Tag Archives: college football

09.13.26
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Plenty of good to like on Saturday

Pretty hard to get a White Out when there is this much Cherry in the stands.

After 24 hours of stewing over a game that should have been closer, a few things became clearer about Temple football from a 30,000-feet perspective.

Stop the count …

One, from a sheer physicality standpoint, the Owls on both sides of the football more than held their own with one of the most talented rosters in college football. What needs to be cleaned up is getting the Owls’ athletes in space to turn the scoreboard into an adding machine and that did not happen enough. The Toledo game (3 p.m. Saturday, CBS Sports Network) will determine if the Owls fix that issue.

Two, Penn State fans actually thought Lincoln Financial Field was going to look like this …

… when, in reality, it looked like the photo at the top of this post. Even Co-Pilot noticed:

For the most part, the 12,500 students who currently live on the Temple campus deserve a big thumbs up from this space because that’s the largest student involvement at a Temple game since Luke Butler led the Cherry Crusade in the Al Golden years. Strong student leadership led to scenes like this back then:

More of this, please, for the Army game and the rest of the season … this is when Luke Butler had the Cherry Crusade rocking.

If the students are going to show this kind of support for the rest of the season, the team should be in good shape because the players feed off that kind of energy. My only regret is that the Owls didn’t score more and we didn’t hear “T from Temple U” being sung from the stands enough because of it. A lot of Penn State fans were puffing their chests about their fan turnout but, for a team with seven-straight losing seasons, the Temple turnout was nothing to sneeze at. It’s easy to show up when your team has been in a bowl every year. It’s hard to show up when your team rarely sniffs a bowl. Memo to President John Fry: Close classes on the afternoon of the Army game so the kids can have some fun at LFF.

A lot of Penn State fans who thought the score was going to be 50-0 or worse left disappointed but their disappointment could wane if the Owls, say, won the American Conference title. More importantly, the disappointment of Temple fans. That means the Owls getting their athletes in space in one-on-one matchups. The best way to do create that space is to have a pass/run threat at quarterback who the defense has to account for and maybe even spy. After two weeks of watching these two quarterbacks, I have the nagging feeling that kind of dynamic runner and passer is maybe a year away from playing (Lamar Best). What we saw is the offense sputter after taking that lead into the second quarter. Interesting that in the 2015-win, Temple scored 27 straight points and in the 2026-win, Penn State scored 27 straight points. Both scores would have been 27-10 if the Owls just took the XP. Owls got great QB play from P.J. Walker that day, but neither of these two guys is P.J. Walker.

I hope I’m wrong and one of these two guys grab the job and show the kind of “it” factor in putting points on the board that Evan Simon had last year. There is not enough evidence of that yet.

That should be the goal and for the Owls to fight as hard as they did and refuse to be pushed around was the good that came from the loss.

That, and the students showing up. Good times ahead if that’s a trend and not an anomoly.

Friday: Toledo Preview

09.12.26
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TU-PSU: You play to win the game

Down three offensive linemen, their best running back, and one defensive lineman, Temple head coach K.C. Keeler was faced with a dilemma.

Play to win, or play to keep it close.

From this seat way up there in 215, it was pretty apparent what he did.

Play to keep it close.

I’m from the Herman Edwards School of Thought: You play to win the game.

I’d rather lose 37-10 playing to win than 27-9 playing to keep it close.

After the game, Keeler said “there are no moral victories” but this really seemed like it to me after losing 27-9 to Penn State on Saturday at Lincoln Financial Field.

Temple fans left the 2015 game happy partly because John Cristopher threw a “Philly Special” throwback pass to P.J. Walker and we didn’t see anything like that today.

What would playing to win look like? A double reverse here, a jet sweep to JoJo Bermudez there, the same kind of pass Ajani Sheppard threw on the first play of the game last week there. A few more blitzes on defense. There is value in creativity.

We never saw any of that on Saturday.

What we did see was the kids play hard enough to earn a victory but never got close enough to pull it off.

To me, that was a missed opportunity. For Temple, the opportunity was right there for not only a win over a ranked team, but that win fueling an attendance boost for the rest of the year.

Beat Penn State in front of 61,355 fans and that translates into 30,000 Temple fans for the rest of the season. Right now, we’ll be lucky to hit 20,000 in any of the remaining games.

I’m not from the school where I will ever be happy to lose by less than 20 points. Sorry.

It’s not like Temple doesn’t have talent to score more than nine points against anybody. The Owls have plenty of explosive players in space. They just have to devise ways to deliver them the ball.

This team–other than quarterback–has enough weapons to turn the scoreboard into an adding machine. Keveun Mason is a proven halfback and most Temple insiders say Sam Brown is better than him. Colin Chase is probably the best possession receiver in the league. JoJo Bermudez is not only the best punt returner in the country but a guy who can take any jet sweep to the house.

Other than Mason’s 76 yards, we saw none of that talent utilized against a team that many feel will be in the national championship picture.

What we did see was a defensive line that fought hard enough to win, but didn’t get it because there was no imagination on the offensive side of the ball.

Maybe Keeler was saving that for later but beating Penn State would have been a gamechanger for the program and the gamechanger was sacrificed for whatever is left in the season.

Did you see anything like this on Saturday? I certainly did not.

To me, the biggest problem ahead is that no one grabbed the quarterback position. Jaxon Smolik did some nice things in the first half but the bottom line is that Jaxon Smolik put only three points on the board. The other guy, Ajani Sheppard, is a bigger running threat and, in this era of college football, that’s the kind of a guy you win with.

Still, neither is Evan Simon and I think, with Evan Simon, Temple puts way more than nine points on the board. Simon had a knack, a sixth-sense if you will, to duct out of a rush and find a receiver downfield.

I don’t see that in either Temple quarterback after two games. Simon had an “it” factor. One of the two quarterbacks better show it or develop it and, after watching P.J. Walker, Steve Joachim, Marty Ginestra, Anthony Russo, E.J. Walker and Simon they all had it right away in the first game.

These guys either don’t have it or have not shown it. That’s a problem.

Temple won the rushing battle and time and possession battle.

What happened instead is a lot of Penn State fans left pissed off that they didn’t win 52-0. If that was Temple’s goal, congratulations.

My goal is to win.

Others are to cover.

I stopped by the concourse and saw a Penn State fan pleading for Matt Campbell to go for two after the Nittany Lions’ last touchdown and thought to myself it was nice he lost a lot of money on the game, but I wish Temple had rolled the dice just a little more. If having him win a bundle, meant my team was closer than a 27-9 score was a tradeoff I was willing to make.

It might not have been a moral victory to Keeler but it seemed like that way to me.

Monday: The Good

Friday: Toledo Preview

09.11.26
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TU-PSU: Penn State is in trouble

“I wonder how many Temple fans will be in the stands?” Answer: A lot.

Since there are about eight million Penn State Youtubers and Temple has none, these are the thumbnails that have come across my recommended feed just in the last two days:

“Temple is in trouble.”

“The Penn State Pregame Show: Another blowout probable.”

“Huge Mismatch: Penn State-Temple 4 Things to Watch.”

Well, turnabout is fair play.

We’re going to be the only site on the internet this week with a specific headline: “Penn State is in Trouble.”

Not because we are picking our beloved Owls (we aren’t) but because the recent college football landscape is littered with road signs that could indicate Temple has a chance in Saturday’s high noon showdown at Lincoln Financial Field.

Red (or maybe Cherry) flags for Penn State fans.

Here are three:

Western Michigan at Michigan: The Broncos came into the Big House bigger underdogs than Temple is in its own house (28.5 to 24.5) and basically won that game with a similar roster to Temple. It can be argued that the Michigan roster is similar to Penn State. In fact, Athlon Sports ranks the Michigan roster as No. 11 in talent level to Penn State’s No. 20. The same rankings had Temple’s roster No. 76 and Western Michigan’s roster No. 79. The Linc is not The Big House nor even Beaver Stadium and, while there will be Penn State fans there, Temple fans will make some noise as they have made here:

That’s a lot of Cherry in the stands in the 2015 game. There will be a lot of Cherry tomorrow as well.

Can’t imagine the Big 10 refs putting another second on the clock in front of this Cherry-clad crowd if the Owls play as well as Western Michigan did.

“Penn State fans will be at the Linc but it ain’t Beaver Stadium,” Colby Dant said. “It ain’t the same vibe.”

“I like this Temple team,” he said. “It could be a good team.”

Oklahoma State at Tulsa: Oklahoma State, fueled by oil billionaires, purchased both the North Texas head coach pretty much the entire 11-1 North Texas team. They went into Tulsa and lost, 24-10. Who did Tulsa lose to at home last year? Temple.

UMass at Rutgers: Ostensibly, Rutgers is in the Big 10 and has won quite a few Big 10 games in recent years. It hasn’t beaten Penn State in this century, like Temple has, but it lost, 37-21 to a UMass team Temple beat within the last calendar year (42-10).

Penn State seems to think Temple is Marshall.

Temple is no Marshall. The Owls, unlike Marshall, have the winningest active head coach in the FBS in K.C. Keeler and, unlike Marshall, have a recent win over UTSA, which not only won a bowl game last year but destroyed Tulane, 48-26, in a year where Tulane made the CFB playoff and Penn State did not. Temple was the only team in the country, P4 or G5/6, to keep all of its starters. There is something to be said for loyalty over paid mercenaries and Western Michigan made that statement a week ago and Temple is about to deliver the same message now.

If Penn State goes into the Linc and thinks Temple is Marshall, the Nittany Lions are in trouble and judging from the way the PSU media is portraying the game, that should be the case. Players read all that garbage and, if they take it to heart, they will think they are in for a cakewalk. In the other building, the Temple players know the challenge and have read all the disrespect directed their way. Keeler said the Owls’ defensive line will be the “story of the conference” and maybe the first chapter of that story will be written on Saturday.

If somebody is in trouble, it might not be Temple. You read it here first.

And only.

Saturday: Game Analysis

09.05.26
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An eye-opening opener against Rhode Island

Driving down Delaware Avenue, the all-news-all-the-time AM station gave its top Philadelphia stories on the hour.

“The top stories are Philadelphia reports four new West Nile Virus cases and the Temple Owls open their football season today.”

Odd juxtaposition of stories, but it was nice to see Temple football getting the same kind of billing as a health scare. Most times the local sports talk stations ignore the Owls, let alone the all-news station.

New season, new stories, so the task for the day was to judge whether the Owls would provide eye-popping results or eye-opening ones.

We’ll have to go with the latter in a workmanlike 38-14 win over visiting Rhode Island. Eye-popping would have been one of the quarterbacks throwing for six touchdowns, like the guy last year did in the opener. Eye-popping would have been for the defensive line to have a few sacks.

Neither happened.

Not great, not overly good, but just OK because, from the way K.C. Keeler talked over the last few months, he said that he has two quarterbacks who can win in this conference and maybe he’s correct but neither one knocked my socks off like Evan Simon did in the UMass game a year ago.

Don’t know if the Owls have one quarterback who can compete against this conference and certainly, on the results, did not see one who is capable of beating Penn State.

You would have hoped to see one of them take the job but neither did. John Madden’s old saying was “if you have two quarterbacks you have none” seemed to apply after the game because the Owls still have two quarterbacks.

The other concerning thing was the defensive line. Keeler said the line was so upgraded that it “could be the story of the year in this conference.”

Hell, it wasn’t even the story of the day because the Owls–although limiting Rhode Island to 97 yards on the ground–got no pressure on Rhode Island quarterback Tyler Budge, other than a single shoe-string sack by Kevin Hornbeak and one in the fourth quarter by Davier Bishop. Most of the time, URI rolled the pocket away from the rush and no doubt Penn State was taking notes.

The offensive line that helped the Owls put up 500+ yards of total offense against Navy last year could only muster 369 yards against a FCS team, albeit a very good one. On Jaxon Smolik’s touchdown pass, he was hit and this offensive line can’t let that happen after giving Simon a clean pocket for most of last year. He didn’t really have a clean pocket all day, nor did Ajani Sheppard.

Another head-scratcher was that tight end Peter Clarke was rewarded for his loyalty by being only targeted twice. Clarke was a matchup nightmare last year and why the Owls only threw two passes his way was baffling. Let’s hope they are saving him for Penn State.

That’s the hope. Doubtful because offensive coordinator Tyler Walker showed a nice wrinkle on the first play of the game, and if he’s saving Clarke for Penn State, he probably would have saved that play for the Nittany Lions, too.

Peter Clarke was MIA through no fault of his own. (Photo courtesy of Zamani Feelings)

To me, if Clarke is going to be a first-team All-American he needs a 10-touchdown, 1,000-yard season. The opening game did not help that cause.

The highlight of the day was sophomore running back Keveun Mason rushing for 158 yards on 20 carries and that’s impressive because he lost the job to starter Sam Brown, who will be ready for Penn State. We were looking forward to seeing Brown play and, if he’s better than Mason, he must be very good. Also, the secondary had two pick 6s in a single game and that hasn’t happened at Temple since Chuck Heater was the defensive coordinator in 2011.

What we do know is for the Owls to have any chance against the better opponents ahead, they have to get some sacks on defense and someone is going to have emerge as a clear starting quarterback by winning the job outright.

That, and staying away from mosquito bites.

Monday: Cherry on Top

Friday: Penn State Preview

Saturday: Penn State game analysis

08.24.26
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Paul Darragh: Another Temple captain gone too soon

Had the BOT went through with its plans a decade ago, we’d all be tailgating at an on-campus stadium that might have looked like this. (Photo from the TempleAllSports twitter account)

Tailgating isn’t what it used to be.

For years, we’d have a solid crew of tailgaters who would reliably show up every single season.

Something happened since and, for the last three or so years, the normal “crew” would be missing one or two guys who we lost to passing away.

Some of them were real shocks, like John Belli.

Paul Darragh definitely was in that category, too.

Darragh wasn’t a regular but just an occasional visitor. He didn’t make it every Saturday, but he would be there every other year, and we’d see him pretty often on Cherry and White Day.

That’s the last time I saw him at a C and W game a couple of years ago. I won’t be seeing him again because he passed away at the all-too-young age of 63. I mentioned to him that I saw him make an interception on an old Youtube video.

Temple season ticket holders mingle with players and coaches on Saturday.

“I never had an interception, Mike,” Paul said.

I took his email and sent him the video and he got a kick out of it and thanked me for it.

“I completely forgot about it,” Paul wrote back.

Great guy.

Darragh might have been a regular tailgater except he had things to do on most Saturdays, like being the head coach at Bloomsburg University. He was named head coach on Dec. 6, 2013 and promptly went 10-2 his first season.

He was also an assistant coach at many places including Temple.

In his playing career, he was a three year starter at linebacker and captain of the 1983 Owls, Bruce Arians’ first Temple team. He also started the last two seasons of Wayne Hardin’s career.

In his post-coaching career, Darragh and most of us tailgaters would have returned to campus and enjoyed many Saturdays at the alma mater had the university stuck to its plans and built an on-campus stadium. Now it looks like there will never be an on-campus stadium as the area (15th and Norris) set aside was held for a few years and now is used by the university for other things. It’s amazing to me that the university spent $1 million for a rendering of the stadium by Moody Architecture yet an artificial intelligence tool (see above) did one for free that looks only about a million times better.

Maybe one day there will be a stadium on campus, but that day will probably be a lot closer to 50 years from now than five or 10. Of course, that talk could be revived if the Owls open the season with wins over Rhode Island and Penn State. It would take something that big to revive the project.

Doubtful that any of us will be around to see it but if it ever gets built, a tradition that included guys like Darragh will be the figurative foundation.

Friday: Less is More

Monday: Game Week

08.06.26
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Bruce Arians in HOF: Temple righting a wrong

Bruce Arians leaving his South Jersey home with photos of Bear Bryant and his Temple kids.

In an interview in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 2009, Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz threw in this casual remark about Bruce Arians:

“Firing Bruce Arians was the biggest mistake Temple football ever made.”

Ball recognizes ball and Ferentz is ball. Not a friend of Arians specifically but a member of the same coaching fraternity, Ferentz was able to spot a school that overstepped the bounds when it came to firing a head coach. The story was about colleges too quick to pull the trigger on firing head coaches and the first person to come into Ferentz’s mind was Arians.

That was 23 years after the offense was committed.

Temple University righted a wrong today by including Bruce Arians into its Hall of Fame 2027 Hall of Fame class.

Ferentz will be entering his 28th season as head coach at Iowa and, if Ferentz was right, Arians might–and we use that word “might” loosely–be entering his 43d year as head coach at Temple.

In my mind, most of them would have been pretty damn glorious. I know because I covered Temple football all five of the Arians years. I am still friends with most of his players in those days, including the GOAT (Paul Palmer) and super nice guys like Joe Greenwood, Sheldon Morris, Mike Hinnant, and Eddie Parker.

Arians was loyal to Temple and Temple should have been loyal to him. In 1986, Arians turned down an offer to be head coach of his alma mater, Virginia Tech, to remain at Temple, saying, “I can’t leave my guys at Temple.”

Frank Beamer took that job instead and stayed at Virginia Tech pretty much the exact same length Arians should have remained with the Owls.

Look at his five years at Temple.

He had two winning (6-5) seasons with the Owls against a Top 10 schedule. Compare that to the revered Matt Rhule, who had two winning seasons against schedules ranked No. 84 and No. 91, respectively.

Me, with Arians players (from left) Kevin Jones, Pat Powell and Mike Hinnant

Love the championship Matt gave Temple, but there is no comparison.

After a 17-10 loss at Delaware, Arians called a mandatory full-contact scrimmage at 5 a.m. on the Sunday after that Saturday on Geasy Field. “We didn’t lose a game after that,” Bruce said. (Partially right. Temple won five out of six after that scrimmage.)

Arians beat Pitt in three of his five seasons. He came closer than anyone would expect against Alabama, Georgia and Florida State.

Bruce’s letter to me after I congratulated him on signing Dick Beck, who becamed captain of his 1988 team.

Give me one other head coach at Temple who beat a P4 team in three of five seasons.

You can’t because I can’t.

In his introductory press conference at Temple, one anti-Temple football journalist asked this question, “Why does Temple even play football?”

Arians shot back: “To beat Penn State.”

The Temple fans at Mitten Hall in 1983 went wild.

Nobody was happier when that really happened than Arians, who was the only ex-Temple head coach to have an extended phone conversation with Rhule.

Matt had already talked to Wayne Hardin in person after that game, kissed him on the cheek and handed him the game ball.

Ball recognizes ball and hopefully Kirk Ferentz will notice what Temple did on Thursday. No doubt Wayne Hardin will be smiling from above.

Monday: Back to the Future

07.19.26
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Temple football focus should be on nothing but Rhode Island

Took a week off to recharge the batteries.

That was the plan.

Little did I know that would be literally.

In this case, not recharge but replace.

In the middle of three days where you couldn’t go outside and breathe without inhaling five packs of cigarettes in an hour, I turned over the engine only to find out my car wouldn’t start.

The final season poll. Rhode Island kept most of its players, including its all-league quarterback, and is ranked No. 9 in the FCS 2026 preseason poll. If the Owls don’t bring violence to this game, they could lose.

Three years of turning that key and never worrying about starting the car were out the window. Called Triple AAA and a guy named “Jack” came by and dumped a new battery in my car.

That was a $247 expense I didn’t count on but I need that car to go to work, doctors and shopping so reluctantly pulled the $247 out of my wallet and handed Jack a $10 trip for his trouble.

My high school basketball coach, George Paull (RIP), once told me, “the only thing I know about cars is that you turn the key and away you go.”

Me, too.

Most times.

Doylestown’s John Fonash had a 96-yard punt return after Temple got a three-and-out on the opening series in this 28-0 win in 1965.

K.C. Keeler has the keys to the Temple football vehicle and he better set the GPS for Rhode Island. (Yeah, we know they are coming here but in terms of preparation that’s the direction he should go.)

Now Temple football recharges the batteries starting today with the focus on directing that trip to the Rhode Island game.

Rhode Island?

Yes. Unlike Temple, RI has a tune-up game at Merrimack the last week of August and that factors into an already problematic opener for the Owls.

Because as tough as the Temple schedule is, the Owls didn’t schedule Howard as a tune-up game the first week of September. They scheduled a Top 10 FCS team and we all know the success FCS teams have against FBS teams in recent years, especially in the opening week of the season.

Temple knows for sure.

The key to beating Rhode Island will be Temple’s defense bringing violence to the football with emphasis on punching that ball out and going the other way with it.

In 2009, the Owls won nine-straight FBS games after losing to eventual FCS champion Villanova in the opener. While hoisting that FCS national title trophy, then Villanova head coach Andy Talley gave special thanks to Temple, calling the Owls, “the best team we faced all year.”

Then Temple head coach Al Golden would have rather had the win than the compliment, yet that Temple team was the first Temple bowl team in 30 years and gave Rick Neuheisel’s UCLA squad all it could handle in a 31-21 loss at the Eagle Bank Bowl.

This Rhode Island team has something in common with that Villanova team in that it kept almost all of its starters. The Rams only lost their All-American kicker to Louisville.

Yet they retained their most important two players, quarterback Devin Farrell and wide receiver Marquis Buchanan, who were sought after by many FBS schools. Farrell threw for 3,745 passing yards to earn third team All-American status while Buchanan was a first-team All-American with 1,124 receiving yards.

Go to Seat Geek.com for some pretty good seats at a great deal. Better yet, buy Temple season tickets, go to the free season ticket holder party and get locked in for great seats the rest of the year, especially the nearly sold-out Penn State at Temple game.

Farrell gives the Rams something the Owls don’t have–an experienced college starting quarterback while Jaxon Smolik–if he wins the job as expected–gives Temple something Rhode Island doesn’t have, a 4* high school recruit at that same position.

Something’s got to give and how much violence Keeler can convince the other 21 Temple starters to bring to the football between now and then will determine the outcome.

It probably won’t be the 55-7 FCS win the Owls experienced last year, but figure on a 34-14 type of outcome if the battery starts when Keeler turns the key.

07.16.26
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A Temple Football Championship: There are no words

Editor’s Note: Every once in a while, I get asked why I write this site and my answer is winning. We get barely (and I do mean barely) enough contributions to keep this website alive yet winning remains the goal. Winning games, yes, but winning championships more. This is the one time in my lifetime of being a Temple fan I was there in person to watch Temple football win a championship. Yet winning remains the goal. When it happens, I’m usually speechless but I’ll try to come up with something. There are no words but I summoned some and they are below.

The morning after arguably the greatest win in Temple football history, there are no words.

Literally no words are coming out of my mouth, at least in the sense of being able to talk this morning.

The throaty and hoarse condition is more than OK because it was the result of cheering for the Owls at beautiful Navy-Marine Corps Stadium as they captured what really is their first-ever major football championship. The 1967 MAC title was admirable, but that was a day when the school played to a level of football that was beneath their status even then as one of America’s great public universities.

So this was it.

ride
I sat in the same aisle across from this trophy on the way home (thanks to Matt Rhule for arranging my seat). I couldn’t stop staring at it.

Walking out of the stadium and into the concourse, I let out a very loud primal: “THAT’S WHAT I’M TALKIN’ ABOUT!!”

Fortunately, I got a few high fives and smiles from my fellow Temple fans and not fitted for a straightjacket. It also put the voice out for 24 hours, maybe more.

When it comes to Temple football today at least, you cannot think in terms of a national championship—the deck is stacked against G5 teams in an unfair system—so what happened yesterday was the pinnacle of Temple football success. Thousands of Temple fans, easily in excess of 10,000 Temple fans, made Navy’s 15-game home winning streak a moot point by turning that stadium into a Temple home field advantage and to get to that mountaintop and look down from it is incredibly satisfying.

Hey, it’s a pretty spectacular pinnacle. The only thing that would have made it better was a G5 slot in a New Year’s Six bowl against Penn State, but that’s not happening for a number of reasons that are not important today. (Objectively, would you take a team for the Cotton Bowl that has won seven straight against this schedule and beat a Navy team, 34-10, over a Western Michigan team that struggled to beat a four-loss Ohio team? I would but I don’t expect the bowl committee to be that objective. I can also grudingly see the WMU argument.)

What is important is that the Owls have gone from being a perennial Bottom 10 team and laughed at nationally to being ranked in the Top 25 for two straight years and going to a title game one year and winning it the next. When you think of the success P.J. Walker and Jahad Thomas have had here, there is a Twilight Zone quality to the parallel between this success and their success at Elizabeth (N.J.). In their freshman year at Elizabeth, they won one game; in their freshman year at Temple they won two games. In their sophomore year at both schools, they won six games. In their junior year at both schools, they reached the title game and lost and, in their senior year at both schools, they lifted the ultimate hardware together.

“Get a Dub?”

Truly amazing and I will miss both of those guys.

The Navy team Temple held to 10 points scored 75 on SMU, 28 on Notre Dame, 45 on an 11-2 USF team, 46 on Houston, 42 on Tulane and 66 on ECU.

Back on Cherry and White Day, I wrote that this team will be better than last year’s team while people on other websites—notably, Rutgers and Penn State fan boards—insisted that Temple would take a step back. I was consistent in my belief that this was the STEP FORWARD year, not the step back one, and that belief was rooted in knowledge that both the defense and offense were significantly upgraded despite graduation losses. Only a Temple fan who follows the team closely would know that, not the know-it-alls who make assumptions on subjects they have no idea what they are talking about.

Today at noon, the Owls will know where they will go for a bowl game. They can finish the season in the top 25 and set the record for most wins in Temple football history.

It won’t be the cake because we saw that yesterday, but it will be the Cherry on top of that white cake and it will be delicious even going down past what promises to be a future sore throat.

Postscript: For the comments to the original post click here:

Monday: Regular Programming

Friday: American Conference Media Day

06.28.26
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Turning a metaphor into a literal demonstration

Swimming upstream.

That’s what teams like Temple, really the entire Group of Five, have been doing since the advent of the transfer portal and the NIL.

Temple has watched while it whatever resources it spends on scouting and developing players turns into benefiting some P4 school. It’s not a fair system but we all knew that.

Little did we know, though, that Good Morning America would turn this metaphor of “swimming upstream” into a literal demonstration on its show earlier last week.

Ginger Zee, the Chief Meteorologist and Climate Correspondent for ABC News, grabbed three Temple football players–including starters Eric King (OT), Colin Chase (WR) and Eric Stuart (LB) for a swimming demonstration. For some reason, they added a pair of athletes from the dance team to fill out this five-person squad.

(You think they’d be able to find a couple of members of another American Conference Olympic sports team.)

Whatever.

Despite the fact that I thought the football players would fare better (at last Chase did swimmingly), it’s publicity the school can’t buy and that’s the best kind. I’d give the other two guys a B+.

It was good publicity for the school on the most watched early morning show in the nation and elevated Temple’s name recognition a bit. It certainly couldn’t hurt the football program.

Temple football players spent all day in OC filming a 4-minute segment that appeared on Good Morning America (6/24/26).

Someone deserves credit for this and maybe its Kevin Neghandi, who works for Disney’s ESPN arm. They could have chosen any one of the 136 FBS football-playing schools.

They chose Temple.

Maybe it is someone in the Sports Information Department, but head football coach K.C. Keeler certainly had to sign off on lending his players to ABC for at least a day and arranging transportation to Ocean City, N.J.

No small feat since being a big-time college football player is a 365-day job.

One of those days being set aside for swimming upstream in a literal sense.

When the guys got back to the Edberg Olson Practice Facility, it was back to swimming upstream in a metaphorical sense.

Let’s hope they ace that test.

Friday: A worthwhile investment

06.21.26
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Temple’s recruiting focus: Speed Kills

Tylik Mitchell is expected to make some kind of immediate impact for the 2026 Owls on offense and special teams.

Lose a Hollawayne, gain a Holloway.

Kajiya Hollawayne was a productive receiver for the Temple football Owls a year ago, starting all 12 games including a spectacular nine-catch, 149-yard game against Navy. He ran out of eligibility, leaving the Owls look for a speed receiver on the edge.

Pretty impressive offer list for Kamari Hollaway.

Temple gained a “Holloway” recently, grabbing highly thought of North Carolina running back Kamari Holloway from Southern Durham (N.C.) High School, right under the noses of East Carolina, which offered him a full scholarship last year.

Holloway has four years of eligibility left.

He was the second “athlete” recruit with speed from North Carolina that K.C. Keeler and his coaching staff have recruited and both have something in common.

Blinding speed.

Hollaway has clocked a 4.48 in the 40-yard dash, which, in terms of measurables compares favorably to former Owl superstar back Bernard Pierce, whose NFL combine time in the 40 was 4.55. So Hollaway is a full seven tenths of a second faster in the 40 than Pierce was the year after he scored 25 touchdowns for the Owls and became a third-round NFL draft choice.

Mitchell, who should compete for a wide receiver job for the Owls this season, also was a former running back out of North Carolina’s Southern Nash High School. His measurable comparison to Pierce was that he ran a 10.7 100-meter dash in high school. Pierce’s 10.8 in the same event was enough to win the PIAA state indoor title as a senior at Glen Mills.

Both Hollaway and Mitchell both put up good football numbers as well. Hollaway had 122 carries for 1,420 yards and 13 touchdowns in 2025. Mitchell, also playing running back, had 1,866 and 21 touchdowns during his senior season in 2034.

Kamari Hollaway.

So the Owls plucked not only two great athletes out of North Carolina, but two of the fastest guys in that state.

The Owls looked a little slow against some of the better teams in the league last year. Going forward, it appears they are determined to win their share of foot races, which usually means getting to the goal line faster than the bad guys.

Friday: How Others See Temple