Tag Archives: life

08.27.26
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Temple football: Sometimes less is more

One of the best interviews with K.C. Keeler I’ve ever seen

Nobody is perfect.

Not even a perfect head coach.

For me, K.C. Keeler is the perfect head coach for my team because my team is Temple and Keeler is from Philadelphia (Emmaus is close enough), was recruited by Temple and didn’t go to Temple only because Hall of Fame coach Wayne Hardin ran out of scholarships and found his way back to Temple when Temple needed him the most.

Yet nobody is perfect, even my perfect head coach.

Would love to see more jet sweeps for JoJo and fewer for Chase this season. No more 3-yard handoffs on the first play of the game to the best running back.

The Navy debacle is well-documented here and I would have wound down the clock down and kicked the field goal with three seconds to win the game, 27-24. That’s not second-guessing. That’s exactly what I told Navy fans I would have done in real time in the same place and at the same time the game was played. They agreed with me that Navy was fucked if Temple did what I told them Temple should do.

In real time.

Keeler got greedy and took the touchdown and trusted his defense against the best player in the league (Blake Horvath). The best player in the league won.

Not the only concerning sign I saw last year so less of those is what I want to see this year.

What did I see last year?

Too many first-play handoffs to Jay Ducker or jet sweeps to Colin Chase.

Don’t get me wrong.

I love Ducker and Chase.

Couple of things wrong with those plays.

One, after three or four games, handing the ball off to Ducker is telegraphing the play to the next team. Two, Chase doesn’t have the speed or the twitch to take the first play to the house. Sam Brown is the “Ducker” of this year. If you are scouting Temple tendencies, you will expect a handoff to Brown on the first series.

That’s not the best game plan, nor is the handoff to the slowest receiver on the field. There is a faster receiver with more twitch who Keeler called the “best punt returner in the nation.”

Know who that guy is?

JoJo Bermudez.

Why Bermudez didn’t get those toss sweeps last year and Chase did is something I will never understand.

First play of the Rhode Island game shouldn’t be the expected handoff to Brown nor a jet sweep to Chase.

If anything was learned from last year, it should be a jet sweep to your best and fastest player, Bermudez. Or maybe you want to save that play for Penn State.

If so, doing less is more.

I’ll leave the perfect decision for my perfect head coach.

Monday: Game Week

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

08.16.26
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The opener will be on us before we know it

Saboor Karriem goes for the tackle against Eagles’ No. 1 pick Makai Lemon. Both will be calling the same stadium home.
Hey, guess who follows Temple Football Forever? The father of Penn State starting quarterback, Rocco Becht. Anthony Becht was a great tight end at Monsignor Bonner and the New York Jets. Thanks for the follow.

One of the things about getting older is having pains in places where you’ve never had them before.

Because I had a pain in my leg I couldn’t identify other than it being nerve-related, I mentioned that to my physician and he referred me to a neurologist. That was way back in April.

Made the appointment the next day and the “earliest” he could see me was Aug. 13.

“Geez, that seems like years away,” I told the person who answered the phone.

“That’s the earliest we have.”

That’s the U.S. Healthcare system in a nutshell.

Long story short, that time between April and August lasted what seemed like five minutes simply because the late spring and summer is my favorite time of the year.

So it goes with Temple’s football opener against visiting Rhode Island on Sept. 5.

If the time between April and August seemed like five minutes, the time between now and kickoff will be like a minute.

Or shorter.

Nobody knows that better than Temple head football coach K.C. Keeler, whose Owls conducted their first preseason scrimmage on Saturday.

One of the strongest areas of the team is the safeties and defensive coordinator Brian L. Smith calls it the deepest part of the defense.

Among the starters is expected to be Illinois transfer Saboor Karriem, who comes to Philadelphia with CVS type receipts. He started and had the most tackles in a 34-32 Big 10 win over USC last year, notching seven solo tackles and three assists. While there are concerns about the bright lights in big games at both the quarterback and cornerback positions at Temple, there are no such concerns about the safeties and linebackers, who played well for the Owls and other teams last year.

Recently, Karriem was “mic’d” up by the Temple video staff and his best quote was, “I miss my brothers, but I have 115 (other) brothers (here).”

Because of the uncertainty at quarterback, it looks like the Owls will have to lean on the defense for most of their success this year.

Fortunately. the defense is showing signs of being up to the task in summer ball so far but the proof will come on Sept. 5.

“Rhode Island Sept. 5 at 2 p.m., that’s it,” Karriem said.

It might seem a long way off now but it’ll be upon us in a minute. That’s the way these things work, both in life and in football.

07.05.26
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Temple’s Mount Rushmore of Coaches

There’s been a lot of talk about Mount Rushmore lately and, while not getting into the context of that discussion, that got me to thinking about Temple’s Mount Rushmore.

Coaches, specifically.

On my Facebook memory feed, I came across a preview of the 1977 College World Series (baseball, of course) that listed Temple as one of the two favorites.

Matt McArdle, a former Temple football safety for the 1979 Garden State Bowl team, responded by saying his brother (John) was the third baseman of that team and we both said that Skip Wilson was responsible for Temple being the most dominant baseball team in the “traditional” East for much of the 1970s.

“Definitely on Temple’s Coaching Mount Rushmore, for sure,” I responded.

With only four spots on that mountain, that caused me to think who would take the other three positions on that mountain.

I came to three men: John Chaney, Pop Warner and Wayne Hardin.

Bruce Arians deserves an honorable mention for both his loyalty and two winning seasons against Top 10 schedules.

Then I asked Chat GPT to make an image of that mountain and, while Chat GPT can do a lot of impressive things, it can’t draw. It had Wilson and Hardin looking like twins and Chaney really not looking like himself.

Warner came closest, probably because of the Stetson hat he wore in the 1930s.

The post got a lot more engagement than I thought it would have with hoop guru Mike Jensen saying I should replace Warner with Harry Litwack. My thought was that if there was a fifth spot on the mountain, he’d definitely be it but the Sugar Bowl appearance gave Warner the nod.

Then I got a lot of people saying Olympic sports coaches like Fred Turoff (gymnastics) and women’s coaches like Tina Sloan Green, Dawn Staley and Nikki Franke belong there.

That’s all well and good but this is a football blog and not a Temple sports blog and we gave both Wilson and Chaney exemptions due to Wilson’s 1,000 wins and Chaney having the most Elite 8 appearances until Michigan State’s coach broke that record.

Let someone start a Temple women’s sports blog–I have neither the expertise nor interest in doing so–and get their own mountain to play with.

As far as football, at least three guys deserve honorable mention–Al Golden, Matt Rhule and Bruce Arians–but didn’t make the final cut for a number of reasons. While Arians showed the requisite loyalty (he turned down an offer to be head coach at Virginia Tech to remain at Temple), he didn’t have enough wins. (Yet his two winning seasons against top 10 schedules was about as impressive as anything a Temple coach has done.) Golden, while deserving credit for bringing Temple football back from the dead, interviewed for the UCLA job after his second season and Rhule, despite two 10-win seasons, didn’t stay for the bowl game that would have set the Temple record.

Longevity has its virtue and that virtue is etched in stone.

Even if it’s only chiseled by Chat GPT and not Gutzon Borglum.

05.22.26
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The best $20 you will ever spend

As a big fan of the local Philadelphia comedian Joe Conklin, saw that he was appearing at one of my favorite venues, the Keswick Theater, on a rare night I had off in my “real job” and then clicked on the price.

That was $118 for a single seat.

Yikes.

Love Joe, but that was a little bit above my pay grade.

(Decided to rent a $5.99 movie that night instead.)

Then saw Joe was appearing at Parx Casino on the penultimate night of my birthday (June 18 as June 19 is the day I came into the world) at Parx Casino for $35. Clicked on that and got tickets.

Same show. Saved almost $100.

Pretty good bargain if you like to laugh and hear Philadelphia sports personality impressions as much as I do.

I’m pretty sure this is June 1 but might want to confirm when you get tickets.

If you are a Temple football fan, a better bargain becomes before that night.

K.C. Keeler, Wissahickon Brewing Company, June 1, for a measly $20.

Make plans to attend now if you are able to fit it into your schedule.

Unfortunately, I won’t be able to do so because that’s a Monday night and my “real job” requires me to be in the office doing editing for a myriad of weekly papers that will appear on Wednesdays throughout the Philadelphia area.

Who knows how long that will last so that’s why we ask those of you who appreciate this site to donate $5, 10, 50 or 100 from time to time.

So this is pretty much for those who work traditional 9-5 jobs.

K.C. Keeler isn’t as funny as Joe Conklin, but he is pretty funny and provides more insight on Temple football than just about anyone else.

If I didn’t have to work that night to put food on the table, I would definitely be there and ask him at least one of the next five questions:

Sekou Kromah was good enough to take to media day. Will Keeler take another pass rusher to the same event in August?

One, I know he was going for an experienced quarterback to replace Evan Simon, but what qualities did he see in inexperienced guys like Jaxon Smolik and Ajani Sheppard that would give him the confidence to make them the starter?

Two, I know what Hunter Smith and Keveon Mason can do as running backs, but is there another guy (along with Rutgers transfer Sam Brown) who can emerge from that deep room and surprise everyone?

Three, we had a damn good pass rush when Khalil Poteat, Sultan Badmus and Sekou Kromah were healthy–which was exactly one game, the UTSA win–so what do you see in the transfer portal replacements that make that pass rush better?

It took 15 years but we finally got to our 150th country today, May, 22, 2026

Four, one-point losses to Army and Navy robbed the Owls of 7-5 and a sure bowl appearance and, what, if anything, will you do different in preparing for both triple options this year?

Five, what, if anything, did you learn from the Owls telling the Birmingham Bowl that you had to think for an hour or two about the invitation and what, if anything, would the university do differently given the same call next season?

Thanks, K.C., and I wish I was there, but Joe Conklin is appearing on my night off and you are not. I will see you at the season ticket holder party in August.

Monday: Get Ready for An Attitude

10.18.25
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Temple: Killing two monkeys with one rock

Took a philosophy course because I needed an easy elective due to pulling 60 hours a week putting out The Temple News back in the day.

(It was a daily then.)

Had a bearded professor who smoked a pipe in class and described a situation where two problems were solved at the same time.

I raised my sleep-deprived hand.

“You mean, like killing two birds with one stone?”

Chalk up another win to the Cherry helmets, which looked particularly good with the White uniforms today. Let’s keep the best helmets in college football going forward.

The guy with the beard took a puff of the pipe, stroked his beard, waited about 10 seconds, and said:

“What an unfortunate way of putting it, Mr. Gibson, but I guess you are right.”

It’s one thing killing birds with stones and it’s another thing to take out a couple of monkeys with a rock and that’s exactly what Temple’s football team did today.

Two monkeys off the Temple football back. One, the first road win since 2019 and, two, the first time the Owls have won more than three games since the season prior to that one.

All because of a 49-14 rout at Charlotte. (Should have been 56-14 because the Owls fell on a scoop that could have easily been a score, but we’ll let that slide.)

Kyle Pagan of Crossing Broad bet 2x as much as I did way back in July. God bless him and everyone who had confidence in this team.

Important milestones if you put your money where your mouth was back in July, like I did. Way back on May 28, I picked the Owls to win six games and get to a bowl.

When challenged by a poster on OwlsDaily.com about that way back in July, I put my money where my mouth was and bet the over 3.5 wins.

My response to his post was this: “If I had $100,000, I would have bet that but since I only bet what I can afford to lose, I put $50 on the Owls.”

I’m $57 richer today.

Would have been $100K richer if I had the money to bet back then.

My reasoning then was simple: One, the Owls upgraded not only at the head coaching level, but also at the key coordinator positions.

In 2025, I reasoned, the Owls would pick up one or two more wins because they wouldn’t have the plethora of pre-snap penalties they had in the three years under Stan Drayton and the three years before that under Rod Carey.

Building on that reasoning was the way K.C. Keeler approached his important role as CEO of the program, which meant plugging some roster holes with key pieces.

Add those two things and it was easy to come to the conclusion that Temple could make the jump from three to six.

Keeler, in my mind, already has proven himself to be the best head coach we’ve had here since Wayne Hardin. Ironically, that was the guy who told him that we didn’t have enough scholarships for him back in the late 1970s and then turned the conversation to golf.

Keeler didn’t want to talk golf but headed to Delaware.

Now he’s back where he should have been in the first place. In my opinion, he’s the best coach at Temple since Hardin because he’s had to do it with a transfer portal and NIL that Al Golden, Matt Rhule, Bruce Arians and even Hardin didn’t have to deal with. Arians deserves a lot of credit because he had two winning seasons against Top 10 schedules but he got to keep all his players then.

Temple ran into trouble after Golden and Rhule and Keeler has righted that ship.

Killing two monkeys with one stone is impressive enough.

If somehow he is able to run the table with this team and this schedule, a big Gorilla is in sight and that might be an American Conference championship game.

Let’s get greedy.

Monday: Tulsa Week