Category Archives: Temple football

07.13.18
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The Big Uniform Reveal: It Looks Good

swaggyt

Conventional wisdom on social media after The Big Reveal on the new Temple uniforms yesterday was: “Well, if the kids like it, that’s the only thing that matters.”

Really?

Identity does, too.

Few of us are kids anymore but all of us once were.


A cautionary note is provided
by our friend Karma.
Since (and including)
the 2015 win over Penn State,
the Owls are 19-3 wearing
predominantly Cherry, 7-7 wearing white
and 1-4 wearing black. They are 0-0
wearing gray, but we will find
out how they fare with that color soon

The thought never occurred to me once when I was a kid that I wanted a new uniform or I was waiting for what I new uniform looked like.

Maybe thinking evolved over the last 40 or so years, but when I look at uniforms like the ones at Alabama, USC and Penn State, I’m more convinced than ever that uniforms have little to no impact upon a recruit’s decision to attend a certain school.

Those schools have a clean, traditional and some—not me—would say “boring” look but it has not affected them.

Nor should it affect Temple, which has had a pretty distinctive look of its own for the past decade or so of mostly success.

Cringeworthy is what I think when I see what Maryland has done with once pretty nice uniforms and that’s what I was afraid to see when the Owls made their big reveal on Thursday. After all, the Under Armour CEO is a Maryland grad and UA and Temple collaborated on this new look.

Fortunately, crazy did not happen. The Big Reveal actually looked pretty good, keeping the predominantly Cherry and predominantly white look while adding a touch of gray and black. A cautionary note is provided by our friend Karma. Since (and including) the 2015 win over Penn State, the Owls are 19-3 wearing predominantly Cherry, 7-7 wearing white and 1-4 wearing black. They are 0-0 wearing gray, but we will find out how they fare with that color soon.

Don’t tempt Mother Nature.

Temple did not stray far from its traditional look, adding a tweak here and there.

The basic identity of Temple is still reflective in the new look, but the identity of Temple is there and that matters every bit as much as what the kids think.

 

07.11.18
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The Ideal Temple Uniform

friendship

Kyle Friend and P.J. Walker were happy with this helmet design.

In the grand scheme of things, uniforms and helmets rank somewhere between 4-99 in terms of importance.

Winning, of course, is No. 1, followed by finding a long-term place to play and maybe recruiting. Beyond that the branding of the program both on and off the field IS important.

In recent weeks, head coach Geoff Collins has hinted at a new look for the program in his twitter feed. Past head coaches have put their own stamp on the program’s look with mixed success.

nohelmet

Hard to read the word Temple with a black-cherry background.

Wayne Hardin got rid of the ugly Owl on the side of the helmets and chose to spell the word “Temple” in large block letters and that stuck for awhile.

“We’re Temple; we want people to know who we are,” Hardin said.

Al Golden brought that back when he took over in 2006.

“That’s the football brand, Temple,” Golden said. “The school brand is the block T but when I played at Penn State when we saw Temple on the helmet that’s the brand we respected because those guys played tough and hit as hard as any team we played. So I wanted to bring that back for my guys.”

Steve Addazio ditched TEMPLE entirely for the ‘][‘ without providing any explanation.

My two cents: I like both the ‘][‘ and the TEMPLE look and have argued for a “King Solomon” solution in this space in the past. Split the baby. TEMPLE on one end as a tribute to the football brand and the ‘][‘ on the other as a tribute to the school brand.

Matt Rhule almost nailed it when he came up with the version seen at the top of this post combining a version of the two. My only problem with that is the chin strap obscured the ][ to the point of annoyance. Put the ][ on the other side, keep TEMPLE on one and you have perfection.

Otherwise, keep it Cherry and White with the broken stripes down the pants and you have one of the cleanest and neatest looks in college football.

Now it’s Geoff Collins’ turn. In 24 hours, we will find out what he has decided.

Friday: The Reaction

07.06.18
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Recruiting: Fireworks or Dud?

hardwork

It’s quite possible this recruiting haul on the beach last  year was better than this year.

For nearly two weeks now, the Temple football twitter site promoted July 4th fireworks with at least a hint or two that a big-time recruit will be committing on that day.

That’s the deal with fireworks. The more promises you make, the greater the expectations. Sometimes they go off in multi-colored extravaganzas and sometimes they blow up in your face. This latest rollout qualified more in the latter category than the former from what I can see.

Our thoughts on Temple football recruiting, particularly since Al Golden brought his binder to town, have simply been this:

TRUST BUT VERIFY.

The Philly.com article did not mention where the six July 4 commits received offers from in addition to Temple, but Shawn Pastor’s excellent site, OwlsDaily.com, did.  One of them was Kennique Bonner-Steward, a 6-4, 215-pound, dual-threat quarterback from William Amos High in Cornelius, N.C. Bonner-Steward had 17 offers, most from FCS schools and his top “other” FBS offers were from Tulane, Old Dominion and Georgia State (err, not Tech).

This is the spin Pravda–otherwise known as Owlscoop.com–put on the day:

pravda

A little misleading as an astute guy named Steve correctly pointed out:

stevebest

You will never, ever, ever, find Pravda criticize a Temple football recruiting class perhaps because the editor of that site is a paid Temple employee. Everything ranks from honky-dory to downright spectacular over there. Just a theory based on years of observation.

Speaking of which, that elicited a very defensive response from Gauss’ boss (John DiCarlo, above). What the hell does Tyler, Tavon, Dion, Matt and Nate have to do with Collins under-performing against P5 competition this year? And what, exactly, did Collins have to do with developing any of those above players?

The answer would be zero.

Just because Matt Rhule got the job done doesn’t mean Collins will do the same.

The other commitments were  running back Jamal Speaks (Upper Marlboro, Md), Tampa (Fla.) wide receiver Josh Youngblood and two defensive linemen from Georgia, Zaylin Wood and Jacoby Sharpe. Speaks had an offer from Maryland and Youngblood had an offer from Minnesota so, on the day, those are the two most-high profile Temple recruits.

Not the kind of fireworks we were looking for considering that the Owls were able to land much-higher profile guys under both Golden and Rhule.

Here’s another take calling out Pravda:

another

 

Temple football has a highly paid staff of professionals in charge of these things but the thought out there is that other schools have more highly paid professionals in charge of the same things and that if the two ever agreed on a player that would be a good thing, not a bad one.

Temple is never going to win all the battles with the so-called Power 5 schools for players, but our formula for long-term success is that Temple should win at least a few of them—anything from a quarter to a half—and then trust its instincts on other type players.

Those instincts have served other staffs well with guys like Muhammad Wilkerson (a two-star who turned into a first-round NFL draft choice) and Haason Reddick, a walk-on who was a higher first-round choice. Then there is Tyler Matakevich, who turned his only offer (Temple) into a national consensus defensive player of the year (Bednarik, Nagurski Awards).

Those are the exceptions, though, to the general college football rule. The really successful programs develop players in addition to be able to win a majority of recruiting battles.

Ideally, that’s the kind of recruiting balance you are looking for in a good class. This one has leaned in the developmental direction and, while that might turn out to be a good thing, it leans more toward risk than reward.

No matter how Pravda spins it.

 

07.04.18
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5 Owl Newcomers To Watch

Very few programs update their rosters online as well as Temple’s football team does these days.

Like the U.S. Constitution, it’s a constantly changing document and staying on top of things can be a daunting task but the days when Temple announced a roster on the last day of the season and did not change it until the first day of the next one (Bobby Wallace and Ron Dickerson were the biggest offenders) appear to be over.

If you’ve made it to the July 4 holiday, that’s saying something so for our “five newcomers to watch” list this summer, we’re going with guys only officially on the roster. The others, some guys who were recruited last year and big things were expected of, obviously either are not coming or have some loose ends to tie up before admission.

We have only one definition of “newcomer” and it is this: Simply, a player who has not made a single play in a previous Temple game:

ryanerasmus

Sean Ryan

Probably the most talented wide receiver in the New York City high school leagues, Ryan takes his talents to 10th and Diamond and already has acclimated himself to the workout routine. While Temple’s receiving duo of Ventell Bryant and Isaiah Wright is probably the most talented in the league, the ranks of the PROVEN are thin behind them and there is plenty of opportunity for advancement. That’s where the next guy comes into play as well.

Jadan Blue

Blue had over 100 yards receiving and two touchdowns in the spring game—both highs for any wide receiver—and has moved to the head of the class of guys who Dave Patenaude has confidence playing in any situation.

Rodney Williams

A safety transfer from a Power 5 program, Syracuse, Williams has the edge to form one of the most dynamic safety duos in the AAC. That’s because the other safety, Delvon Randall, has been projected as a first-round draft choice if he repeats or improves on his 2017 season. Williams has started 21 games for the Orange the last three seasons, including a win defending national champion Clemson last year (one of the first plays in that game was a tackle for a 6-yard loss by Williams).

Darian Byrant

A product of Chestnut Hill Academy, Bryant was one of the Owls’ most heralded recruits three years ago as an offensive lineman. Patenaude has said “the best development has been with Darian Byrant” who, at 6-5, 320, appears ready to start at right tackle.

Tyliek Raynor

Raynor has world-class speed (4.4) for a tailback and appears ready to slide into David Hood’s third-down back role. He was Philadelphia Public League MVP in 2015 while gaining 1,327 yards on only 99 carries. He spurned solid offers from Arizona, Miami (Fla.), West Virginia and Purdue to play for his hometown school. No one knows if the torn meniscus injury suffered last year will shave a tenth of  a second or so off that 4.4 but we should find out soon enough.

Friday (7/6): July Fireworks

Monday (7/9): College Football Pet Peeves

Wednesday (7/11): The Ideal Temple Uniform

Friday (7/13): Thoughts on the Rollout

Monday (7/16): Ranking the Schedule: 1-12

06.29.18
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Stadium: The Alternatives

cbpfootball

TU fans would be right on top of the action at CBP.

For the next year, maybe five, the powers-that-be at Temple University who comprise the Board of Trustees can bang their collective heads against a wall or get to work.

Banging their heads would constitute essentially what they are doing now: Trying to make peace with people who want no peace.

Neville Chamberlain tried to do that with the Nazis in the late 1930s. When the British finally figured out the Nazis did not want peace, it was almost too late. Winston Churchill finally unraveled that mess.

Temple wants peace with its neighbors and a stadium entirely within property it owns. Because a part of that property is a public street, the neighbors can block it so Temple must abandon this folly and figure out a place and a way to build its stadium or look for the alternatives.

Here are the acceptable ones:

skyview

Plenty of room (counting space on right) for a 35K stadium at Broad and Master.

Move the stadium to Broad and Master. This would require knocking down a brand new $22 million Olympic sports facility and moving it back to Broad and Norris. That probably means spending another $22 million on the Olympic facility but it would be worth it. Critics of this plan say “it won’t fit” but that’s only if  the fields are North-South. Anyone who attended the spring game saw plenty of room for an double-decker East-West stadium from Broad Street to 13th Street that would require no closure of a city street.

homes

A simple purchase of either “North Broad Getty” or “Auto Zone” or “Wheel thing” gives Temple plenty of room to connect the hospital with the main campus via a stadium

 

Connect the main campus with Temple Hospital. Put the stadium halfway up Broad Street. There is plenty of open land that Temple can acquire near the  North Broad SEPTA train stop that would allow for more parking. Just take a ride North of main campus (lock the doors) and you will see boarded-up property, not actual homes, along the old route that included the Phillies first home (Baker Bowl, Broad and Lehigh). Can’t imagine the neighbors would object to Temple purchasing homes that currently are unoccupied and boarded up. It would be within walking distance of both the main campus and the health sciences center and just as accessible to rail and subway transportation as the current plan. Again, no public streets would have to be closed.

Swallow hard and accept Jeffrey Lurie’s demands. Any way you look at it, Temple is going to spend a lot of money parking its football program. Either it’s the laughably low figure of $130 million for a stadium or increase its rent five-fold to the Philadelphia Eagles for the right to play in one of the nicest stadiums in major college football.

Wait The Phillies Out. This is not as crazy as it seems. Extend the lease and work with the city and the Phillies to get their long-sought-after Center City stadium. Then slide into Citizens Bank Park. Play at the Linc until then. A 45K Temple football stadium in South Philly makes more sense than a 70K Temple stadium in South Philly or even a 35K Temple stadium in Templetown.

Unacceptable would be a move to Ambler  or an upgrade of the Chester stadium (farther away than the Linc and less accessible to public transportation) or any deal with Franklin Field, which would be seen as a return to the bad old days.

Either way, if this last-ditch “community engagement” does not work, the BOT needs to roll up its sleeves and come up with a new plan.

Banging heads against a wall for the next five years serves no purpose to anyone.

06.27.18
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Stadium Delay: Did You Expect Anything Else?

muchbetter

A much-more inspired rendering of what a TU stadium SHOULD look like.

All along in this never-ending Temple Stadium saga, there have been two types of people:

The first type, the believers, are the “wink wink, done deal” crowd, saying that everything is taken care of and nothing to worry about. Most of these people live in Virginia, New York and Florida.

The second group, the skeptics, are more intimately familiar with Philadelphia city politics, who have lived here all their lives and who have been through this whole thing once before with the building of The Apollo (now the Liacouras Center).

skyview

The site of the spring game

Those of you who have followed this space for years know to count me in the second group.

The Temple News deserves credit for breaking this story on Monday—really a lot of credit in that no other media outlet seems to care enough about—that Temple officials have decided to delay the project to “further engagement with the community.”

Did you really expect anything else?

From the time a BOT member told a long-time fan at the March 2012 NCAA Tournament (on the very day Temple beat North Carolina State) this was a “done deal” the stadium has been anything but a done deal.

badurban

The current uninspired rendering

The believers are more likely to claim to have inside information than the skeptics. As recently as May, we were told by those people to “expect shovels in the ground by August.”

Now it is much more likely that those shovels will be figurative ones burying the project than actual ones moving the AstroTurf off Geasey Field.

Here’s the bottom line on the stadium: The neighbors don’t want it and no amount of “engagement” is going to convince them otherwise. There is no political incentive for their representatives to do anything but oppose a project that includes the permanent closure of a city street where the city, not the university, has the final say.

Unlike the Apollo project in the 1980s, Peter J. Liacouras is not around anymore. When he threatened to move Temple out of the City of Philadelphia to Ambler, people believed him and then Mayor Ed Rendell brokered a deal to get the Apollo done. He had an outspoken ally and a respected community voice in then hoops coach John Chaney, who told them in no uncertain terms what their neighborhood would look like without Temple. Too much development on campus has happened since then to make a similar threat anything but an empty gesture.

This time, the city holds all of the cards, owns the card table and has a key to the basement where this game is played and there will be no dealing.

Friday: The Alternatives

06.25.18
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Good News for Owls: More Bowls

sundevil

If the AAC can get a tie-in to the new bowl in Arizona, Temple could be playing in Tempe.

Anytime someone moans and groans about there being “too many bowls” I say there are too few.

After being hit with a “are you crazy?” stare, I mention two things:

  • Temple’s 2010 team
  • Cornhole Championships

By now, the story of the Temple 2010 team is well-known, but it’s certainly worth repeating.

Those Owls finished 8-4 and pummeled a team, UConn, 30-16, that made the Fiesta Bowl. The Owls being denied when the Huskies, also 8-4, were accepted (via being in a BCS league, the Big East) was widely regarded as one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in recent sports history.

Besides some mentions on the afternoon ESPN talk shows, Temple got nothing out of that bowl season and, the day after head coach Al Golden held a meeting to say: “Guys, we’re not going anywhere” he announced he was taking the head coaching job at Miami.

Talk about a punch in the gut one day followed by a kick in the nuts the next, that was it for Temple football.

Cornhole championships come into play simply because that—and poker and bowling—are staples of the ESPN programming after the bowl games are completed in January. If two or three extra bowl games take cornhole, bowling and poker off television that’s not only more palatable to me but for ratings in general.

Anything that gives an 8-4 or a 6-6 Temple team a greater chance at bowl exposure is good news, not bad so that’s why Brett McMurphy breaking the story of more bowls starting with the 2020 season is encouraging.

Chicago and Myrtle Beach, S.C., are locks to host two of the three new bowls. Phoenix, another attractive site, is rumored to be leading for a third bowl.

Meanwhile, from an American Conference perspective, the league is musing a permanent invitation for its champion to play in the Liberty Bowl, if the champion doesn’t make the NY6 game. That’s a good idea because the Liberty is a tier above the current places where the second-place team usually goes (Military, Boca).

All this should be officially announced on July 1, which is less than one week away.

Anything that’s good for Temple and bad for cornhole is OK in my book.

Wednesday: Stadium Delay

Friday: The Alternatives

Monday: Under Pressure

Wednesday (7/4): 5 New Arrivals To Watch

Friday (7/6): How New Rules Impact the Owls

 

06.20.18
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Stadium: No News Is Bad News

Colorado State was able to get this done in less than half the time TU talked about it.

Way back in May, a post from an ardent Temple fan on one of the two message boards covering Owl sports, read: “When You Hear Nothing, it’s a good thing.”

To use a double-negative for literary effect, nobody knows nothing about anything when it comes to concrete and mortar movement on a new football stadium, err, “multi-use complex” for Temple University.

Colorado State University

It will be a long time before the construction workers show up at Temple

That’s not a good thing, unless you are against the idea of an on-campus stadium at Temple.

Our esteemed friend who posted that is an Owl fan from Virginia who knows a lot about many things but very little about Philadelphia politics. In the same thread, someone else posted “I’m hearing a shovel-in-the-ground date will be in August.”

Obviously, that guy, too, is from a place where the Government functions at a reasonable pace without the palms outstretched and greased. Philadelphia City government in the 21st Century is something that would make the Tamney Hall guys blush.

There will be no “shovel-in-the-ground” date this August simply because there are no scheduled meetings of Philadelphia City Council’s facilities committee—the one that would have to approve Temple’s plan for closing 15th Street—on the docket.

City Council’s  adjourns for the summer after meeting tomorrow (June 21) and does not return until September. So file away the “I’m hearing” guy under another piece of misinformation that has been disseminated about this project since the words “done deal” were uttered in March of 2012.

That was six years ago.

Six.

By contrast, the new stadium at Colorado State was proposed in 2014 and construction started in March of 2016 and there has been a full season of football played in it already. That’s Fort Collins, Colorado. This is Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where there has been no progress with the neighbors and their representatives who oppose this plan and another key City Council period to get something done is about to expire.

No deal has been done and no news is definitely not good news.

06.18.18
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Only Birthday Wish: Stadium Closure

rendering

If this doesn’t work at 15th and Norris, Broad and Master should be an option.

Another year down, another foot closer to the grave.

That’s a harsh way to look at it but, when the years in the rear view mirror represent a long road and looming just ahead is a brick wall with failing brakes those are, err, the breaks.

Come Tuesday, I will smile at whatever “happy birthdays” come my way with the realization that there has been nothing happy about the day since, oh, about age 40 when I realized what the average life expectancy was for someone of my demographic.

Taking the optimistic view, at least I don’t ever have any intentions of exiting stage right like Anthony Bourdain and Kate Spade did last week.

There is too much to live for, like maybe another Temple football championship this year.

While that would be nice to get, the birthday present I would like most doesn’t involve a Stormy Daniels encounter or a lottery win as much as closure on this ongoing Temple Stadium issue.

One way or another. If it’s happening, I want to see a shovel-in-the-ground date in the next month. If not, I want to know that, too, in roughly the same time frame.

A good friend of mine ran into a member of Temple Board of Trustees in March, 2012—the day Fran Dunphy’s basketball team beat North Carolina State in the NCAA tournament—and the BOT member told him the stadium was a “done deal.”

Three years ago—in 2015—I was told by a BOT member on Cherry and White Day (not the same one) that the ACC wanted Temple to build a stadium first and, if the Owls did, an invitation to join that league would be forthcoming within a couple of years. The ACC did not know if Temple was committed to football and needed a concrete sign like a stadium before considering Temple.

Since 2012, all we’ve heard is a lot of talk and very little action other than drawings or renderings or an open meeting shouted down by the neighbors.

Some done deal.

To get things done in Philadelphia, you need the approval of the City Government and that hasn’t happened. I’ve vacillated on this stadium over the last five years but only a few months ago came to the conclusion I was for it for a simple practical reason. The BOT almost voted to eliminate Temple football in 2005 (the measure lost by a single vote) and no stadium and no additional Linc deal could regenerate the same kind of opposition. They might have to move the site from Broad and Norris to Broad and Master, but they should be willing to do it if that turns out to be the only option. Building a stadium means Temple Football Forever.

I know this blog won’t last forever, but I hope the program does and it would be nice to know what the deal is on that very soon.

This never-ending saga needs to conclude on way or another.

Wednesday: No News Is Bad News

06.15.18
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Recruiting: Encouraging Signs in Early Returns

smiling

Not every recruit gets to experience this championship feeling like they do at Temple

College football recruiting ranking this early in the game are like exit polls in politics.

They don’t mean much except to a small core of addicts but do give some insight into where the process is headed.

For Temple football, that apparently is a good place because the Owls through their early camps—the places where the hard recruiting work is done—seem to be doing just fine with their AAC peers and, more importantly, the future regional P5 schools on the schedule.

Let’s take the Temple versus Rutgers and Temple vs. Georgia Tech  comparisons for instance. It’s important because Temple plays GT in 2019 and 2020 and RU in 2020 and 2021.

On Scout.com, which now encompasses the old 247.com site (with 50 full-time recruiting experts on the staff, Temple is ranked No. 63, while Rutgers is ranked 54. Both teams have six commitments with RU having five “three-stars” and Temple three of the same. Both teams are ahead of schools like Kansas State and Texas Tech.

On Rivals.com, Rutgers is No. 58 and Temple is No. 58—also ahead of Kansas State and Texas Tech. GT is 44 on Scout and 46 on Rivals. These numbers, of course, could change for the better or the worse but a lot of the groundwork has been laid by this charismatic coaching staff who connects well with the kids.

To use a political term, that is within the “margin of error” meaning that depending on how the respective staffs “coach up their player” could mean give one school or the other the overall talent advantage a couple of  years down the line.

Given Geoff Collins’ proven track record at places like Florida, Mississippi State, Alabama and Georgia Tech, that’s a good sign for Temple.

Collins was the defensive coordinator at two of those schools and the recruiting coordinator at the two others so he knows the talent coming and going.

By this time, Collins should know what he’s doing in terms of what it takes to push the right buttons in the kids’ (and their parents’) minds to get them to commit. It certainly helps that he has a world-class university in a world-class city to sell.

Signing day will tell the rest of the story, but the exit polls are trending in a very good way.

Monday: Birthday Wishes

Wednesday: No News Is Bad News

Friday: Expanded Bowls

Monday (6/25): New Redshirt Rule

Wednesday (6/27): Under (Center) Pressure