Tag Archives: Geoff Collins

09.22.17
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#Myth Busting

The telling screen shot last night came not from the horror show that a nation had to witness for three hours prior, but in the interview afterward.

A profusely sweating Geoff Collins was wearing a vest that said, simply: #TEMPLETUFF.

Not TEMPLE TUFF, but hashtag Temple TUFF. Temple has been on national television twice, and there is plenty of talk about juice and swag and money downs and hashtags but the nation has seen nothing of the Temple TUFF brand we have become used to the last two years.

tuff

So we’re going to do some #Mythbusting today.

There are largely two schools of thought on what happened to a once-proud Temple football program floating around on social media.

One is that “the team lost too much from last year’s squad this is a rebuilding season” and another is that they “hired a head coach who is learning on the job with a group of ill-qualified assistants.”

One theory is an absolute myth perpetrated by fans who follow the program only casually and it’s surprising to those of us who have followed the Owls closely that some people find that line of thinking plausible.

An offense that lost its starting quarterback, but returned a running back who gained over 900 yards and scored 14 touchdowns, the top fullback in the country, three of five starting offensive linemen should not be rebuilding. A fourth non-starter, center Matt Hennessey, should and probably will be Temple’s next great center in the mold of Alex Derenthal and Kyle Friend. Ask any Temple fan who followed the team over the last 40 years (I will raise my hand here) who the best set of receivers are in Temple history and that fan will probably say the current group of Ventell Bryant, Adonis Jennings, Keith Kirkwood and Isaiah Wright. Any offense that has those four guys on it is not rebuilding, it should be reloading.

Emphasis on “should be” because the coaching is the X-factor here. Temple won the past two seasons because it catered an offense to suit the talents of its players, and did not try to force fit a square peg (spread offense) into a round hole (play-action offense). A good head coach tailors a scheme to the talent he has, not the talent he wants.

The myth perpetrators also say the defensive line lost a lot, but starters like Karamo Dioubate, Greg Webb, Michael Dogbe and Jacob Martin are still on the team from last year’s championship squad. Sharif Finch, one of the stars of the 2015 team, also returned this year. They didn’t lose as much as they gained. They did the pushing around last year and this year they are being pushed around. What’s the difference? Coaching.

Sure, the team lost three linebackers but that should have been offset by a secondary that was outstanding last year and mostly returned intact. The Owls replaced a fifth-round NFL draft choice, Nate Hairston, with a guy in Mike Jones who was projected by NFL draft guru Mike Mayock as a sixth-round pick last year. In Artrel Foster, Jones, Sean Chandler and Delvon Randall, those guys are not being put in a position to showcase their talents because the defensive scheme doesn’t call for the necessary quarterback pressures that would result in Pick 6’s coming back the other way.

Maybe the Owls were not meant to defend their championship this year, but they certainly were not meant to be embarrassed like this. When Matt Rhule left, the situation screamed for the school to hire a successful FBS head coach instead of rolling the dice on another coordinator. USF’s kids are benefiting from hiring such a coach, a guy who succeeded in an urban setting (Louisville) like both Philadelphia and Tampa. Charlie Strong did his learning on the job elsewhere and had a pretty good handle on it by now. Meanwhile, Temple’s kids flounder until this guy can learn on the job how to be a head coach.

These kids, and these fans, are the Guinea Pigs and there is not a damn thing anybody can do about it.

Monday: Fizzy’s Corner

Wednesday: If Not Now, When?

Friday: From Plain to Plain Ugly

 

09.21.17
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Nothing To See Here

bobster

Maybe Geoff Collins has us fooled all along.

The problems we have seen with our beloved Temple Owls for three games he does not see.

Like Baghdad Bob above, there is nothing to see here and the Owls are in fine shape to upset preseason AAC favorite South Florida tonight (ESPN, 7:30) in Tampa.

At least that’s the vibe I’ve been getting after each Collins’ press conference. Last Saturday, on the “Temple Football Playbook” show, Collins looked positively giddy to be 2-1 and the kids are playing great and the two teams he barely beat are “really, really good” football teams. There’s plenty of juice in the building.

Never mind that one “really, really” good football team barely beat Lehigh and the other “really, really” good football team lost to Coastal Carolina, Old Dominion and Hawaii.

Tonight, Temple plays a “really, really, really, really good” football team in USF on the road.

The fact that the public sees Temple as a 20-point underdog does not seem to faze him one bit, nor did the prediction before the season that USF would finish first and the two-time defending AAC champions would finish third. “I love it,” Collins said at the time.

Those same two-time AAC East champions are now ranked seventh in the AAC power rankings based on a couple of subpar performances after an opening-day embarrassment when there was no sign of the “Temple TUFF” we had been used to for the past two years.  Collins blamed it all on misfits, but Temple fans weren’t buying that explanation because essentially the same players who were supposedly caught in misfits were not particularly known for screwing up similarly under a different set of coaches.

Tonight’s game is a referendum on just how Temple should select its head coaches post-Collins Era. Should it go the way that, say, USF did and hire a guy with head coaching experience who has done it before as a HEAD coach in an urban setting (Louisville) or churn that coordinator pile once again and hope to come up with a flavor like Al Golden or Matt Rhule, knowing full well it could be sour-tasting like Steve Addazio?

Temple AD Pat Kraft thinks he made a brilliant selection with Collins. Only time will tell.

One thing about coordinators is that not every great one was meant to be a head coach. It’s a different job being a head coach and you never really know a good one until you see him in action on game day.

Maybe Collins was just playing Possum and we will now see Temple TUFF, a running game, a defense that can stop the run and crossing patterns underneath and an offense that is innovative and not predictable.

One thing is certain: Temple fans will be watching tonight with a lot of anxiety mixed with a only little bit of hope.

It’s up to Collins to Keep Hope Alive by proving that Kraft’s confidence in him was well-placed.

Tomorrow: Game Analysis

09.19.17
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The Lost Letter

helmet

Dear Geoff,

Despite having used some of the extra money in my new contract for a canopy bed and a nice new My Pillow that I ordered online, I’m having some bouts with insomnia.

Oh-and-three will do that to any coach who gives a damn and, from being my friend for over 25 years, you know I do.

So to combat the insomnia and before I get back to that My Pillow, I thought I’d jot just a few notes down because I’ve been able to DVD all three Temple games. Here are a few suggestions. You can take this letter and crumple it up in the circular file if you don’t like them and it won’t affect our friendship. Getting this off my chest might help me catch a few zzzz’s. Even though they are your players, I consider them my kids, too, and I’d like to see them succeed.

 

Keep Nick Sharga In the Game

Watching the Notre Dame game, I thought the first series was promising. Nick Sharga was in the game, the offense was moving and you made the right call on 3d and 2 with the handoff up the middle to him for the first down. Then I went, “Oh no” when Nick was pulled for three wide receivers on the next play. Things went rapidly downhill after that. I , too, was talked into the trendy multiple wide receiver sets by my first offensive coordinator. You are only going to have Sharga this year. You can let Patenaude try all his fancy stuff next year.   It took me two years to figure that out and I’m giving you the benefit of hindsight. Having Nick is like having an extra OL blocker. This is not a bad offensive line. Three of the guys who were starters return and a fourth, Matt Hennessey, who did not start, is a Rimington Award candidate. It should be performing better and using Sharga as a full-time blocker will help.  Once that happens, the linebackers and the safeties inch up toward the line of scrimmage, fake it into the RB’s belly and you’ll have these great receivers running so open through the secondary Logan won’t know which one to pick out. Hell, you might consider playing Sharga on defense, too. He was my best linebacker in a 34-12 win over Memphis two years ago. Position flexibility is something you should know a little about.

Stop the underneath crossing patterns

When Villanova gained about 8,000 yards on a crossing patterns underneath and throws to the tight end, I knew that wouldn’t happen the next week because I had faith in you. Still do. Then UMass gained what seemed like 8,001 yards off the same patterns. My only guess is that you allow Taver to make the defensive calls and he’s a little stubborn. Maybe you should take over as DC until things are cleaned up. I asked Phil what he would have done and he said put Sharga and Folks at linebacker, put Freddy Booth-Lloyd over the nose and Julian and Dogbe at tackles. Don’t forget Karamo Dioubate is also on the team. Please dust off his recruiting film. Nick Saban loved it. He’s a one-man Mayhem Machine. Anyway, Snow said that the best pass defense is putting the quarterback on his ass—err, backside, my faith won’t allow me to say that word this year—and having those three in the A gaps and over the center should cause the requisite Mayhem you desire. You’ll be surprised how that much traffic around the quarterback frees up guys like Quincy Roche and Sharrif Finch. Even if the quarterback isn’t sacked, hitting him might result in a hurried throw that Champ or Delvon can take to the house.

sharga

Make Isaiah Wright The Tailback

Love Ryquell, but he looks a little slow this year. Is he hurt? If he is, don’t hesitate to use Isaiah Wright at tailback. We practiced Wright as both a tailback and a quarterback and I thought he had a chance to be our most dynamic offensive player last year. We had Jahad so we couldn’t use him at tailback a lot, but we still found a way to put IW in as a Wildcat Quarterback. Putting him at tailback even for 10 carries makes the team that much harder to defend and he can do a lot of damage with that swing pass out of the backfield. I think he needs more touches and don’t forget reverses AND he can throw the halfback pass as well. Ryquell is a one-cut runner. This guy is a five-cut runner who, to use a basketball term, can create his own shot.

Good luck against South Florida and I will be watching.

Thanks for letting me get this off my chest. I have to get back to My Pillow now.

Regards,

Matt

p.s. Please ditch the black uniforms. They are VERY unlucky. Stick with the Cherry helmets with the white ‘][‘.

09.16.17
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It’s All Over (But The Shouting)

Not sure of the exact time, but the Temple football season ended somewhere in the second half in the third game of the season.

Sure, the schedule says there are still nine games to play in a 12-game season but anyone who knows anything about football and watched this team has seen enough.

This is around a five or six-win team now and I don’t see anyway around that. I hate to admit when I’m wrong, but my projection prior to the season of  eight-to-10 wins for this team is way off. It’s all over but the shouting and a lot of that shouting will be done by Temple fans who have been used to double-digit win seasons.

The blame rests not with the kids but with the coaching staff.

The capper came when Temple called an option play on a 3d-and-21 down-and-distance situation in a 29-21 win over a UMass team the Owls should have smoked, 31-6. It does not matter what the play was, but the result was a 4-yard gain and a punt. It was playing not to lose and not playing to win and that is always a bad strategy. This team has played not to lose for the last two games instead of putting the foot on an inferior opponent’s throat.

americasteam

The play call speaks to the tone deafness of this rookie coaching staff the silence has been deafening for three games now.

Sad, because the kids deserve better.

There are enough holdovers from a 10-4 championship season to have expected a much more successful season than what we are looking at now. In a nutshell, this is what we have seen so far.

  • Against Notre Dame, the Owls were blown out, 49-16, against a team which finished 4-8 a year ago. Yeah, I know it’s Notre Dame but the last we checked this was the same 4-8 team that lost to Navy and Navy was the same team that got blown out by Temple in the AAC championship game. New head coach Geoff Collins blamed the 422 yards rushing on “misfits” but he did not mention that most of the misfits were the guys he hired as assistant coaches.
  • Against Villanova, the Owls could score only 16 points on a team that got absolutely torched for 35 points by Lehigh. Let that sink in for a moment.  Lehigh. Then Collins had the gonads to call Villanova “a really good team.” Sorry, Geoff, Villanova blows and so did your game plan against that “really good team.”
  • Now we get to Massachusetts, a team that was beaten by Old Dominion, Hawaii and Coastal Carolina. Here’s the weird part. Temple hired last year’s offensive coordinator from Coastal Carolina and this year’s Coastal Carolina offensive coordinator–with Coastal Carolina talent–scored more points on UMass than last year’s Coastal Carolina coordinator with Temple talent. Maybe the Owls hired the wrong Coastal Carolina OC. He still hasn’t figured out that Isaiah Wright needs 20 touches a game, not the four he split between the last two games.

Something is very wrong with this picture and it has been that way for three games. One or two games might be an outlier, but this looks like the norm for the balance of the season.

Yes, it’s 2-1 but that’s the softest 2-1 in Temple history. Get me four more wins in the next nine games and I will be pleasantly surprised, but I do not see it getting any better going forward. It’s not the kids. It’s the coaches and I expected much better. The USF game could get very ugly fast unless major issues are addressed on both sides of the ball.

We have, oh, just four days to do that and nothing I’ve seen in the last four weeks gives me a whole lot of confidence that anything will be addressed at all.

Monday: A Blueprint

Wednesday: USF Preview

09.12.17
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Where’s The Mayhem?

collins

I can’t believe how much coach looks like Dan Klecko in this photo.

Like many Temple fans who attended that rainy Cherry and White Day, a particular T-Shirt caught my eye among the many they were peddling along merchant row.

It was white with Cherry lettering and the words simply said: “Temple Football: Mayhem is Coming.” I thought the $33 price tag was a little steep for a cotton T-shirt, but I plucked down the big bucks nonetheless because this was something different in usual Temple athletic fashion wear.

Wore the shirt all summer to the gym and a few people asked me about it. I said, “Mayhem is getting into the backfield, creating fumbles and interceptions and scoring on defense. This is what the new coach is supposed to bring to Temple.”

So far, so bad.

maniac

 

No Mayhem, except in the coaching box.

Not that many fumbles nor interceptions from the vanilla defensive packages the defense runs nor blitzes designed to create both. After the Notre Dame game, new head coach Geoff Collins said that the embarrassing total of 49 points were on what he called “misfits” and that 90 percent of the 422 yards rushing against the Owls came on 17 plays. That begs a couple of questions. One, isn’t the nine months of practice before the Notre Dame game enough time for cleaning up any potential “misfits” and, two, seventeen plays are a lot of plays. Just the fact that the Irish gouge you for big plays does not mitigate responsibility for allowing them.

The Owls have one tackle, Greg Webb, who started against Navy and was an immovable object (against an option offense that scored 76 on SMU the week before) who seems to have fallen out of favor with this staff. The Owls showed more defensive Mayhem against Navy in that one game last year than they have displayed in two this season. The Owls have another four-star tackle, Karamo Dioubate, who the day he committed to the Owls took a phone call in Buffalo Wild Wings (Roosevelt Blvd, Northeast Philly) from none other than Nick Saban trying to get him to flip his commitment to Alabama. KD said thanks but no thanks. KD wasn’t “above the line” so he did play not at all on Saturday. KD showed flashes of that talent as a true freshman last  year and looked to be primed to break into stardom by the aforementioned Cherry and White Game. KD is not hurt nor is Webb. Let’s get these two difference-makers into the UMass game.

It would seem to me if you are going to for Mayhem without blitzing it would behoove the Owls to have players on the field who are capable of creating it on their own. To me, Villanova was more appalling than even the Notre Dame embarrassment because the Owls’ defensive secondary which shined under the “Snowstorm Defense” was cut to pieces being led by a coordinator in Taver Johnson, who did not have championship level defenses in his past. Just what has Taver Johnson done to merit him being hired as DC at Temple? I’ve looked at his bio up and down and sideways and have not seen it. At least, with Chuck Heater, Temple hired a guy who was a National Championship defensive coordinator. Let that last sentence soak in for awhile.  With Phil Snow, he was a great DC with Arizona State and UCLA in the 1980s. With Johnson, his most impressive credential is that he is Geoff Collins’ friend. No national championships, no history as a great DC anywhere previously.

Ultimately, as the CEO of this Temple football operation, Collins is responsible.

There seems to be a subset line of thought that  “it’s only one game, give the guy a chance” excuses coming out after Notre Dame followed by “it’s only two games, give the guy a chance” coming out of Villanova. Let’s get this straight: No one is calling for Collins to be fired. Anyone who knows Temple knows this guy has a job at Temple for life, unless he wins eight games and then he lets Ed Foley coach the bowl game. Let’s not kid ourselves here. If the guy who “wanted to sign a 10-year contract” is out after year four, nobody makes it to five years at Temple with a modicum of success. By “give the guy a chance” I mean dissect if what he is telling you is bull or part of an overall plan. Give the guy a chance?

The problem with that logic is one game quickly becomes two games and, before you know it, eight games become 12 games. Hopefully, those same people are not saying “it’s only been a year” and still waiting to the kind of Mayhem Collins promised he would bring. How about it getting here by Friday? You’ll know it’s here with at least two fumbles recovered and one interception to the house. Anything less (and this is a very low standard) is a Ponzi Scheme designed to sell $33 T-Shirts.

Wake me up when Mayhem arrives. Until then, that nice $33 cotton T-shirt will remain in the closet collecting the same mothballs as the Mayhem we have been promised.

Thursday: UMass Preview

09.07.17
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Throwback Thursday: Half-Full Or Half-Empty?

novaone

Temple won this before 6,734 fans at Veterans Stadium.

When the fans pour a few pre-game brewskis at the first home tailgate of the year, roughly 50 percent of them will be seeing that cup as half-full and the other group has half-empty.

That’s the short view coming after a shocking, at least to me, 49-16, loss to Notre Dame in the opener.

Ordinarily, Temple losing 49-16 to Notre Dame is not shocking but count me with the half-empty group after the opening week of the season. The logic is indisputable: Notre Dame was coming off a 4-8 season and Temple was coming off a 10-4 season. During that season, Notre Dame had lost to a Navy team that Temple clocked, 34-10. Notre Dame, last we checked, did not get a significant influx of transfers in from Alabama or Ohio State. Temple, last we checked, had plenty of guys who were significant players on their championship team returning.

Temple SHOULD have given Notre Dame a much better game. Maybe not my prediction of 17-13, but, say, 28-16. Forty-nine to 16 was unacceptable and has shaken a lot of fans’ confidence in this new coaching staff. Not the players, because guys like Ryquell Armstead and Adonis Jennings and Nick Sharga were as key to the success of last year’s Owls as any of the NFL departed stars on offense and guys like Michael Dogbe, Delvon Randall and Sean Chandler were just as important on defense as anyone not named Haason Reddick.

projectmayhem

Not impressed with Project Mayhem’s debut Saturday. Hopefully, the sequel is better.

The coaches changed, mostly, for both teams one group of coaches over-performed and the other under-performed. That’s why a number of fans see what has happened so far as alarming, appalling and shocking. Perhaps just as appalling to me was the fact that Collins, in his AAC media day interview, went down a list of defensive players and every single name (at least a half-dozen players, maybe more) were players who he said “played well” or “played at a high level.”

I immediately went to the toilet and puked. (Just kidding, but no one plays well on defense giving up 49 points. Three points, yes. Six points, yes. Forty-freaking-nine points, no.)

Hopefully, like another SEC coordinator Temple hired, Steve Addazio, Collins understands our intense hatred of Villanova and coaches accordingly on Saturday. Daz “got” the rivalry and he produced 42-7 and 41-10 wins over that team. That’s what I’m hoping for Collins to produce on Saturday for this Temple fan base so bitterly disappointed by the first week.

That’s the short view, though.

Long view, over several decades, is how far Temple football has come.

One of the greatest Temple fans, Ted DeLapp, posted this remarkable headline from the 1975 Temple-Villanova game, a 41-3 win before 6,734 fans at Veterans Stadium.

That was not a misprint.

Six-thousand, seven hundred and thirty-four. Archbishop Ryan and Father Judge drew 11,000 fans to their game that same year. North Catholic and Frankford drew roughly the same amount.

One fan commented that it “was pouring rain that day” but DeLapp looked up the NWS forecast data from that day in Philadelphia and said only 0.03 inches of rain that day fell at the airport, which is only a couple of miles from the Vet. Amazing how people’s memories fail them.

On Saturday, upwards of 32,000 (or thereabouts) will see Temple host Villanova. The Wildcats are a top 10 FCS program and the Owls, while not the Top 25 program new coach Geoff Collins claims they are in the FBS, certainly flirted with the Top 25 in the last two seasons before being stood up in the last two bowl games.

Short view, for Temple at least, glass is half-empty.

Long view, half-full, especially considering that thousands of more people are both interested and invested in Temple football than 40 or so years ago.

Saturday around 6:30 p.m. or so if what’s in that cup taste like sewer water, it’s going to be a long season. Collins gets a Mulligan on the first week, but there will be no Mulligans going forward.

Sunday: Game Analysis

09.05.17
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Deep Six Above The Line

 

Zach Gelb goes on an epic and spot-on “above the line” rant. 

Usually, when you change something that has been considered, for want of a better phrase, “the standard” you have to have a pretty good reason.

 

Geoff Collins, the new Temple coach, is the only coach in the country to deep six the depth chart for a more vague rating of players called “above the line.” As it is, Temple is the only school not offering a depth chart for the press or television.

His logic is faulty. At least at Temple.

That logic has always been flawed at Temple.

“When players see themselves listed as a number two they play like a number two,” Collins said.

That might make sense in the SEC, but it has never made sense at Temple.

Look at the number of guys who weren’t even second on the depth chart who worked their way up and made huge impacts at Temple.

For the purposes of space here, we will just take five.

Haason Reddick was a walk-on who didn’t even earn a scholarship at Temple until his senior year, a fact that his father is still unhappy about. All he did was become a first-round draft pick in the NFL.

Matt Brown, who was a walk-on slot receiver from Peddie School (N.J.), became one of the greatest running backs in Temple history. His dynamic kickoff returns caused then head coach Al Golden to move him to running back, where he was even more explosive than wide receiver. He was part of Golden’s great “Bernie and the Bug” duo that took Temple from a 20-game losing streak two bowl games.

Mike Curcio, a walk-on linebacker for the 1979 team, became one of the greatest linebackers in Temple history and went on to a career in the NFL.

Nick Sharga, currently in Collins’ own words the “best fullback in the country” was also a walk-on, as was current scholarship kicker Aaron Boumerhi.

We haven’t even touched the surface of second-team Temple guys who eventually became first-teamers and went onto great college careers, but that list is a much longer one than that of the walk-ons, who’ve we’ve only scratched the surface so far. At Temple, guys who are on the second team work that much harder to make the first team and do not play like second teamers.

To me, the Collins’ logic is flawed and that’s one reason why this “above the line” depth chart is an idea that deserves to be crumpled up and thrown in the circular file.

Or at least come up with a reason that makes a modicum of sense.

Thursday: Throwback Thursday

 

09.01.17
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Spaghetti Midwestern

midwestern

Watching the so-called “Spaghetti plots” over the last few days that plotted the projected path of Harvey, one of them had the storm directly over Indiana by “Saturday PM.”

Temple and Notre Dame both seemingly have dodged a bullet because subsequent plots have put the remnants closer to, say, Philadelphia than South Bend.

While rain is considered the great equalizer on the football field and a nightmare for Las Vegas, if Temple would be fortunate enough to win on Saturday in a monsoon the narrative would have been it wasn’t a fair fight and the Owls won due to the elements. This is like one of those old Spaghetti Westerns, so named because they were mostly made in Italy. They all had a simple plot. Good guy versus bad guy and a lot of action with a satisfying result at the end.

spaghetti

This is how close Harvey came to helping out Geoff.

Call this a Spaghetti Midwestern, where the bad guys depend on which side of the economic tracks you are on in today’s modern day college football reality. It’s really hard to imagine that, unless you are Irish, Catholic or a Notre Dame fan for life why you would be rooting for anyone but Temple in this one.

People who follow this blog usually know in this space the day before a Temple game we talk about the matchups, how the Owls should attack and expect to be attacked.

In all honestly, we don’t know Jack this year. New quarterbacks, mostly new coaches, new coordinators for both teams. Of course, the returning head coach, Brian Kelly, presided over a 2016 team that lost to a Navy team that could not get within a sniff of Temple in the most important game of both team’s seasons. (Apologies to Navy, but winning the AAC title game is still more important than an Army game that you’ve won 10-straight times.)

This we do know: Temple has a GREAT defense and will smack you in the mouth. Whether those body blows result in a TKO or Mayhem turns into touchdowns the other way, we will find out Saturday. In this space, and at this moment, we will focus on the larger picture.

Certainly, all of the Group of Five schools will be rooting for Temple. They’ve been dealt a bad hand by the BCS Power 5 schools who have engineered a hostile takeover of college football and dictated to the NCAA what the rules are and who should be in their title game. They have made it a virtual impossibility that any G5 school ever make it into a championship.

Fortunately, the basketball side of the NCAA has avoided that doomsday fate but the P5 is certainly positioning itself for a hostile takeover of that wonderful tournament as well.

A win for Temple in this game will not cure all of those ills but would certainly be a step in the right direction. Certainly there have been other high-profile wins by G5 schools over P5 schools, with Houston beating Oklahoma last year, Memphis beating Ole Miss in 2015 and Temple beating Penn State in that same year.

None of them have moved the needle closer to fairness because those schools are still have-nots in a sport of haves. A win here would be slightly different in that the Owls would do this in the first week of a long season before a national television audience and, if they were to keep the momentum for as long as they did in 2015, they would have to be mentioned as a possible playoff team by the highly paid talking heads. One of those talking heads this year is a Temple grad, Kevin Neghandi, who will run the college football show for ESPN this fall.

That kind of platform is not available for any other G5 school and Temple will at least build the stage with a win on Saturday. It is helpful that Hurricane Harvey does not make a visit to throw a caveat into what would be such a glorious victory.

Sunday: Game Analysis

Tuesday: Above The Line

Thursday: Throwback Thursday

 

08.28.17
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Game Week: Most Exciting Season Yet

kraft

The guy who is the new head coach at Temple has this fascinating way of answering questions he does not want to answer.

Geoff Collins just shakes his head.

Up and down for yes.

Side to side for no.

Smiling all the while, but not a single word uttered.

Watching Collins do this the last three or four times sold me. Simply not because of that knee-jerk reflex, but because of a thousand other idiosyncrasies he has shown since being hired as Matt Rhule’s replacement. Answering questions is just one endearing quality. More so, to me at least,  he could cite to me chapter and verse every important play a current Temple player made on film in every game he ever played. For someone who felt that Rhule never looked at tape either of his players or opponents, that was a very good sign. If this guy pays that much attention in the film room to what his current players have done, this is likely  a guy who will study opponents’ film and attack their weaknesses. I was never sure Rhule did that, at least enough on a consistent basis for my taste. To Rhule, it was enough to focus on “the process” and “controlling what we can do.”

That’s nice, but college football is a big war game and encircling your enemy and exploiting his weaknesses is at least as big a part of it.

Collins, from what I’ve seen, seems to understand that’s a part of the process, too.

Judging from the focused practices, this is a guy who won’t stand for the Owls having 120 yards in penalties at Notre Dame, like Rhule brushed off after last year’s Penn State fiasco.


This is Pat Kraft’s “Home Run”
hire and, if that lands in the
upper deck like a Rhys Hoskins’
one, we will have a repeat
championship team
at 10th and Diamond

This guy has the “it” factor that even Al Golden and Matt Rhule did not have. This is Pat Kraft’s “Home Run” hire and, if that lands in the upper deck like a Rhys Hoskins’ one, we will have a repeat championship team at 10th and Diamond.

He’s genuine, not a bull-shitter who will tell Temple fans he wants to be here 1,000 years like the message the last guy perpetuated. He just avoids that question and that’s fine. As John Chaney once said, don’t tell me you’ll love me forever if you won’t.

This guy, Collins, has the kind of charisma those two did not with the attention to detail Golden had.

Golden was the meticulously organized guy, building a binder of how to construct a program based on his years of being an assistant at Penn State, Boston College and Virginia. Rhule observed Golden and tried to follow the same blueprint. Collins believes in those concepts, but thinks just outside the box enough to be able to implement new and improved ideas.

That’s the primary reason why I am more enthusiastic about this season than I have been for any one since the late, great Wayne Hardin was head coach.

Here’s the nut graph: This Temple team can win anything from 6-12 games and that’s why I’m fascinated more by going into this season than any other in the last decade or so. Last year was the so-called “step back” year and we debunked that theory the first week before the season because we felt the guys returning were more than capable of getting the Owls the league championship.

It turned out they were.

I’m not calling for a league championship here, or even a win over Notre Dame—I think the Owls fall just short of both goals—but don’t sell this guy Collins short.

He could very well prove me wrong and I think he might. This is one time I very much want to be wrong and one guy who is capable of debunking my theories. I will be hanging on his every word of this incredibly fascinating season.

Or every nod of the head.

Wednesday: Enemy Territory

Friday: Game Preview

 

 

 

08.25.17
by

Eye Of The Needle

needle

In Mark 11-23-27, a God-like figure who goes by the initials JC and is not John Chaney said, “it is easier for a Camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God.”

Whew.

I guess you and I dodged a bullet by not winning that $700 million lottery on Wednesday night, simply because eternity is just a bit longer than the 50-100 years we get to live on this planet and, if you had to chose one, you’d chose eternity.

What has proven to be just as difficult, though, is for a Group of Five team to enter the Kingdom of College Football Heaven. That’s how corrupt college football has become in an era where the Power 5 sets the rules and the Group of Five must follow or go home.

The bad news is that Temple is PROBABLY not going to get into Paradise this year. The good news is that it’s possible should this scenario occur:

  1. Temple beats Notre Dame
  2. Notre Dame beats everyone else
  3. Temple beats everyone else

Crazy, because crazy things rarely happen. Yeah, we know that’s pretty nigh impossible but, on the eve of a college football season, we can dream, can’t we?
Really, the MOST crazy part of this equation is if Notre Dame loses to Temple, it’s hard to see the Irish run through the rest of a schedule that includes teams like Southern Cal and Georgia. Still, after losing to Army in the opener last year, did you ever envision Temple winning the toughest G5 Conference?

I did not think so.

So say both Temple and Notre Dame run through their regular seasons unbeaten. It would be pretty impossible for even a P5-stacked selection committee to pick one-loss ND over unbeaten Temple for a slot in the Final Four given the fact that the unbeaten team won at the one-loss team.

There are not many G5 teams that have a similar pathway into the Final Four because they have not scheduled a marquee team.

If the G5 is ever going to crash this rich man’s party, then this year is the year and Temple is the G5 team and the first step is winning at Notre Dame.

Somewhere, the real Touchdown Jesus would probably look down and at least crack a smile if that happens.

We can pray Notre Dame does its part. The Owls will have to handle their part on their own accord by winning three more games than we predicted them to two days ago.

Can’t happen?

Yeah, probably, but as long as both teams are unbeaten (and both are now) we will dream our dreams and others are free to dream theirs.

Monday: Game Week (Can You Believe It?)

Tuesday: Enemy Territory