson and tackles Kevin Robertson and Khris Banks. George Reid, from Abington High (thanks, Rob Krause!), has had plenty of playing time at safety and outside linebacker and M.J. Griffin is a prized recruit ready to come into his own at safety.

Now it’s just a matter of getting these guys on the field against a real opponent. If Austin Peay can get it done, so should Temple.

Friday: Special Teams

Monday: Do You Ever Get The Feeling?

08.28.20
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Temple offensive starting projections

 

“After Ray rips off a couple of big runs, I want you to fake it into his belly, bring the linebackers and safeties up for run support and find Jadan or Branden wide open for six. Easy peasy this year.”

Without any solid news coming out of the Temple summer football camp, it’s hard to get a read on who the impressive newcomers are and how fast they are progressing up the depth chart.

This time a year ago, we would have had a season-ticket holder party and have been able to sit down at the tables and talk to the players and get their imput.

Rod Carey probably has the best offensive personnel he’s ever had. A little less RPO and a little more play-action are the ingredients he needs to turn the scoreboard into an adding machine.

That’s how in 2009 I got this when I asked who was surprising among the true freshmen. “Bernard Pierce.” Just about every one of the seniors and juniors I talked to back then said to watch Bernard Pierce and that’s he’s going to make an immediate impact. To a man, when asked about the pleasant surprises the two words “Bernard Pierce” came out of every mouth.

They were right.

Players know. Pierce had to wait until two days before the Villanova game to be cleared by the NCAA to play, and that’s why he only had 44 yards in a limited debut against Villanova. Everyone who saw him said in the parking lot afterward if Pierce played the entire game, Temple would have won.

Without that kind of input, picking a projected starting lineup is like walking around a dark room without a light on. All we have to go on here are three things: 1) what we saw last year; 2) last year’s depth chart and 3) the roster currently published on Owlsports.com, which is constantly updated.

So here’s an educated guess with all of those caveats plus the injury factor which can happen between the time this is typed and published. That’s how football is, unfortunately.

Quarterback: Anthony Russo (6-4, 235); Halfback: Ray Davis (5-9, 210); Fullback: None (unfortunately); Wide receivers: Jadan Blue (6-0, 180), Randle Jones (6-0, 190) and Branden Mack (6-5, 220); Tight end: David Martin-Robinson (6-4,245); Tackles: Adam Klein (6-5, 295) and Isaac Moore, (6-7, 305); Guards: Vince Picozzi (6-4, 305) and Michael Niese (6-5, 275); Center: C. J. Perez (6-1, 287).

First impressions: The line is extremely large and experienced. In Perez, the Owls got an All-MAC performer and MAC championship center to replace a high NFL draft choice. “There’s not one coach here I didn’t know previously,” Perez said on the school’s official website. An argument could be made that this line is better than the one that played in the bowl game because Picozzi is back after wrecking his knee in the USF win last fall. Picozzi, from Lansdale Catholic, was arguably the second-best lineman on the team. The other guard is a FCS All-American from Dayton, Michael Niese. Huge upgrades at the guard position from just the bowl game.

Second impressions: Quarterback depth improved with Re-Al Mitchell, the transfer from Iowa State, and the improvement of prized recruit Trad Beatty. Even if Russo, who has been durable for his two seasons, goes down, the Owls should be in good shape at quarterback. I don’t feel as confident in the backup RB position, which is why the Owls should have made a run for Penn State portal guy Ricky Slade (who ironically went to Old Dominion, which isn’t playing football this year).

Randle Jones is one of three receivers who may be the best group ever to play at the same time at Temple. All three sport single digits.

That should open enough holes for Ray Davis to go from 900 yards to over 1,000. If that happens, and the coaching staff utilizes more play action than they did last year, that should buy an extra second or two for Russo to find the most talented three wide receivers who have ever played together at Temple.

That’s not even an argument because it’s impossible to find three who had the stats just two (Mack and Blue) put up last year. Going over the list, the closest I could find were the Henry Burris duo of Troy Kersey and Van Johnson and their best year fell well short of the nearly 2,000 yards Mack and Blue put up under the same quarterback last year.

One thing is clear: If the Owls have trouble putting points up on the board this year, it will be on the coaches and not the players. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that establishing the run first and a heavy dose of play-action second will get that job done.

Monday: Defense

Friday: Special Teams

Monday: Do You Ever Get The Feeling?