11.04.12
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What happened?

Shockingly, this crack team of reporters didn’t ask Daz about why he didn’t use his final 2 timeouts with 1:46 left in the first half and the Owls driving.

Somewhere near the end of the first half yesterday, I found myself repeating two words:
What happened?
Even though I had to scratch my head about Temple (with two time outs and 1:46 left and down 31-17) giving up at the end of the first half by not using its two time outs, I wasn’t talking about the game.
I was talking about the last three weeks.
I’m not buying the argument that because this is the “big bad Big East” that the Owls are in over their head, talent-wise.

I called for this pass to be thrown on June 4. It took them to Nov. 3d
to throw it and it worked, but not for six.

According to Scout.com and Rivals.com, Temple recruited talent that was at or near the top of the MAC for the past five years.
So that puts the Owls somewhat on a par or more talented than Northern Illiniois, Ohio, Kent State and Toledo.
Or not.
So much for recruiting rankings.
I don’t think there’s any doubt now that any of those teams would do better in the Big East than Temple has.
Yet, as we stood three weeks ago after a win at UConn coming off a win over South Florida, I didn’t think any of the above teams would have done as well as Temple.
So, what happened?
Regression.

Regression might not have happened in the locker room, but it has on the scoreboard and, ultimately, that’s where you are judged in this business

Joe Paterno said a football team improves the most between the first and second games, yet did Temple  improve after a 41-10 win over Villanova? No, it lost to Maryland.
Head coach Steve Addazio says the team is so young, but nine of the 11 defensive starters against Villanova were either seniors or juniors. It’s young because of a couple of suspensions and a couple of other coaching decisions.
If it’s so young, then shouldn’t it be getting better, not worse, with each game?
I get that Louisville is unbeaten, but shouldn’t Temple AT LEAST have given the Cardinals the same kind of game 0-8 Southern Mississippi did (17-21) or 1-8 Florida International did (21-28)?
Should Temple not have given Louisville the same kind of game Troy (48-55) gave Tennessee or Tulsa (15-19) gave Arkansas yesterday?
Shouldn’t Temple have given Rutgers the same kind of game Kent State gave the Scarlet Knights?

And this, mentioning the Fitzpatrick to Coyer throwback on the eve of the Rutgers’ game. ….

I think so.
The Owls lost a lot to the NFL last year, but they didn’t lose so much talent that they should have been blown out three weeks in a row.
This is what happens when you don’t throw the ball on first down, using the one dependable weapon you have, Montel Harris, to set up the passing game with play fakes. Love the Jalen Fitzpatrick throwback pass to Chris Coyer that I called for on June 4 (see inset), but it shouldn’t have taken until Nov. 3 to use it.

This is what happened in the last 2 minutes before half. Do you see a timeout? 

When you throw so much on third down, you are asking for sacks and negative plays. I realize the fumbles came on third-down runs, but it’s OK to throw the ball on first and second down, too.
That’s one of the possible fixes. The other fix would be to move Kevin Newsome from offense to the middle of the field on defense. Daz says he’s not playing more at quarterback because he doesn’t know all the plays. (I don’t know how that’s possible since all they do is run it up the middle, do a read option left and a read option right and throw an occasional pass. That’s four plays to remember.) Then put him in the middle of the field on defense and tell him to knock down or intercept any ball in his zone. Since Temple has been killed on passing plays over the middle, Newsome could not be any worse than what the Owls have now. He is perhaps their most freakishly good athlete.
That said, the game got away from Temple yesterday because of a negative four in the turnover department.
The offense keeps giving the ball away and the defense can’t take it away.
That’s a pretty deadly combination.
Regression might not have happened in the locker room, but it has on the scoreboard and, ultimately, that’s where you are judged in this business.
Beat Cincinnati.
Win the game.
Win … the … game.

Tomorrow: Charting the first 10 plays, free courtesy of TFF

11.03.12
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Pulling out a rabbit’s foot to beat Louisville

My letter in the Philadelphia Daily News three days after the UConn game.

OK, I admit it.
Steve Addazio’s Stone Age offensive philosophy and the lack of a pass rush or a lost back line of the defense is not why Temple has lost its last two games.
I’m to blame.
Yeah, me.
Ever since I wrote that letter to the Philadelphia Daily News at the top of this post, Temple hasn’t been able to do a damn thing on the football field. You can read that complete letter here.
I must be the most superstitious person, or at least one of, in the world.
I wore a black “Papreps” T-Shirt to the Maryland game.
They lost, so I tossed the shirt.
I sat in the Penn State section at the Temple game (figured I’d be nice to my PSU friends who gave me a free ticket).

The game will be seen within the entire Temple recruiting footprint.

They lost, so I sat in the Temple section at the UConn game.
I’ll never sit in an opposing section again.
I wore my Cherry “Temple Al Golden” sweatshirt to the Rutgers’ game. (I call it the Al Golden Sweatshirt because it’s the one he wore on the sidelines of the Penn State game in 2007. Or so Patti told me when I bought it from her in the Temple athletics office.)
You won’t see my Al Golden Sweatshirt again, even though I paid $55 for it.
Last week, I’ve done something I haven’t done in years.
Watched from home and my furniture and lamps and TVs got the brunt of my frustration in a 47-17 loss.

Al Golden, wearing my sweatshirt

They got smoked, so I don’t care if I’m the only person in the neighborhood watering hole watching Temple football today, but I’ll be damned if I watch the game from home.
And I’ll bring my rabbit’s foot with me.
In this space every week on this day, I usually write about what teams did to be successful against the teams Temple is playing every Saturday.
Since William and Mary blitzed Maryland (and Temple didn’t) and Ohio used a short passing game to beat Penn State (and Temple didn’t) and Youngstown State used a spread offense to beat Pitt (and Temple didn’t), I figured I’d throw all that X’s and O’s mumbo jumbo out the window.
All I know is that an 0-8 Southern Mississippi team lost by four to Louisville and a 1-8 Florida International team lost by a touchdown to Louisville.
Armed with that knowledge and a rabbit’s foot and the same clothes I wore in Connecticut, I’m hoping to reverse the Karma back to 3:30 p.m. on Oct. 13, when I was singing “T for Temple U” with the team after an overtime win at Uconn.
You’ll know if it works by about the same time today.

Picks last week: Last week, I went 2-2 straight up, 1-3 against the spread. I had Kent State and Toledo winning straight up, but Toledo fell two points of the spread and the 13.5 I had with Kent State against Rutgers was the bargain of the year.
Season record: 11-6 straight up, 9-8 against the spread, 1-1 locks of the week.
This week: AIR FORCE giving 7 at Army; GEORGIA TECH giving 7 1/2 to host Maryland; Host BUFFALO giving 3 1/2 to Miami (Ohio) and CINCINNATI giving 4 1/2 to visiting Syracuse.
Reasoning: Air Force has played a tougher schedule, Maryland is without its top four QBs, Buffalo is on the upswing and Cincy has far more talent and depth than ‘Cuse.
Also like (unofficially and not for purposes of picks) national sack leader TULSA getting 8 at Arkansas. Staying away from that game because 7-1 Tulsa is stepping up in class.

Tomorrow: Complete analysis of the game

11.02.12
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Fast Forward Friday: Agreement in principle

Owls can go high end and have this view from Trump International …

According to Hawaii’s athletic administration, the school and Temple have reached an “agreement in principle” to play a football game on Friday, Dec. 7, 2012.
Whether it will be a day that lives in infamy or regular fame will be determined by whether or not the Owls are able to squeeze two wins out of their next four games.

... or slum it and have this view from the Maile Sky Court.

Heck, I hope the Owls now win all five but that will require a return to the offensive form they showed against USF and the defensive form they showed against UConn.
We can only hope.
Hawaii sports columnist Dave Reardon, who has a sweet job in a sweet town, noted that because the Owls will be playing the same weekend of the Honolulu Marathon, they might have trouble reserving hotel rooms.
Thanks to the magic of the internet, I found that should not be a problem.
I wanted to enter 50 rooms for three nights arriving Thursday, Dec. 6 and leaving Sunday, Dec. 9, but they only go up to 10 rooms. (This also  works for getting in Dec. 5 and leaving Dec. 8.)
At least 82 hotels had 10 rooms available as of this morning.
If the Owls chose to go first class, 10 people for 10 rooms at The Trump International will run them $12,270.
If they go low end, the Maile Sky Court will set the same amount of people back $4,270.
In between, they could go Hyatt Place Waikiki Beach ($6,470), Modern Honolulu ($10,170), Aqua Waikiki Wave ($10K even), Waikiki Marriott ($8,070) and Hilton Hawaii Village ($6,660).
That’s not even counting the airfare.
Where are the Owls getting this money from?
Pure speculation here but the Big East may be hyperventaling from the prospect of having six DIRECT bowl tie-ins and only three current teams qualified to fill them.
Syracuse and Temple could make four and five.
Plus, if Temple makes a bowl it will be a much bigger payout than the money the Owls made at the Eagle Bank Bowl, the Garden State Bowl and the New Mexico Bowl.
Combined.
So a trip to Honolulu to set up that kind of payday would be chump change in comparison. (Or Trump change, if the Owls go first-class.)
Problematic that any of the other BE teams have a chance.
First, though, the Owls will have to show signs that they can come out of a six-quarter on-field funk.
They will have that chance starting tomorrow.

Tomorrow: Louisville Game Day Preview

11.01.12
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Throwback Thursday: Temple 55, Louisville 14

Bill Cosby opened a monologue on Oct. 11, 1982 praising TU’s win over Louisville.

The Tonight Show host opened his guest stint on Monday night, Oct. 11, 1982 with this line:
“I love Louisville. I love Louisville because Temple beat them, 55-14, in football Saturday night. Crushed them. I love Louisville.”
The guest host, a comedian named Bill Cosby subbing for Johnny Carson again, received loud applause from those in the audience who loved Louisville the town and Temple football.
Then Cosby went right into a hilarous routine about his playing days at Temple.
Louisville football fans did not appreciate the mention as much and flooded NBC with letters (this was before the days of email).
Evidently, there were few Louisville football fans in the Burbank audience.
There are many more Louisville football fans today.
Winning can do that for a program.
There was a time not all that long ago when Temple was not only where Louisville is now, but was much better than Louisville. History shows that the Owls are 3-2 all-time vs. Louisville, with their only losses coming, 21-12, on the road in 2003 and 62-0 at home in 2006, the first year of the Al Golden Reclamation Project. Temple has beaten Louisville by an average score of 24-12.
Louisville is rated about 105 slots ahead of Temple in the current rankings.
Temple coach Al Golden is confident that the Owls are headed in the direction Louisville is now.

Rick Pitino explains to reporters that Temple can beat Louisville
if the Owls use play-action fakes to Montel Harris on first down
to find open receivers and buy time for Chris Coyer to throw.
At least that’s what we think he’s saying.   Meanwhile, the Daily News’
Dick Jerardi (background) looks  longingly at the buffet table.

Golden is not a patient man and both he and Temple fans hope they can get there sooner rather than later.
What follows below is what can happen when a superbly-coached Temple team takes the field, an account of the Owls’ 55-14 win at Louisville a generation ago.
By Jere Longman
Inquirer Staff Writer
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – There was great optimism in the Louisville athletic department last night. Basketball practice starts Friday.
Football? Well, that’s another story. Football here ranks a distant fifth to varsity basketball, intramural basketball, fast-running horses and slow-sipping bourbon.
It’s not hard to see why.
Take last night’s 55-14 humiliation by Temple (3-3). The Cardinals jumped ahead early but were helpless as the Owls steamrolled ahead, 27-7, by halftime.
Led by linebacker Tom Kilkenny, the Owls tuned up for Pittsburgh by sacking quarterbacks Dean May and Scott Gannon eight times and intercepting May twice.
”Our defense gave us good pressure to make the offense go,” said Temple coach Wayne Hardin.

This is the Louisville weather starting tomorrow.

Louisville’s defense was as inept as its offense, surrendering 402
yards and resuscitating the Owls repeatedly with mental lapses.
Temple played with injuries to several of its running backs but still
delivered 277 rushing yards. Harold Harmon rolled up 108 yards in the first half before exiting with a bruised heel. Rod Moore, understudy to injured fullback Brian Slade, scored twice in the first half.
Quarterback Tim Riordan completed 8 of 11 passes for 132 yards and a 38-yard
touchdown.
Early in the third quarter, Louisville (2-3) closed to 27-14, but its defense was too leaky to contain anyone stronger than Wisconsin-Stout. First, the Owls drew the Cardinals offside on a fourth-and-one at the 38, then repeated the trickery to gain first-and-goal at the eight. Riordan rolled right, and tightroped his way into the end zone, putting the game out of reach, 34-14.
“We’ve come close before, but recently our offense has been
sputtering,” Hardin said.
“I don’t know of another team in the country who could lose their top three runners (Jim Brown, Slade and Joe Baiunco) and still play the way these kids played.”
For good measure, cornerback Anthony Young intercepted May late in the third quarter and returned the ball 54 yards to the Louisville four. A facemask penalty put the ball at the one, backup tailback Sherman Myers (58 yards rushing) vaulted over and the margin was now 41-14. The audience of 19,223 at Cardinal Stadium was not amused.
Early in the fourth quarter, a group of students began singing, “Turn out the lights, the party’s over,” but Temple scored twice more before anyone could find the switch.
Gannon was flushed from the pocket at the four, only to be rammed by
nose tackle Bob Shires. The ball bounced into the end zone and was
pounced on by Jerry McDowell.
With 5 minutes, 29 seconds left, Young fielded a punt and returned it 58 yards for a touchdown, pulling Temple ahead, 55-14. That was the most points the Owls had scored since 1978, when they rang up 56 on that vaunted football power, Akron.
“Anthony Young had another outstanding night,” Hardin said. “That was
our first TD on a punt return in about 10 years.”
The outcome was quite unexpected and embarrassing in Bluegrass
Country.
Fueled by an earlier win over Oklahoma State of the Big 8 Conference, the locals figured Louisville football finally was emerging from the shadows of its basketball team.
Indeed, Denny Crum, the basketball coach, has been appearing on television boosting Bob Weber’s football program. The local media wondered whether Louisville’s big problem this weekend would be taking Temple too lightly.
Now Louisville’s big problem appears to be regaining whatever shred of
credibility it once enjoyed. Some schools don’t score 55 points on the
Cardinals’ basketball team.
“We just got an old-fashioned whipping,” Weber said. “We played much poorer than I ever thought possible. The first half, we were just standing around, and the second half was just an after-the-fact happening for us.”
Temple grabbed a quick 3-0 lead on Bob Clauser’s dying-quail field
goal of 39 yards.

belt
Frank Minniefield gave Louisville some false confidence, fielding a punt and slashing up the middle for an 88-yard touchdown. The Cardinals were temporarily ahead, but it was all a mirage.
Temple quickly regained the lead, 10-7, driving 80 yards to score in
seven plays.
“What bothers me is that we started so slow and never got into the
game mentally,” Weber said.

Tomorrow: Fast Forward Friday

10.31.12
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Hawaii pulls out of talks with Temple

If the Owls get to six wins, they would likely be slotted into a sweet bowl.
Hawaii could not resolve a myriad of issues.

The road ahead just got a lot bumpier for Temple’s football team on becoming eligible for a bowl for the fourth-straight season.
Hawaii pulled out of talks to give Temple a 12th game today because it could not resolve ticket issues.
It would have been tough enough to get to a bowl game with Hawaii on the schedule and now it appears to be near impossible.
Now the Owls will have to get to a bowl the old-fashioned way: By earning it.
Four games left, two against teams that have been in the top 20 most of the season, one against a Syracuse team with a premier quarterback, Ryan Nassib, and another against an Army team that beat Boston College.
 Not easy. The Owls will have to hold serve against Army, pull a mild upset against Syracuse and an even more shocking one against either Louisville or Cincinnati.
 The road ahead:

Anthony Robey: Lock-down corner

LOUISVILLE _ The game will be played at 11 a.m. Louisville time (12 in Philadelphia) and is the only home game not a sellout the rest of the way. Louisville has a tendency to play “up” or “down” to the level of competition. It was not able to blow out a horrid Southern Mississippi team in the rain (21-17) and it barely got by a bad Florida International team (28-21). Louisville and Temple both struggled to beat South Florida (Cards by 27-25, Owls by 37-28), but Cards handled a Pitt team (45-35) that handled the Owls. If the Temple secondary doesn’t start knocking balls down (and maybe even intercepting one or two passes), it won’t matter against a quarterback like Teddy Bridgewater. Except for lock-down sophomore corner Anthony Robey, a 4.39-40 speedster, the Owls look lost on the back line of their defense.
ARMY _ Hopefully, Matty Brown will be 100 percent for this game at West Point because he has been Army’s worst nightmare the past three years. Two years ago, in a 42-35 win, Brown singlehandedly led the Owls back from a 28-7 deficit with 226 rushing yards and four touchdowns. Also in that game, the Owls did something they have not done the Steve Addazio Era: Score on a trick play, a 48-yard pass off a double-reverse thrown by Joey Jones, by far the best pass thrown by a Temple player in 2010. Last year, Brown had 159 yards rushing against Army in a 42-14 win prompting the Army fan sitting next to me to ask, “Doesn’t he graduate this year?” No, I told him it was Bernard Pierce who probably is leaving. “I wish it was Brown instead,” the man replied.

Chris Coyer: More effective throwing on 1st down than 3d.

CINCINNATI _ The Bearcats have shown some chinks in their armor but mostly have been outstanding. They were able to beat Delaware State, 23-7, a week after Delaware beat Delaware State, 48-14. They also allowed Fordham to stick around for most of the first half. On the other hand, they beat Pitt, 34-10, and Virginia Tech, 27-24. They also have a sophisticated passing attack, something the  Owls might have if they let Chris Coyer throw on first down instead of third down all the time. The pathway to winning is to ratchet up the passing game and head away from pound and ground. The Owls should follow the blueprint they had against USF: 16 for 20 in the passing game and, not coincidentally, 37 points. The plan to win should be 37-28, not 17-14. Planning to win 17-14 is a good way to lose, 47-17.
SYRACUSE _ If the Owls go into this game with only four wins, a crowd of about 11,000 should be rattling around Lincoln Financial Field putting a sad punctuation mark on the dreariness of the season. If, on the other hand, they go into the game with five wins and a chance to reach a bowl game with six, there should be a big crowd cheering them on and a win will depend on whether the Owls’ new 3-4 defensive alignment with an abundance of athletic linebackers will be able to put enough blitzing pressure on Nassib to rattle him into a loss. (That new alignment might be wishful thinking on my part but when you can’t cover anybody on the back line and you have six linebackers who can run a 4.6 40, that’s the way to go IMHO.)
That’s the road ahead. It won’t be easy to navigate, but earning greatness or even a BCS bowl never is.

Tomorrow: Throwback Thursday

10.30.12
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When did Temple stop playing smart?

… Breaking News: Temple’s proposed game with Hawaii is ‘off the table’ … Hawaii could not resolve ticket issues on its end …

Note Boston College was beaten badly by Temple, yet beat Navy, 37-0. This was the only time I ever saw Hardin say he was outcoached but Temple had better personnel than Marshall and won, 31-10.

Not long ago in the general scheme of history, Temple was known as having a smart football team.
Smart coach.
Smart players.
“I was outcoached by Wayne Hardin again,” Joe Paterno said after his second-straight one-point win in a row over the Owls in the 1970s. “We were lucky they didn’t connect on that two-point conversion.”
“Hardin is outcoaching Joe again,” late Allentown Morning Call sports columnist John Kunda said out loud  in the press box after Temple took a 7-6 lead on PSU at halftime in 1979.
Everybody in the press box laughed because they knew it was true.
Something happened along the way to change that perception, certainly in the 1990s, and again maybe in the last couple of weeks.

Also at Pitt, Temple gets two cracks at a score inside the 5. On third down, instead of rolling Clint Granger out on a pass/run option, the Owls run it up the middle behind an inexperienced offensive line and a true freshman running back. That’s just beyond stupid.

I get all the Temple TUFF talk and the team generally over the last five years has been as tough as nails.
What’s alarming is the number of extremely dumb plays being made out there by both players and coaches. Here are four touchdowns worth of stupidity at Pitt:
1) Ball goes off Temple player’s leg on a punt, leading to an early Pittsburgh possession.
2) Temple player catches a kickoff while standing on the sideline. If you are standing on the sideline at the 10, that’s usually a pretty good clue the ball is going to go out of bounds.
3) Temple player gets the ball stripped. That probably falls more in the area of toughness than smartness, but it takes some smarts to secure the ball.
4) Also at Pitt, Temple gets two cracks at a score inside the 5. On third down, instead of rolling Clint Granger out on a pass/run option, the Owls run it up the middle behind an inexperienced offensive line and a true freshman running back. That’s just beyond stupid. Give Granger two cracks at finding a receiver in the end zone on a rollout.
To me, that’s the most egregious stupidity because it came from a coaching staff who should be thinking on the fly better.
Just once, I’d like to see the team play as smart as those Hardin teams did most of the time.
There’s still four games to get the team’s head in the same place as their heart. If that doesn’t happen, there won’t be a fifth.

Tomorrow: The Road Ahead

10.28.12
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Storm clouds brewing

There’s a storm coming our way and it’s headed for 10th and Diamond.

It’s pretty damming when Kent State is able to befuddle Rutgers with a sophisticated offensive scheme while Temple is stuck in the Stone Age, offensively. Kent State has no more offensive talent than Temple has

Batten down the hatches, this storm headed our way is going to be a bad one.
Hurricane Sandy?
Heck no.
All those Temple haters waiting to come out of the woodwork to pile on the Owls’ program, Steve Addazio, the quarterbacks, the kids and the coaches.
Is some of it warranted?
Sure.
I’ve been the first to criticize the offensive scheme and I will continue to do so until it is changed from a run-to-set-up-the-pass approach to a pass-to-set-up-the-run.
To me, nothing would maximize the ability of the Owls’ great running backs more than play action on first down, bubble screens, shovel passes to spread the field and open up the run.
This run-first to set up the pass has been a disaster.
I wrote as much after losses (Maryland) and I was just as adamant about it after wins (UConn).
It’s pretty damming when Kent State is able to befuddle Rutgers with a sophisticated offensive scheme while Temple is stuck in the Stone Age, offensively. Kent State has no more offensive talent than Temple has and that includes the line.
This is what I wrote after the UConn win and I highlighted it in red:

The way this team currently is constructed, the run can never set up the pass. It’s not going to work. It’s got to be the other way around.

On defense, I wrote last week that Temple was beaten on so many jump balls in the secondary that they needed to get 6-foot-3 scout team quarterback Kevin Newsome, a three-time All-State safety in Virginia, back there and move another 6-3 player, Vaughn Carraway, from safety to corner in order to best utilize their best athletes.

This from former Temple hoop great Mike Vreeswyk yesterday. I know who is embarrassing here and it ain’t Temple football.

That didn’t happen and the Owls’ secondary got scorched again.
The Owls need playmakers in the secondary and Newsome would be a playmaker. He looks good holding the clipboard on the sideline, but he’d look a lot better getting a pick six and holding the ball over his head in the end zone.
The coaches are big boys.
They can take it.
I will not criticize the kids, though.

The kids are another story.
I believe they are giving their all in some misguided schemes.
Right now, I believe big changes have to be made on defense in order to put the Owls’ best athletes on the field.
Newsome and Carraway and Anthony Robey need to be back there. Put your tallest, fastest, highest-jumping athletes on the back line.
Heck, with the D-line so thin due to suspensions and the linebacking corps top-heavy in talent, I would also seriously consider going from a 4-3 to a 3-4 defensive scheme. Play Hershey Walton at nose guard and John Youboty and Sean Daniels at end and rotate in the other guys. That gives you two more athletic and faster guys in there to either rush the QB or make game-changing plays in the secondary.
Kent State beat Rutgers by disguising its defense and forcing turnovers. Mostly because of that, the Flashes got seven turnovers. The RU turnovers were the result of pressure, something TU almost never dials up on defense. Instead of tipped balls becoming interceptions, the TU secondary’s best move is tackling a guy 20 yards downfield.
Temple played a vanilla defense against Rutgers and did nothing to force turnovers.
Yeah, it’s a gamble now to change the base defense from 5-2 to 3-4 in four practice days but the definition of insanity is doing the same thing next week and expecting a different result.
Really, could they do worse than give up 47 points to a Pitt team that had a hard time scoring 20 on Buffalo?
The other problem with that is you need practice time to do it and the oncoming storm doesn’t help. Maybe the Eagles could allow use of NovaCare but that’s far from an optimal solution.
The Owls are looking at getting ready for Louisville with mimimal outdoor practice time.
That’s a double wammy of a storm and far from a perfect one.

10.27.12
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Game Day Wake-Up: Hope and Change

Will today be the day the Owls finally throw play-action on first down or will  it be Groundhog Day again?



It only seems fitting that the Temple football team flew over Punxsutawney on the way to the University of Pittsburgh for today’s game with the Panthers.
Every game day this year I feel like Bill Murray’s character in the movie Groundhog Day. Murray was a weather man who is reluctantly sent to cover a story about the day. On the “next” day, he wakes to discover it is Groundhog Day again and again. He comes to the realization that he’s doomed to spend the rest of eternity in the same place, seeing the same people do the same thing over and over again.
 I’m not at that same point with Steve Addazio’s offensive approach, but I’ve got to admit at least five of the six MORNING AFTER game days I’ve waken with the idea that I’m going to be stuck in eternity of an antiquated “three Groundhogs and a cloud of dust” offensive approach.
On the other day, Temple went 16 for 20 passing and scored 37 points.
You look at all of these other big-time teams in the SEC and Big 10 and they all integrate a balanced approach of running and passing on first down. At Temple, it’s 75.9 percent running on first down and that’s never a good thing.
In football, as in life, you need balance.
So today’s theme, other than Groundhog Day, is Hope and Change:

Hope: Owls use play-action fakes to Montel Harris on first down to allow quarterback Chris Coyer time to find open receivers running through the secondary.
Change: Temple receivers catch the ball.

Hope: Daz runs Harris when the defense is on its heels, not when there are eight guys in the box.
Change: Move the sticks.

Change: Defensive line finally gets pressure on the opposing quarterback.
Hope: Ball is put up in the air for grabs and Vaughn Carraway and Anthony Robey come up with picks.

Hope: Matty Brown is healthy.
Change: Brown breaks first big return since Villanova.

Maybe today will be a day hope turns into change.

Picks this week: I have not picked in a few weeks because nothing jumps out at me. A few games jump out at me this week and the top one was Boston College being a 1-point favorite against Maryland. I think Maryland wins this game outright, but am staying away from the game due to the injury of QB Perry Hills.
Other picks:
KENT STATE getting 13.5 at Rutgers; NORTH CAROLINA STATE getting 7.5 at North Carolina; PENN STATE getting 1 at home vs. Ohio State; TOLEDO giving 7.5 at Buffalo.
Record for the season straight up: 9-4.
Record for the season ATS: 8-5

10.26.12
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Now would be a good time to dust off the spread

“Wilbur, tell coach Addazio the best blueprint to beat Pitt is the spread offense.”

The only architect I ever knew was Wilbur Post, who spent his working days in the barn talking to a horse named Mr. Ed while making blueprints.
Mr. Ed even talked back.
They say Frank Lloyd Wright was the greatest architect of all time, but he died a year before Mr. Ed came on the air as a CBS Television smash hit.
So Wilbur Post was the only architect I ever knew.

Youngstown State drew up the blueprint for beating Pitt.

Blueprints come to mind this year because Temple head football coach Steve Addazio had a nice blueprint to beat Maryland and tossed it in the trash and a nice blueprint to beat Penn State and tossed it in the trash and now he has a nice blueprint to beat Pitt tomorrow.
 I hope he doesn’t throw that in the trash, too.
Youngstown State beat Pitt, 31-17, at Heinz Field using the spread offense that Addazio talked about Temple using all summer.
 “We now have the quarterbacks we need to run the kind of offense we wanted to run last year,” Addazio said before the season. “I’m talking about explosive plays downfield in the passing game.”
Nice words, but have you seen any signs of Temple using the spread this year?
 I didn’t think so.
 Now would be a good time to dust that off.

“This wasn’t a last-second stunner. The Penguins never trailed, baffling Pitt with a spread offense that kept the Panthers off balance during a soggy night at Heinz Field . Youngstown State converted 11 of 16 third downs and held the ball for more than 35 minutes.”
_ USA Today, 9/1/12

 From the Sept. 1 USA Today: “This wasn’t a last-second stunner. The Penguins never trailed, baffling Pitt with a spread offense that kept the Panthers off balance during a soggy night at Heinz Field . Youngstown State converted 11 of 16 third downs and held the ball for more than 35 minutes.”
Temple lost to Maryland in my mind largely because the Owls did not follow the blueprint William and Mary coach Jimmye Laycock drew up to battle Maryland to a 7-6 game. Laycock noted that Maryland was playing a true freshman quarterback, Perry Hills, out of necessity. He figured that if the freshman was blitzed enough so he wouldn’t have time to throw, good things would happen for the Tribe. So Laycock blitzed the heck out of Hills (14 times), got three sacks and three picks.
Temple?
Blitzed Hills just twice, getting to him once, but allowed Hills the time to throw all kinds of jump balls to talented Maryland receivers.
Ohio coach Frank Solich drew up a nice blueprint to beat Penn State and all but hand-delivered it to 10th and Diamond. A lot of quick one-drop slants to move the sticks and keep the Big 10 pass rush away. It befuddled Penn State all day in a 24-13 win.
 Temple?
 Ran up the middle all day and lost by the same score.
Now Youngstown State has delivered the blueprint, maybe even UPS special delivery, to beat Pitt and it is by utilizing a spread offense. I’m told Temple has that offense somewhere in its repertoire.
Let’s hope they open the mail at the E-O.

10.25.12
by

Throwback Thursday: TU beats No. 4-ranked Pitt

… Breaking News: Hawaii players are posting on their Facebook pages this morning that the game with Temple is a “done deal” and they will probably be playing the Owls on Friday, Dec. 7, 2012 … a day that will live in infamy (maybe) … …

Program covers have come a long way since this Sept. 25, 1976 Temple vs. Pitt game.

Temple plays Pitt a week after a loss to Rutgers its head coach called “an embarrassment.”
October, 2012?
No.
September, 1984.
The difference then was that Pitt at the time was three weeks removed from a No. 4 preseason ranking in the country.
Temple beat Pitt, 13-12, on a field goal by a kicker named Jim Cooper.
Temple will have a kicker named Jim Cooper next year, but more on that later.
The win in 1984 gave Temple a 2-1 record on the way to a winning season under 32-year-old head coach Bruce Arians.

Story in the Allentown Morning Call the week after Temple beat Pitt.

“We were embarrassed at Rutgers, didn’t play to our ability at all,” Arians said. “We oughta be 3-0 and we know it.”
The Owls played the No. 10-toughest schedule in  the country then and its wins over East Carolina (17-0) and Pitt were sandwiched around a one-point loss to Rutgers.

Bruce Arians made a habit out of beating nationally-ranked Pitt teams.

Pitt was coming off an 8-3-1 year and maybe that influenced its inflated preseason ranking in Sports Illustrated. The Temple loss was one of four straight for Pitt (BYU, Oklahoma, Temple, West Virginia) and the Panthers never met their expectations.
At the time, it was the first win for Temple over Pitt in 39 years but Arians made sure it would not be the last.
The next week, Temple was to play Florida State and Arians fully expected to win that game, too.
“Florida State is a great opponent and it is a game we can win,” Arians said. “There’s no doubt about it. We can take the field anytime, anywhere and we have a chance to win.”

Temple’s last win over Pitt came 14 years ago.

This week, Temple renews its long-standing “rivalry” with Pitt. It’s just a one-year deal since Pitt moves to the ACC next year, but when the teams meet on Saturday it will bring back fond memories of Cooper and Arians for a lot of Temple fans. Arians beat Pitt three out of his five years as Temple’s head coach.
Later, he became well-known (and sometimes vilified) in that town as the offensive coordinator of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Still, Arians is mostly fondly remembered in Philadelphia by Temple people as an energetic young coach who did the best he could with the tools he was given.
Beating Pitt in a year it was ranked No. 4 in the preseason AP poll certainly helped foster a positive impression of Arians, who is still helping Temple football today.
Arians figuratively begat then kicker Cooper who literally begat another Cooper by the same name, Jim Cooper, Jr.
Next year, Cooper Jr. will take over the kicking duties for Steve Addazio.
If he beats Pitt, 13-12, like his dad did, it will have to be in a bowl game.
I’m sure dad and son would sign for that now but first both, being long-time Owl fans like the rest of us, just want to win the next one.

Tomorrow: Fast Forward Friday