Amnesia is a terrible thing to have once, let alone twice in the same week.

Evidently, though, that is just what happened to Temple head football coach Matt Rhule after the glorious 20-10 win over East Carolina, fueled by this promise:

“Last week, we were a little bit shell-shocked on the plane coming home from the loss to Central Florida. As a staff, we made a decision … so, this week we wanted to get back to who and what Temple is: play good defense and special teams and run the football.”

Rhule remembered the good defense part. He forgot the run-the-football part and the special teams part.

Since Matt cannot control what a punter does or does not do, let’s just concentrate on what he can control—the run-the-football part.

Just to be sure I wasn’t seeing things, I got up early this morning to chart all of the Temple offensive plays. Temple ran 71 offensive plays and lined up in three wide receivers on 68 of those. Temple ran the ball 32 times and passed it 39 times. By any definition, that doesn’t jive with “play good defense and special teams and run the football.”

Kenny Harper scores

Against East Carolina, Temple ran 56 offensive plays, lined up in three wides 22 times and ran the ball on 37 of those offensive plays. Of the 37 running plays, Temple lined up with a fullback, Marc Tyson, 20 times. Both Temple offensive touchdowns were a result of a Marc Tyson block off a two-back formation. Tyson, like so many uniquely talented Temple players the last two seasons, joined federal witness protection last night.

You can blame the loss on the drops all you want, but that’s something the coaching staff cannot control. The coaching staff CAN control the commitment to the running game. Not only did the Owls coaching staff forget about it in game-planning this week, it forgot to stick to the running game after Kenny Harper ripped off a 75-yard touchdown run.

Amnesia twice in one week.

Before the game, we wrote this:

“If you decide to pray for anything, please pray that the Owls don’t fall back into their three-wides, no-blocking-back for P.J. Walker approach they had against Houston and UCF. In that scheme, Walker had no time–none–to throw and receivers could get zero separation. So happy to see the Owls get away from that last Saturday.”

Well, with the help of some selective amnesia, they got back to it Friday night and, not surprisingly, they lost. Hopefully, on the bus ride home from LFF, Matt Rhule remembers what he said on the plane ride home from UCF–and, this time, never forgets.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jq013xyXUyg

Another slick, short and sweet video by Temple Athletics pumping up the fans for Temple’s Friday Night Lights’ game and there’s plenty to like about it.

The audio part, though, could use a little work. Imagine Dragons?

You’ve got to be kidding me … Young Jeezy must have some more appropriate lyrics for Temple’s epic showdown with visiting Memphis on Friday night. After all, YJ pumped up the team with a pre-game talk that helped the Owls double up East Carolina, 20-10, last week. Jeez is more than an honorary Temple football fan. He’s a real one. A Jeez phone call might close the deal on a five-star someday. Let that thought marinate for a minute. I prefer Mumford and Sons and the Foo Fighters, but I’m not a five-star so I yield to Jeez. Chances are Jeez’s playlist is on most five-star’s headphones.

Looks like Matt Ioannidis has his game-face on, but Tavon Young and Kenny Harper were politely asking for the students to get on the 4:30 buses that leave the main campus for the “free tailgate.” Having been a Temple student once, I was so broke I knew the word “free” back then evoked a Pavlovian response, like “I’m there.” If some on the main campus cannot make the 4:30 buses, there’s a dedicated subway line right in front of the Liacouras Center that takes all of 10 minutes to get to the game.

Time for the alumni to put away the remote, get off the couch, put on a coat, get in a car, bus or train to the Linc and wear out the vocal chords. I will be there. Will you?

For all of the bitching and moaning of not having an on-campus stadium, it’s hard to imagine a following without an on-campus stadium having easier transportation options than Temple fans have. Heck, Uconn has its own stadium but it’s 27 miles from the main campus.

More importantly, there’s an epic game to be played and how can a student or alumnus miss it? National TV, winner-take-all for a bowl game and the winner gets a bowl, loser gets to bite their fingernails for one or two more weeks or maybe even the rest of the season.

If those stakes don’t cause the fans to stay standing in their seats and yell “Let’s Go Temple” and “DEE-fense, DEE-fense” (both while the Owls are on defense, of course), nothing will. Make no mistake about it. This will be a tough game. Memphis went toe-to-toe with UCLA and destroyed a good Cincinnati team. For Temple, a win here could be just the momentum-generator the Owls need to make a program-changing win over Penn State next week.

There are 12,500 students who live on campus now and 27,000 additional full-time students who commute home. There are 291,000 living alumni, about 180,000 of them live within an hour’s drive of the stadium. There are 6,000 full-time Temple employees. Even if you get half of the 12.5K and 6K and one-quarter of the 180,000, you have pretty close to a full stadium.

A lot of yelling and cheering for these guys could not hurt and no doubt would help. You can just tell by looking at their faces they would appreciate it. They deserve your support and, for the students especially, it costs nothing more than putting one foot in front of the other and walking two more feet to a bus or a subway. They are, after all, representing you and the Linc is our “Hood.”