Tag Archives: ncaa-football

10.25.25
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Learning lessons in a win goes down easier

A couple of weeks ago, the Temple football Owls learned a hard lesson in a bitter loss.

Today, they learned the same kind of lesson in a win, a remarkable 38-37 overtime one at Tulsa that has to rank with one of the top college football games in Week 9.

Give me the second option any day of the week.

Put both lessons up on a blackboard, add one plus two and come up some basic arithmetic that could result in the Owls controlling their own destiny–as much as they can–to get to the American Conference title game.

First, the old news. Temple head coach K.C. Keeler probably learned that taking three knees with a first-and-goal at the 1-inch line and then kicking a field goal with either no (or very little time) on the clock for the bad guys was the preferable option to scoring too soon and giving Navy time to do damage.

Water under the dam and a damn hard way to lose a game.

Today, he learned that trying to reward a guy with a touchdown after a long run is definitely not preferable to giving it to your Mr. Inside (Jay Ducker) after your Mr. Outside (Hunter Smith) put you in a similar spot at the 1-yard line.

That’s why Ducker is Mr. Inside and Smith is Mr. Outside. They both have specific roles on this team and the play-calling took both out of their roles.

Ducker is the inside run specialist but it looked like Temple OC Tyler Walker was trying to “reward” Smith for his effort with a touchdown and Ducker never got back in the game on that series. One, Smith had to be gassed after that long run yet he got the next carry. Two, Ducker is the better runner between tackles.

To me, that was the key to the game being a 31-14 Temple win and a 38-37 Temple win (or worse) because Tulsa made that a 14-point swing. Stopping the “sure” seven of Temple and scoring seven on its own on the next series.

Afterward, Keeler said he was “doing other things” and that Walker was responsible for those four ill-fated calls. That would have made it 21-7, Temple. Instead, the Hurricane used that goal-line stand as momentum to go up, 17-14.

Can’t do that going forward against anyone and, hopefully, this hard lesson was learned.

When the Owls wear Cherry helmets, they usually don’t lose.

Fortunately, the Owls survived because my favorite Temple quarterback (now officially of all time, supplanting Adam DiMichele, sorry Adam), Evan Simon, threw five touchdown passes and, once again, no interceptions.

For those counting, that’s 21 touchdown passes against zero (that’s right, zero) interceptions for the season. Simon is only two touchdowns from tying E.J. Warner’s record for touchdown passes at Temple (23) and is almost a sure bet to eclipse it. Look who is on that list. One, is the son of a Super Bowl winning QB (Warner) and Brian Broomell (who had 22 TD passes) is QB of a Temple team that finished No. 17 in the nation in 1979 and beat two other bowl teams, West Virginia and Syracuse. Another (Steve Joachim, 20 TDs in 1974) only won the Maxwell Award as the best college football player in the nation, beating Heisman winner Archie Griffin.

Now back to Simon, who is going in the books as better than all of them.

This was the sequence that turned a potential blowout for Temple into an overtime game. I get that you are trying to reward a guy who had a 72-yard run with a touchdown but, if after the first play, he doesn’t score, give it to your inside run specialist.

That won’t be the first time he’s ever beaten Warner because, in 2022, Simon was the winning quarterback in a 16-14 Rutgers’ win at Temple. The key play was when Temple’s tiny quarterback tried to throw over a lineman who tipped it and took it the other way for 6.

The hard lesson that day for Temple was if you are a vertically challenged quarterback, don’t throw when a big guy is coming at you with outstretched arms.

The hard lessons the last two times for K.C. Keeler and his staff include a smarter approach when you get to the bad guy’s 1-yard line.

How they apply those lessons will go a long way in determining whether the Owls reach “just” a bowl or something much sweeter.

Much, much sweeter.

Monday: The scenarios

10.24.25
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Keeler has a chance to challenge Hardin’s start

Probably the best look behind the scenes at Wayne Hardin and Temple Stadium that I’ve ever seen.

Only one new Temple coach started his career with the Philadelphia school winning roughly twice as many games as he lost.

That was the great Wayne Hardin, a College Football Hall of Famer who continued his great career here in 1970 and finished 18-9-1 over his first three years at Temple.

Nobody else started at Temple so successfully.

Tomorrow’s high at Tulsa is 59 but there is plenty of wet weather in the forecast.

Not Bruce Arians. Not Al Golden. Not Matt Rhule.

To me, and pretty much everyone else, K.C. Keeler is a sure-fire bet to join Hardin in the College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta for what he’s done before he got here.

That was the way with Hardin, too, who had Navy as the No. 2 team in the nation in 1962.

Yet what Hardin did at Temple might have been more impressive.

Same with Keeler at Temple because his best may be yet to come.

Top teams in the country in turnover margin.

Keeler got his 275th career win on Saturday, 49-14, at Charlotte.

In his first season, the Owls are 4-3 with a shot to finish 9-3. Amazing in the sense that they were 3-9 for the last four years and 1-6 the year before that.

Even more amazing that they were only a missed false start away from being unbeaten in the American Conference and having their championship destiny in their own hands.

Now they are going to need help to knock Navy out of a tie-breaker situation.

It all starts on Saturday (3:30 p.m., ESPN+) at Tulsa. Temple has no chance in that game if it is thinking about 9-3 or even looking at the scoreboard.

K.C. Keeler tells the story about being recruited by Wayne Hardin in the late 1970s.

It does have a chance if it does all the “Hardin-like” things Keeler has been preaching all season. One, don’t look at the scoreboard. Two, concentrate on the next play. Three, “do your job” on the next play and not go outside that job by “trying to make a play.”

These things have been what Keeler has been preaching all year and, for the most part, the Owls have answered his prayers.

Saturday at Tulsa will provide a challenge because the Owls will have to overcome some weather issues. There is a good chance of rain, a high temperature of 59 degrees, and even some thunderstorms in the area. That’s advantage Temple because the Owls No. 4 in the country in turnover margin and Tulsa is No. 109. On a rainy day, that ball is slippery and the team who values it most has the advantage.

You can add 4 wins to that total.

The Owls have experience in that area as the home game against Howard was delayed by a half hour by thunderstorms in Philadelphia and the game at Georgia Tech was also delayed by the same thing. The Owls remained focused at home, not so focused on the road, but the lessons learned in Atlanta should be applied in Tulsa.

One game at a time. One play at a time.

Seven years after the above video was made, Hardin had Keeler in his office on a recruiting visit. The Owls ran out of scholarships that day, but Keeler is where he belongs now.

Beating Tulsa tomorrow opens another door. There are four more doors to bust down after that.

A 9-3 start is implausible but not impossible. Wayne Hardin showed the way in 1972.

K.C. Keeler is doing the same almost 60 years later. The fact that the two were in the same room once talking about coming to Temple is a pretty neat thing indeed.

Late Saturday Night: Tulsa Game Analysis

10.20.25
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Tulsa Week: Some solid evidence out there

The guys from The College Football Experience discuss Temple once again.

A year ago, the Temple football program was in turmoil with talk of a leadership change and still was able to beat visiting Tulsa.

By double digits, 20-10.

Each season is a new deal, especially in the era of the transfer portal and NIL and both teams hired new head coaches.

Temple hired K.C. Keeler, a legend, who won his 275th career game on Saturday. Tulsa went the younger route, hiring Tre Lamb, who was head coach at East Tennessee State.

Pretty sure we all know who made the better hire and it wasn’t just because Keeler recognizes that the Owls play and look a lot sharper when they wear the Cherry helmets.

Temple is now 4-3 (really should be 5-2), while Tulsa is 2-5. One of those wins was against Oklahoma State. The other was against Abilene Christian.

Both teams played Navy which is a point of comparison.

Navy went to Tulsa and won, 42-23, while it was lucky (and got some help from the refs) in surviving at Temple, 32-31.

That doesn’t mean Temple is going to win by 20 or so on Saturday (3:30 p.m., ESPN+) but if the Owls dot their I’s and cross their T’s, they should be able to come home with a two-game winning streak.

One, they have a staff that was able draw X’s and O’s well enough to play a competitive game against Navy. Two, Tulsa doesn’t.

Also, unlike that Navy game, the Owls are going to have to be focused in an environment that could put them to sleep.

Now that staff will have to turn its film study to a Tulsa team that likes to throw the ball deep and the fact that the Owls faced a lot of that on Saturday in a 49-14 win at Charlotte should help them adjust. What they have to do is play the ball and not the man because the few times the 49ers were able to move the ball, they were helped by face-guarding penalties against the Owls.

Another good Tuesday practice should help clean up those kinds of mistakes and help the Owls take another step forward.

Wearing the Cherry helmets with the White uniforms again wouldn’t hurt, either.

Friday: Tulsa Preview

10.03.25
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Temple-UTSA: Some educated guesses

Only a couple of things are certain around 1 p.m. or so at the Sports Complex in Philadelphia on Saturday.

The Philadelphia Flyers will be playing indoors next door and the Temple Owls will be hosting UTSA outdoors at Lincoln Financial Field on a jammed packed day of Philly sports. My guess is 17,000 plus fans in both places. Between 1-4 while things are being settled in those two places, about 45,000 Phillies fans will arrive on the scene for some pre-game tailgating.

They will probably find Lot K closed and all Temple parking. Those fans can make a difference by making noise and standing on third down when the Owls are on defense.

If anyone tells you they know what the outcome of the football game will be, they are lying. The ball is a funny shape and takes odd bounces and this one figures to be close. If those balls bounce Temple’s way and the fans can make a difference, everybody leaves happy.

In between, there are some educated guesses on both sides.

It’s amazing to me that two separate betting sites have this game at a projected 28-27 Temple score and the line has remained with USTA a 6.5-point favorite. Both Gary Segars of Winning Cures All and the guys at The College Football Experience (including Colby Dant and Ryan McIntyre) like Temple.

TCFE has gone as far as to lock things up for Temple.

Bud Elliott of CBS Sports “The Cover Three” Podcast picked Temple OUTRIGHT on the Moneyline.

This can go either way but this win is right out there on the table for Temple to taste and so the Owls must do what they have to do to put a fork in it.

This is just the kind of game first-year Temple head coach K.C. Keeler has preached about for the last nine months. Almost every day Keeler said the conference games are going to be a “50/50” ball and the team that plays the cleaner game will come out on top.

Should be a beautiful day for a good chunk of the 250,000 Temple alumni living within an hour of LFF to make the trip to support the Owls.

So far, Temple has played pretty clean. It is one of only three FBS teams with no turnovers through four and there are 129 other FBS teams.

Now it’s time to move on to the next thing as former Temple head coach John Chaney famously said:

“Take care of the known and don’t worry about the unknown.”

So far, the “known” about UTSA is that it can run the ball with Robert Harvey, Jr. (is there a Robert Harvey Sr. of any note?), who is the leading rusher in the country.

So Temple needs to stop that known and do its best against the unknown.

That element is in good hands with Temple DC Brian L. Smith, who has had major success against UTSA. Last year, Smith held UTSA to 13 points through three quarters in a Rice win. Contrast that to former Temple DC Everett Withers “holding” UTSA to 51 points in that same season. To me, that’s the biggest improvement of the K.C. Keeler hire: Bringing in a DC with a history of success versus the handicap that Temple had the last two years, a DC (Withers) with a history of failure just because he was a friend of the head coach at the time. In 2021, Withers gave up nearly 40 ppg as DC at FIU. In 2023-24, Withers came pretty darn close to that at Temple (38.7 ppg).

Smith has revamped the scheme and put personnel in positions to win.

The other known is that UTSA is terrible against the pass and Temple quarterback Evan Simon is pretty good for the pass and the Owls must exploit that secondary.

Temple must also continue to run the ball well with the 2021 MAC leading rusher (Jay Ducker) and the 2023 leading Sun Belt rusher (Hunter Smith) controlling the game and the clock, all the while keeping Harvey and company off the field.

That’s the way we think things will go down. Because we don’t know for sure is the reason why we will show up and support and will be standing and making noise on third down.

All other Owl fans should do the same.

Very Late Saturday Night (pushing 11 p.m.): Game Analysis

Monday: What We Don’t Care About

Friday: Navy Preview

09.28.25
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Game Week: How good is UTSA?

UTSA has had an up-and-down season but hasn’t faced the quality of competition Temple has.

In between worrying about getting a parking pass and navigating traffic on Saturday, the next-in-line question for Temple fans should be this:

How good is UTSA?

Evan Simon cuts last year’s game down to one score with this bomb to Dante Wright. With Jay Ducker and Hunter Smith being able to establish a running game, Temple should be in this thing until the end. If the players take care of things one play and a time and not watch the scoreboard, Temple could win handily.

For fans, not players nor coaches because it would behoove the Owls to practice and prepare for the Roadrunners like they are as good as Georgia Tech or Oklahoma.

Spoiler alert (players, please turn away): They are not.

Even though Vegas has the Roadrunners as a 6.5-point favorite, I fully expect that to be bet down to 4.5 Wednesday and maybe a field goal by kickoff.

Let’s examine what they’ve done so far:

They got blown out by Texas A&M, 42-24. The Aggies are a good team, maybe as good as Oklahoma and slightly better than Georgia Tech.

However, UTSA’s last game–a 17-16 win at Colorado State–might provide more clues. Off that result, you can pretty much say the Roadrunners are on a par with the Rams and the Rams are really not good. Colorado State got blown out by Washington (38-21) and barely beat Northern Colorado–Northern Freaking Colorado–and that score was 21-17. They also lost to possibly the worst P4 team alive, Washington State, 20-3. Northern Colorado barely beat Houston Baptist and lost to Indiana State, two teams I think most college football experts would agree are far worse than anyone Temple’s played, including Howard and UMass.

So however good UTSA looked against Texas A&M and that wasn’t much, that was canceled out by how bad it looked at Colorado State.

If UTSA lets a team like that hang around with it, that bodes well for Temple. Temple has to sell out to stop the run because Robert Henry Jr. is the leading rusher in the country, but TU DC Brian L. Smith understands that a lot better than we do so we think that will be part of the gameplan. He understands a lot about UTSA and has beaten them before at Rice, something UTSA head coach Jeff Traylor acknowledged this week.

“I know the defensive coordinator is from Rice, who’s given us a pain in the rear end for the past five years.”

On the other side of the ball, it should be interesting to see how Temple’s new Mr. Outside (Hunter Smith) combines with Temple’s Mr. Inside (Jay Ducker) to both control the clock and set up deep play-action passes for Evan Simon. With the departure of Terrez Worthy over the weekend, Ducker is now No. 1 on the depth chart and Hunter Smith is No. 2. That means Temple has the 2021 leading rusher in the MAC and the 2023 leading rusher in the Sun Belt topping a deep running back room that also includes Joquez Smith.

This is not Oklahoma coming to town (1 p.m., ESPN+) on Saturday. It’s not even Georgia Tech.

Temple has been sharpened by that iron and, other than one Texas A&M game, the Roadrunners have been sharpened by, let’s say, plastic.

What Temple learned in its Georgia Tech game was that, after spotting the Yellowjackets a 21-0 lead, the Owls played even with that team the rest of the way.

If the Owls have learned their lesson and applied it in the bye week, this is win No. 3 for Temple.

If not, it’s another disappointing loss.

Stan Drayton might let that happen. I’m guessing K.C. Keeler won’t.

Friday: UTSA Preview

09.22.25
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5 Things We’ve Noticed After Game 4

If the Owls use their heads to clean up things like penalties and use Kajiya Hollawayne’s throwing arm on a couple of surprise throwback passes, the sky’s the limit.

After four weeks of the 2025 Temple season, we are back to where we were this time last month.

At Square One.

Pretty much everyone expected Temple to win the first two and lose the next two. It’s now an eight-game season with a mini-Fall Camp in the form of a Bye Week.

Here are some things we’ve noticed:

A real possibility: 6-2 Turning into 8-4

With no Memphis on the schedule this year and Georgia Tech and Oklahoma in the rear-view mirror, there is nobody Temple can’t beat in the final eight games. There is also nobody Temple can’t lose to and head coach K.C. Keeler predicted as much before the season when he said the American Conference games were going to be so close that Temple needed to play clean. They’ve done so in terms of turnovers. They have not in terms of penalties. Half of that problem is theirs. The other half is the refs. They have to fix what they can, and the former problem needs to be addressed. No grabbing the facemask. No jumping 5 yards offsides on a blitz. It shouldn’t be that complicated to watch the ball before coming off it. Temple is not going to win all eight remaining games but 6-2 is a strong possibility and winning both the turnover and penalty battle will be the determining factors.

Hunter Smith was the Sun Belt’s leading rusher in the 2023 season. He is averaging 7 yards a carry for Temple in limited action so far.

Hunter Smith is intriguing

While Temple has a nice Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside combination in Jay Ducker and Terrez Worthy, Hunter Smith is a talent worth exploring. Smith is a Mr. Inside with speed and can be a home run hitter. He probably needs more touches.

The Run Defense Needs Some Attention

Even against UMass, opposing running games were gashing the Temple defense. The Georgia Tech game–where the Yellowjackets rushed for 279 yards–was a real eye-opener. Others have noticed and, with nation’s leading rusher Robert Henry Jr. coming to town in two weeks, selling out to stop the run might not be a bad idea for new DC Brian L. Smith.

The GT-Temple TV ratings aren’t in yet, but Temple-Oklahoma was the highest-rated TV game involving a G5 school through the third week.

A Good Temple team is good for the conference

For the second year in a row, a Temple game was the highest-rated TV game involving a G5 team against a P4 in the first four weeks of the season. Last year, it was the game at Oklahoma. This year, it was Oklahoma at Temple. It’s not all eyeballs on Oklahoma because Temple is located in the nation’s fourth-largest TV market and the only Top 10 TV market without a P4 team. A winning competitive Temple team attracts eyeballs to the conference and the sooner that happens, the better.

A Few Trick Plays Couldn’t Hurt

Good coaches like K.C. Keeler utilize the unique talents of their players. The Owls have a wide receiver who was a highly rated quarterback coming out of high school and signed with UCLA as a quarterback. We assume Kajiya Hollawayne can still throw the ball. Would it kill anyone if the Owls tried a throwback pass to him once to draw the defense his way and have him throw the ball downfield to the elusive JoJo Bermudez?

It’s worth a try. Nothing ventured nothing gained and there is plenty to be gained in the next eight games.

Friday: How the Conference Shapes Up

09.18.25
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GT-Temple: Only one more chance to meet the moment

Another scoop and score for the Owls against Georgia Tech would be nice, maybe two.

From a conference standpoint, there are plenty of chances for Temple to meet the moment this year.

From a reality standpoint, there is only one and that one is Saturday (4:30 p.m., The CW Network) at Georgia Tech.

Why?

Let’s finally see that throwback pass to Kajiya Hollawayne, who hits JoJo Bermudez for six. That would qualify as a Trojan Horse.

Simply because even if Temple is only able to do something that is a 7.5 percent possibility (according to ESPN) and win the American Conference championship, there will always be a “yeah, but. …” aspect to it.

“Yeah, but they were blown out by the only two big-time teams on their schedule, Oklahoma and Georgia Tech.”

I will take that “yeah but” knowing that still the storyline of what could be a remarkable season includes the chapter which will be written Saturday.

Here’s what it could be:

“Amazing season for Temple. It not only won the American Conference championship it beat Georgia Tech, which went on to win the ACC.”

Scratched my head all week wondering how that could happen and came up with the Troy theory.

In my mind, Temple is a better team–maybe MUCH better–than Troy, which went into Clemson and took a 16-0 lead before falling, 27-16. GT had to have a Herculean Effort to beat Clemson, 27-24.

There are a lot of fans out there who think Georgia Tech is closer to Oklahoma in roster talent than it is to Troy yet there is a lot of evidence to the contrary.

We will see come around 8 p.m. or so Saturday.

The “wise guys” in Vegas say this will be a 24 or 25-point game which projects to a probable score of 34-10 or 35-10.

Hmm.

Temple is the only game in the country in the 4:30-7:30 TV window. Click over for better view.

Not if GT is closer in ability to Troy than it is to Oklahoma.

Maybe Temple is GT’s “Trojan Horse” which was a legendary tale of subterfuge that marked the end of the Trojan War. After a prolong siege of 10 years, the Greeks devised a clever plan to gain entry into the heavily fortified city of Troy. They constructed a large wooden horse, hiding a select group of soldiers inside and left it at the gate as a supposed offering of peace. The Greeks pretended to sail away and the Trojans brought the gift horse into the city. While they slept, the soldiers inside the horse opened the gates for the rest of the Greek Army and a surprise upset occurred.

That’s where the Troy-Temple comparison comes into play.

I will admit my theory about Temple being better than Troy is out there but so was the Trojan Horse a dozen or so centuries BC.

Maybe that’s a sign that new OC Tyler Walker should try a few trick plays because going at Oklahoma conventionally did not work.

This is Temple’s one chance to meet the moment from a national perspective. The season can still be good with a loss, but this moment is out there to be had so why not seize it?

Late Saturday Night: Game Analysis

09.14.25
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Keeler: Owls didn’t meet the moment

This Cherry helmet is the best in college football. Let’s stick with that going forward.

In the grand scheme of things, this is about the 147th-most important thing that happened on Saturday but seeing Temple football come out in those God-awful-looking white helmets certainly didn’t meet the moment.

Not when you have the best helmet in college football sitting back home in the equipment room at 10th and Diamond.

Georgia Tech’s stadium with Atlanta as the backdrop is one of the best homefield advantages in the country.

When you look sharp, you play sharp and the Owls certainly didn’t look sharp.

Then the game started and it wasn’t long before first-year Temple head coach K.C. Keeler made the most perspicacious statement of the day.

Doing a first-quarter interview on ESPN2, Keeler said: “I thought we didn’t meet the moment.”

This time, he wasn’t talking about the equipment room.

There were plenty of moments the Owls didn’t meet but a few of them came on defense early when they hit Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer early and didn’t bring him down. Other times they touched him and he spun away.

A decent crowd on Saturday at the Linc would have looked way more impressive if Temple had an on-campus stadium like GT has.

A lot of that is traced to Mateer’s talent but when the Owls were touching quarterbacks–good quarterbacks with FBS starts under their belts in the first two games–they were bringing them down.

That was meeting the moment. Albeit the moment became bigger against better players on Saturday getting to Mateer and not putting him down didn’t meet the moment. He’s human. If hit hard enough, he goes down, too.

The Owls had a minus-6 deficit in the turnover battle in last year’s game and lost, 51-3. They stopped Oklahoma on third downs 13 of 14 times in that game and still lost by 48.

The Owls cleaned things up this year to have no turnovers and still lost by almost the same margin. That does not compute except that they didn’t do as good a job getting off the field defensively as last year’s team.

The formula to win wasn’t there against Oklahoma but the formula to stay in the game certainly was and the Owls didn’t have the right mix. Limit turnovers. Check. Repeat last year’s performance on third down. Not check.

Throw some trick plays in there to keep Oklahoma off-balance.

Definitely not check. Would have loved to seen Evan Simon toss a throwback pass to Hollawayne and have the former UCLA QB hit JoJo Bermudez for six on that first series. That would have fired everyone up. Instead, a couple of boring handoffs to Jay Ducker got nowhere.

OC Tyler Walker–who had a fantastic first two games–didn’t meet the moment, either.

You won 55-7 with these home helmets. Don’t mess with Karma. (Photo Courtesy Zamani Feelings)

A lot of national type guys–Chip Patterson of CBS sports and Kirk Herbstreit of ESPN–thought the Owls had a chance to stay in the game against the Sooners. Now that those national guys saw what happened, they are off the Owls. The Owls showed in the first two games that they are deep and talented along both lines but allowed themselves to get bullied by the Sooners.

I didn’t see that happening. Maybe neither Patterson nor Herbstreit did.

Maybe that’s what Keeler meant by not meeting the moment but they really have one more big-time moment to meet on Saturday at Georgia Tech.

Like Oklahoma, the Yellowjackets have a big-time quarterback in Haynes King. The lesson of Saturday is when they get their hands on him, they have to put him down.

That’s meeting the moment on the field.

Off the field, leaving the White helmets home might not help, but it certainly couldn’t hurt.

Friday: Georgia Tech Preview

09.13.25
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Oklahoma: The Best Team Money Can Buy

Somewhere along the last decade or so, college football has lost its way.

Oklahoma’s football team provided a pretty good example of that on Saturday at Lincoln Financial Field in a 42-3 win over the Temple Owls.

With a player reimbursement budget only about 100x–probably closer to 10,000x–higher than Temple’s, the Sooners proved you get what you pay for.

The lower bowl was pretty much full.

That wasn’t the way it was supposed to be.

After World War II, the NCAA established the “Sanity Code,” principles that covered financial aid, recruitment and academic standards and were intended to ensure amateurism in college sports. The idea was to level the playing field, to make sure no school with more money would have an advantage over another school with less.

For a long time, it worked.

In 1987, the NCAA put its foot down and gave SMU the so-called “death penalty” for paying players.

Now, the only code is “The Insanity Code” otherwise known as the NIL and the transfer portal.

Owls have a much better chance against the UTSAs of the world than the Oklahomas or Georgia Techs.

Since the NIL and the transfer portal, though, paying players is legal and that’s a sad state of affairs.

As former Oklahoma head coach Barry Switzer once said, “NIL stands for Now It’s Legal.” That was my second-favorite quote of this new era (error, really) of football.

That’s great for the Oklahomas of the world and terrible for the Temples.

All that was on display at LFF on Saturday afternoon.

Through no fault of the Temple kids or the Temple coaches, a bigger, faster, stronger Sooner team dominated the Owls and put on display the widening gap between the haves and the have nots.

My favorite quote was what I saw on twitter a few weeks ago by a P4 fan who said, “it’s all fun and games until Mark Zuckerberg takes an interest in Temple football.”

What he meant was the man with the deepest pockets wins and the only way to show how ridiculous the NIL is would be for some billionaire to fund a historically downtrodden program.

At this point, I don’t really care if it’s Temple, Troy, South Alabama or Kent State. Just would love to see a billionaire back one of those programs and have them win the natty every year. I wonder how fast the so-called “blue bloods” would scrap the current system if that happened.

For Temple, neither Zuckerberg nor a Saudi billionaire is walking through that door any time soon.

The reason a No. 21-ranked Temple was able to stay with a No. 9-ranked Notre Dame on national TV a decade ago was because the Owls were able to recruit good players, put them in a rigorous offseason training program and retain them.

For one a few nights in 2015 and 2016, Owl fans were in Heaven.

No more.

Now a team like Temple will probably forever be stuck in the Purgatory of being outclassed by P4 and with its only hope of competing being against similarly situated schools. The best the Owls can hope for is to compete for bowl games every year and maybe challenge for a league title every five years or so.

Because Georgia Tech–next week’s opponent–has many of the same advantages over Temple that Oklahoma has, the real season begins in two weeks. That playing field in Atlanta will be tilted in the home team’s direction, too.

It’s not what the NCAA had in mind when it set the rules.

Now there are no rules other than the guy with the most money wins.

That’s not the sport I signed up to be a fan of when I was in college so many years ago but it’s the one I’m watching now.

If things don’t change soon, the NFL business model–which gives all teams an equal chance–looks more appealing every day for the few entertainment dollars I have left. College football would be wise to study it.

Monday: The Moment Too Big

Saturday: Georgia Tech Preview

09.06.25
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Oklahoma is now on the radar

Between looking down at the Dopler Radar and looking up to see if my favorite Temple quarterback was going to turn an ankle, it was a pretty stressful afternoon for at least this Owl fan.

Evan Simon conducting the world famous Diamond Marching Band.

Fortunately, after a half-hour delay to start the game due to “lightning in the area” (Eagles fans know all about that), the game started and Temple won, 55-7. All game long, my radar had a ton of lightning bolts around Lincoln Financial Field but most of them went south.

My favorite Temple quarterback (Evan Simon) not only didn’t turn an ankle, but he also lived to see an important next game, played a terrific first half and conducted the world-famous Diamond Marching Band in perhaps the best rendition of “T for Temple U” anyone has ever heard after sitting out pretty much the entire second half.

Leonard Bernstein (RIP) couldn’t have done it better.

Never thought it was necessary for him to play in a 55-7 win over Howard and wanted to preserve him for Oklahoma. Fortunately, he slid enough to prove K.C. Keeler right in playing him and me wrong for worrying about it.

A win over Oklahoma would be the sweetest music Temple fans have heard since the 27-10 win over Penn State in 2015.

The fact that this Oklahoma game day is the day he’s been waiting for the last 365 days for a particular day that will happen a week from today is interesting.

I was very tough in this space on Stan Drayton because I felt that very nice man had the “want to” but never had to “how to” for a Temple head coach.

K.C. Keeler is also a nice man but he has both the want to and the how to part down.

That much he’s proven in his two games on the job at Temple.

An example of the how to part came in the opening day game against Oklahoma last year. Believe it or not, both Temple lines more than held their own against the Sooners but that game got out of hand when Temple had 6 turnovers to the Sooners zero. Oklahoma was 1-for-13 on third down against one of the worst Temple football teams in history last year.

Plus, knowing how to be Temple head coach means knowing who the best quarterback on your team is. Drayton never had a clue.

I do know this.

If Simon played, rather than Forrest Brock (responsible for five of the six turnovers against Oklahoma), he’d have zero or maybe one turnover last year and that would have been closer to a 35-21 game than a 51-3 one.

Does that mean Saturday will be a 35-21 game?

Have no idea.

It could be closer.

What I do know is that it won’t be a 51-3 one and Temple does have a puncher’s chance.

With a Maestro like Simon, who knows how to orchestrate an offense and it on all the right notes, Oklahoma fans, might be the ones most stressed a week from now.

There’s a storm coming in so batten down the hatches.

Monday: 5 Trick Plays for Oklahoma

Friday: Oklahoma Preview