Tag Archives: Justin Lynch

10.08.21
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Temple: Worst special teams in history

Whether he wants to admit it or not, Rod Carey cannot say his special teams by delegation produced better results than any of Ed Foley’s special teams at Temple.

If someone gave Rod Carey a blueprint to destroy Temple football on the day he was hired, it would be this:

“Hey, Rod. How about firing the best special teams coach in the country and giving the defense an extra coach on the field?”

“Yeah, Joe (or Fran or Pat), that sounds like a pretty good idea to me.”

Some time later, Carey had this conversation with Ed Foley:

“Sorry, Ed. Gonna have to move you upstairs. We need another defensive coach on the field.”

Ed: “Fuck that. I’m outta here.”

Carey: “See ya.”

With Dwan Mathis throwing the ball into the ground on 3d and 17, it might be time to get behind Justin Lynch. In over 40 years of watching Temple football, I’ve never seen a Temple quarterback give up like Mathis did Friday night.

Since then, Temple has has been a national embarrassment on special teams. That’s a nice way of putting it. Probably a better way would be the Owls suck royally.

That certainly wasn’t the reason for Temple’s 52-3 loss at Cincinnati on Friday night but it definitely was the reason why the Owls gave up 14 early points that they could absolutely not afford if they were to have any confidence going forward.

In a potential blowout game, you need some early confidence and Temple got none of that.

In a 61-14 opening-day loss to Rutgers, Jadan Blue routinely let the ball go over his head on the 30 and allowed it to bounce inside the 5. Blue, my favorite CURRENT Temple player, showed absolutely no interest in advancing the ball and that’s his job.

Against Cincy, he muffed a punt that led to six.

That got him pulled.

Love the guy, but it should no longer be his job.

His replacement, Amad Anderson, muffed another one a short time later than led to another Cincy six.

When you are a 29.5-point underdog, can’t make those plays.

Why doesn’t Cincy muff punts? Why didn’t Temple under Matt Rhule?

Those were not plays Ed Foley’s special teams made.

Foley’s teams routinely returned punts for touchdowns and blocked the bad guys’ kicks for touchdowns the other way.

Again, not the reason for a loss but certainly the reason that it wasn’t a 31-3 loss or even more cosmetic. Those 14 points in terms of the Owls’ confidence in winning were worth much more, say, 28 points.

Temple fans deserve to have a kind of team that locks down the “most easy” of the three phases of the game and Rod Carey in his capacity as CEO has failed to do that nor has he shown any interest in fixing it. Special teams are 1/3d of the game. Carey thinks they are 1/10th.

Hopefully, new AD Arthur Johnson was taking notes in Cincinnati on Friday night. If not, he will get an earful from Temple fans once the team plane lands in Philadelphia.

Monday: Listen and Learn

12.17.20
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Recruiting: All That Matters is Winning

What Bobby Wallace used to call “the fill-em” (or the film).

In a vacuum, what happened on the recruiting part of the 2021 Class first signing day would have to be listed as one of the best signing days in Temple football history.

Maybe the best.

Unfortunately, these days, the vacuum works both ways because what you are sucking in the door has to be weighed out for what is going out the other end of that Hoover wind tunnel. That was never part of the equation in the Golden Rhule Era.

Freddy Booth-Lloyd has expressed concerns felt by many current Temple fans.

In that sense, what in other years would be viewed as an unmitigated success is extremely mitigated by the departures of tackles Dan Archibong (NFL draft), Ifeanyi Meijeh and Vince Picozzi, linebacker Isaiah Graham-Mobley (other FBS teams) and starting quarterback Anthony Russo (Michigan State), among others.

These are mostly guys I’ve met, interacted with and liked very much at post-game tailgates in the past. They are good young men, character guys, not malcontents. More than that, though, from a pure bottom-line perspective, Temple is losing proven players who were developed over years in the system for (largely) unproven FBS level players–many of whom have some development left to do. For guys the character of Dan, Ifeanyi, Vince and IGM to leave indicates something smells inside the halls of Edberg-Olson and a vacuum cleaner isn’t going to remove the stench.

FBL=good man, fortunately did not major in English at Temple.

That’s going to affect the only bottom line I care about in 2021: Winning.

To me, Temple has to have a major rebound year for the school’s administration to even think about keeping Rod Carey after a 1-6 year with, say, 5-2 talent. Temple has come too far and the road has been too hard and bumpy to be satisfied with 6-6 seasons going forward. Two double-digit win seasons were followed by another winning season and two eight-win seasons before this year’s disaster. Blame COVID if you want but a standard had been set for this program and 2020 fell way below it, COVID or not.

FBL said one of his goals was to come back as a Temperor. If Temple had all 105 scholarship players with that kind of loyalty, it would win a chip every year.

The Owls got immediate starting help in edge rusher Will Rodgers and the quarterback from Georgia, D’Wan Mathis, but where are the immediate upgrades from Picozzi, IGM and the two interior defensive tackles? Hell, where are the guys who can replace those skill sets, let alone upgrades. I didn’t see them. Unless they magically arrive by February, the Owls will have trouble getting to .500 next season.

You can talk about how “happy I am” with the signing day and “I’m through the roof” but I, as a Temple fan, won’t be happy or through any roof until that 1-6 gets turned around to 8-4 or better and, sorry, nothing I saw on this signing day indicates those days are coming back fast enough.

Talk is cheap. Proving it is expensive. Now comes time for Rod Carey to put his money where his mouth is.

Picks This Weekend: 8-5 against the spread on the season and going with all underdogs to stay above water for the season. San Jose State getting 6.5 in the Mountain West championship against Boise State, Tulsa getting 14.5 for the AAC title at Cincy, and UAB (with hopefully future Temple AD Mark Ingram) getting the 5.5 in the CUSA title game at Marshall. (Would have had Louisiana Lafayette getting 3.5 in revenge match with Coastal for the Sun Belt title, but that game was canceled due to COVID in the CC program. Probably the first championship cancellation of all time. Very sad.)

Update: Went 3-0 against the spread with both SJS and UAB winning outright and Tulsa easily covering the 14.5 in a 27-24 loss. Now at 11-5 against the spread this season.