Tag Archives: books

09.01.25
by

5 Takeaways From the Temple Game

OL shows the improvement Keeler spoke about by blowing UMass off the ball here.

Controversial take here but I’ve thought about it long and hard since the end of Temple’s 42-10 win at Mass on Saturday.

Put Evan Simon in bubble wrap for one game only and sit him against Howard this Saturday.

My thinking is this:

You can beat Howard, 40-0, with both Simon and Gevani McCoy so why not start McCoy? If the game works out like it should, McCoy gets a nice game under his belt and faces live ammunition that can’t be duplicated in practice.

You probably don’t even have a puncher’s chance against Oklahoma if Simon turns an ankle (or worse) against Howard. For those of you who don’t think Temple has a chance against Oklahoma anyway, this is your periodic reminder that fellow AAC member Navy beat Oklahoma last year.

Who did Navy lose to, 32-18, a couple of years ago?

Temple.

You can hear a lot of cheering for Temple when Peter Clarke catches this touchdown pass.

Beating Okie after going 2-0 would make a huge statement for the program and the conference itself.

Okie beat Illinois State, 35-7, on Saturday. Hard to believe that Illinois State is as good as UMass so Temple does indeed have a chance. They need Simon healthy to do it and getting McCoy up to game speed with an extended look against Howard wouldn’t hurt either. He was inserted into the game deep in Temple territory with the Owls up so big that all he did was basically hand off.

Allowing him to throw the ball downfield and utilizing the entire playbook would be a win/win for Temple. To do that, he needs to play an entire game.

That’s our first takeaway from the game. Here are four more:

Keeler was right about the lines

Two weeks ago, Keeler said he “never had a defensive line this deep. We have 9-10 guys who can really play.” Turns out he wasn’t blowing smoke. The Temple DL dominated, and all 10 guys played well. A week later, Keeler said, “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a position group improve as much as our offensive line.” He credited that with an intensive strength program and new OL coach Al Johnson. UMass went to a goal-line defense, selling out for the run, when Temple had the ball on its 1 and the Temple OL blew a hole so wide open a truck could run through it. Instead of a truck, Jay Ducker went for 55 yards.

The Tight End Room is Stacked

Peter Clarke and Ryder Kusch emerged as the top two tight ends, both catching a pair of TD passes. Yet Daniel Evert, who scored a long touchdown against Army last year, is also very good and will make an impact. Despite all that, Jake Woods might have been the star of summer camp and he will be heard from as well.

K.C. Keeler should consider put Evan Simon in bubble wrap for one week only. He can play all the rest starting with Oklahoma.

Ducker and Worthy Should be Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside

Got the distinct feeling that if Terrez Worthy went through the hole at the goal-line, he would have taken it to the house. Worthy runs a legitimate 4.4-40 and is the fastest guy on the team. He’s a home-run hitter and few linebackers have the speed to cover him out of the backfield. OC Tyler Walker probably noticed that from the booth and will take advantage of that mismatch.

Two Dante Wrights are better than One

Temple was expected to miss the oft-injured Dante Wright but Kajiya Hollawayne and JoJo Bermudez proved to be up to the task with the former catching a touchdown pass and the latter catching 7 balls for 78 yards. Yet Colin Chase was pretty much the WR star of the summer camp, much like Woods was with the tight ends, and although he had a spectacular catch near the goal-line, was not targeted like he will be as the season goes on and, once he gets those targets, should show fans in the stands what he showed his teammates in the summer.

While Saturday was exciting and a lot of players performed well, there will be a lot of other players making an impact over the next 11 games.

Or if they are as lucky as they appear to be good, a dozen or more games.

Friday: Howard Preview

07.20.25
by

This week: The AAC Discovers Keeler’s Plan

Plenty of “money quotes” in the above short six-minute interview where the AAC sent a media person into the Temple film room to interview K.C. Keeler.

To me, the big takeaway was that Keeler was so unlike his predecessor, Stan Drayton, that any objective observer has got to assume that the record is going to reflect that.

Drayton spent three years of spinning his wheels in the mud at Temple, going for the trifecta with the same record that got his predecessor, Rod Carey, fired: 3-9. Drayton never figured out a way push the bus out of the mud and get it moving forward.

I have that exact black jacket but it’s a pullover and not a full zipper. Would be sweet to find a full zipper in adult extra large.

Keeler spent six minutes detailing how he is going to put some straps around those Temple tires and have his new strength coach and big hogs up front pull this spinning vehicle out of the mud.

It’s sounds like a pretty good plan.

It’s a week of discovery for Temple football, not so much for the people inside the $17 million Edberg-Olson facility but for the AAC and maybe college football in general because they are going to hear Keeler’s plan to revive everything inside the building and at Lincoln Financial Field.

That’s because media day is in Charlotte on July 24th-25 and a lot of what Keeler said in the above interview will be on full display those two days. ESPN will cover the second day session but, by then, it should become apparent that Keeler’s approach is different than Drayton’s.

In the above interview, Keeler says that “we’re not going to be the kind of team on 4th and 1 where we’re going to bring five receivers in. We’re going to run the football.” Yet bringing five wide receivers in is what Drayton did on 3d and 1 at the 50-yard line in Year Two of his regime, throwing a pass with a lead against visiting ECU that turned out to be incomplete with 1:46 left in the game. He was forced to punt on fourth down and never saw the ball again in a 46-42 loss.

That wasn’t even Keeler’s best money quote of the week.

The money quote came not from the above interview but from Shawn Pastor’s excellent five-part series about Keeler, which just concluded on Sunday. (We recommend you subscribe to OwlsDaily.com to read all five parts. It’s well the few bucks a month it takes to subscribe.)

Here’s the Keeler Money quote:

“I didn’t come from Michigan. I came from Sam Houston, where we had very limited resources. So I see life a little bit different. I see this isn’t half-full here. This is overflowing in my mind. I think this is a gold mine.”

Compare that to what Drayton said on Nov. 10 on the same site after a 53-6 loss to Tulane: “Tulane has made the commitment to bring good players into the program. There’s definitely a gap there if we don’t catch up, no question about it. We have to level up.”

Two Temple coaches. Two very different opinions to what resources they have/had at their disposal.

One made Chicken Shit out of Chicken Salad.

The other is trying to make a Chicken Parmesan dinner, complete with Spaghetti and meatballs on the side out of the same base ingredients. He knows what he needs to put in the pot, even though his proven recipe is largely a secret. He’ll outline what the dinner will be this week, but not give away any KFC (or KCK) secret recipes.

When he gets back from Charlotte, he will be in the kitchen working on the first course to be served Aug. 30.

My educated guess is that it won’t taste like the same chicken bleep we fans have been eating as our post-game meal for the last four years.

Friday: Media Day Reactions

Monday: Biggest Turnarounds

07.06.25
by

TU football: After recruiting blitz and uni reveal, no rest for weary

.

If the Owls get to a bowl game, the “Keeler Cheesesteak” will be Richie’s most popular.

The days of a Temple football coach heading to a far away state for a vacation in the middle of the summer are over.

Apparently.

While Stan Drayton spent the two weeks around July 4th last year at his home in Houston, Tx., this year’s new head coach K.C. Keeler is from here so he’s not going anywhere.

Keeler spent the day after July 4th catching a Cheesesteak at Richie’s on 12th Street. That “vacation” lasted about an hour and it was back to work.

Oklahoma fans are already making plans for being in Philadelphia.

I don’t know about you but it’s a refreshing change for this Temple fan.

Before Drayton’s jaunt to Texas, the prior coach, Rod Carey, spent the last two weeks of every July in Indiana with his family. Before that, Steve Addazio spent a week in Gainesville every June.

Drayton felt guilty enough about his Houston jaunt to mention on his own without prompting to Temple reporters that he wasn’t worried about not being in Philadelphia because he was “in constant contact” with his “senior leadership council” and that they were putting in the required work.

Can’t imagine how those phone calls went.

Drayton: “You guys lifting every day and getting in the sprints?”

Council: “Yeah, coach, we’re cool.”

Drayton: “What’s that music in the background? Are you guys having a party?”
Council: “No, coach, that’s music to lift by.”

Drayton: “OK, I’ll go back to watching my daughters at this gymnastics’ meet.”

Council: “Have fun coach.”

Drayton: “See you in two weeks.”

If anyone deserves a vacation, it’s Keeler. The month of June included a blitz of recruiting that saw the Owls sign the largest 2026 class in all of FBS ball. That was capped by a July 1 announcement of new uniforms.

Keeler apparently believes that whatever rest he can get is after the season because the preparation for 2025 begins now. The season includes a home date against Oklahoma and, while few Temple fans are expecting a win, it’s reasonable to expect that this won’t be another 51-3 game. After all, Oklahoma lost to a Navy team in 2024 coming off a 32-18 loss to Temple in 2023.

That you to the TFF community for a great month of June.

A lot can change in college football in a year, especially with the transfer portal.

The current Owls are undergoing rigorous drills in typically hot Philadelphia summer heat, supervised not by a “senior leadership council” but by a staff of proven winners, led by the winningest FCS head coach of all time.

Since college football is a 365-day-a-week job, it’s comforting to know that the people in charge realize that, too.

For now, a signature Cheesesteak and an hour away from the office will have to sub for a vacation.

06.19.25
by

Temple returns to recruiting footprint

Another year around the sun came and went on June 19th for this reporter and it was my annual reminder that the expiration date invisibly stamped on my forehead is rapidly approaching.

In a sense, Temple Football Forever, too. We don’t know the date and probably don’t want to at this point.

Yet while this website won’t last forever, what new head K.C. Keeler did this week was a sign that Temple football as a program will last, if not forever, a long time.

If Keeler keeps this kind of recruiting up, chances are he will be talking about Temple going from one year with a lot of losses to one year with a lot of wins like he did here at SHS last year.

That’s because he stepped away from the nasty habits of the last three head coaches and returned to the Owls’ recruiting footprint.

Bruce Arians once said it was simply metro Philadelphia, South Jersey, the Lehigh Valley and the D.C./Virginia corridor that included Norfolk and Richmond.

Al Golden reaffirmed that when he arrived on the scene, correctly pointing out that Temple is smack dab in the middle of 46 percent of the nation’s population.

“If you drew a 250-mile circle around Temple, that’s well within a five-hour drive for any family who wants to send their kids here,” Golden said. “That’s 46 percent of the nation’s population and you should be able to find 25 great players from that many kids.”

Arians went 6-5 twice against a Top 10 schedule with that philosophy.

Golden ended 20 years of Temple misery adopting it.

What do Arians (York), Golden (Colts Neck, N.J.), Matt Rhule (State College) and Keeler (Emmaus) all have in common? They played their high school football within 250 miles of Temple.

What do Geoff Collins, Rod Carey, and Stan Drayton have in common?

They did not.

Daron Harris makes returning kickoff and punts for touchdowns look easy, like this one against Imhotep.

Now with a slew of local recruits signed recently, Keeler apparently has decided that blueprint makes sense for him, too.

Among those guys are a 6-4, 315-pound offensive tackle from Strath Haven named Billy Brown, an All-Philadelphia Catholic League tight end named J. P. Oates and defensive backs Daron Harris of Chester and Dylan Abram of Monsignor Bonner.

Temple might not be back this year, but rest assured Keeler’s plan is to return the Owls to those kinds of days.

That’s not all.

Defensive tackle Jude Okeleke (pronounced OAK-LEAK-EEE) turned down a solid offer from Fran Brown and Syracuse to commit to Temple this week, saying “I’m home.” While not a Philly-area recruit, it’s nice to know that Okeleke considers Philadelphia home. Technically, he is within that 250-mile footprint, having played at the Taft School in Watertown, Conn. Better yet, he is considered one of the top 75 DT prospects in the country. Being from Nigeria and not able to earn NIL money, Temple gets the added benefit of probably keeping him for four years.

Brown was a first-team Philadelphia Inquirer OT playing in 2023 before moving onto Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass. last fall.

Oates was a first-team All-PCL tight end for a 10-0 regular season LaSalle High team last year, catching 47 passes for 576 yards and five touchdowns.

Harris was called “one of the top athletes in the state” by Chester head coach Dennis Shaw, scoring 28 touchdowns for the Clippers in a variety of ways (5 rushing, 7 kick returns and 2 interception returns).

Abram was all-PCL and had five interceptions for Bonner after returning to his original school from Philly Public League power Imhotep.

None of this proves Temple football is back to the winning days of Arians, Golden and Matt Rhule but usually a good blueprint leads to a solid foundation.

History always repeats itself and, while we’re all getting older, all evidence points to Temple football getting better.

Monday: The Foreign Component

03.02.25
by

Temple schedule: Some catching up to do

Temple’s schedule is rated one of the hardest in the AAC.

Anyone who tells you what Temple’s record is at the end of the calendar year is a fool.

A year ago at this time, knowing who Stan Drayton brought in and who he needed to bring in, we took a stab at the 2024 record and came up with 2-10.

We were wrong.

K.C. Keeler needs to take a page out of Howie Roseman’s book and load up on both lines.

The Owls went 3-9 for the third-straight year under Drayton.

No stabs this time because, with the release of the 2025 schedule, it looks pretty daunting for anyone, not to mention a first-year staff.

One thing we do know: Both the gameday coaching and the talent acquisition piece seems to be upgraded even though the schedule is tougher.

So any guess at a final record is a crapshoot.

If Drayton had been retained, we could only see four potential wins on the schedule (UMass, Howard, Tulsa and Charlotte).

Maybe that’s what new head coach K.C. Keeler gets as well. A lot of it will be determined how he uses the available transfer portal scholarships (right now, it stands as nine). If he the Drayton route and gets JUCOs, then he might finish with four wins. If he gets some solid FBS and FCS starters, then he could grab another game or two and reach his stated goal of getting to a bowl game in his first seasons.

Going the “Howie Roseman” route and loading up on both lines probably is the way to go because the Owls seem to have an abundance of skill players and a lack of depth on both the OL and DL. Drayton’s 2023 season fell apart when he didn’t address that depth in the portal and, due to injuries, had to play linebackers at defensive end and safeties at linebacker.

So Keeler has some catching up to do between now and Aug. 30 to achieve his minimum goal. Drayton did this time a year ago. The difference between the two is that one headed to Houston for a two-week vacation while the other probably will focus on upgrading the roster.

Friday: An Old Rival