Succession plan: There’s already a blueprint

Proof positive that G5 football programs can still thrive with similar resources to Temple.

When Stan Drayton was first hired as Temple’s head football coach in December of 2021, very few people attending that first press conference would have told you that the 3-9 season that preceded him would be followed by a couple of more 3-9 seasons.

Drayton seemed to be that enthusiastic about winning, if not the first year, then certainly his second.

Temple certainly has been treading water since.

Winning is the only measuring stick. It always was and always will be.

Manheim Township coach Mark Evans greets Temple football coach Geoff Collins and o-line boss Chris Wieshan. pic.twitter.com/CYcFH0N1FW

— Tim Gross (@TimGrossLNP) January 12, 2017

Wiesehan (right) with Manheim Township head coach Mark Evans and Geoff Collins on a 2017 recruiting trip.

If 2024 is another 3-9 season (or worse), Temple will have some tough decisions to make. Under normal business circumstances, the logical move would be to get the next head coach.

The nuclear one would be to give up all together on football but that will be determined probably if the new President is a more egghead type (David Adamany) than an ex-Division I football player type (Jason Wingard).

Give me the football player type any day but that’s a decision for the BOT to make.

Everyone around here is rooting for Drayton to go 6-6 or better but it doesn’t look good right now. There isn’t a single AAC-level starting quarterback on the roster and the defensive coordinator who allowed both FIU and Temple to give up nearly 40 ppg. is still here.

The fact that Drayton was hired by his Texas buddy and that Drayton kept his Texas State buddy here as DC doesn’t present the best optics to the rest of the college football world.

Or even the Temple BOT.

Let’s say business as normal and Temple is determined to succeed in football. Then you have to start thinking about a succession plan right now.

A blueprint of success already exists even in the G5 space. New Mexico State made a couple of straight bowl games by hiring a proven Power 5 head coach (Jerry Kill). Troy did the opposite by grabbing a guy (Jon Sumrall) who worked under Neal Brown there and knew the formula to succeed at Troy.

Temple probably won’t have the option of hiring a proven P5 head coach but does have one of those other kind of guys in Chris Wiesehan. Chris was here under both Matt Rhule and Geoff Collins and knows what worked at 10th and Diamond and what did not.

I had text convo with someone who is in the building every day and he said most of Drayton’s staff is standoffish to outsiders with the exception of Wiesehan, who takes time to talk to everyone. That was Collins’ personality. It was also Rhule’s. Drayton himself has the same personality but, for some reason, most of his staff does not.

The thought here after the recent revolving door situation that it would be a good idea to name a “coach in waiting” instead of going through an exhaustive search should Drayton bolt.

Maybe Wiesehan is that guy. Maybe he’s not but a lot of people smarter and closer to the program than me have told me this: “Mike, that guy is the real deal. He would make a great head coach at Temple.” Here are just a few things I like about the guy: 1) He left Hawaii to come to Temple; 2) He left a Power 5 program to come BACK to Temple; 3) He was part of the recent past Temple greatness.

That would make for a pretty good Temple football trivia question. Keith Kirkwood also left Hawaii to come to Temple but Keith was never a P5 assistant who loved Temple enough to come back to take the same job in the G5 realm.

That’s a demonstrated affinity to the school not just through words but through deeds and that should count for a lot.

Some of the same things the same people told me about an unheralded assistant named Matt Rhule a decade or so ago are the same things they are saying about Wiesehan now. There’s a lot of street cred in that.

I’ll have to take their word for it. Certainly, makes sense from the standpoint that Wiesehan knows the landscape from the perspective of three different coaching staffs and was once a nominee for the Frank Broyles Award as the best assistant coach in the country (2018) while …. wait for it … at Temple. He knows every nook and cranny of 10th and Diamond unlike any other “national search” guy would. He was part of success stories under both Matt Rhule and Geoff Collins.

He already knows the blueprint to succeed at Temple. He might be the only one in the building who does.

Just like Sumrall did at Troy.

Smoke and fire: The Drayton to The Ohio St. Story

Do a twitter search for “Stan Drayton Ohio State” and there are about 87 results over the last three months.

Do the same for “Stan Drayton Temple” over the same time period and there are roughly three results. Not 87. Not 67. Not 12.

Three.

Where there is smoke there is fire.

We will never know if Drayton, the head coach at Temple, applied for the running back position coach at OSU but he can provide a few clues over the next few weeks.

OwlsDaily.com, the best site covering Temple athletics, did its due diligence and asked Drayton about the OSU situation after the Cherry and White game and he denied it.

Err, what’s he gonna say?

“Shawn, you got me. I applied but Ohio State backed off when they heard about the payout they would have to pay to Temple. So I’m stuck here for now.”

Deny all he wants, Drayton can convey to Temple fans that he really wants to stay here and win over the next three weeks–not months–by grabbing one of those big-time quarterbacks still remaining in the portal.

If he does not, he is sending a clear signal to Temple fans, the Temple players, the entire Temple community that he doesn’t think he has a viable future here and he is riding out the inevitable third-straight 3-9 season his current quarterback room dictates is going to happen.

Temple possibly has the worst quarterback situation of all 130 teams and that’s not just an opinion. It’s supported by the numbers. Its top two depth chart quarterback guys include one who lost 55-0 to SMU last year and another who has a career four FBS TD passes against six FBS interceptions and played for the 129th-best FBS offense last season.

Not good.

Has Drayton thrown up his hands and given up?

Seems so or we would have had General Booty in here on May 5 after he decommitted from Oklahoma on May 4.

Some 3* and above uncommitted QBs still left in the portal desperate for a home.

Drayton would not be the first big-time coach in this transfer portal/NIL era to give up. Chip Kelly left a lucrative and successful job as head coach at UCLA to step down and be an OC at Ohio State. In that vein, a few other successful head coaches–Sean Lewis of Kent State comes to mind last year joining Colorado as an assistant–and leaving HC jobs and dropping down to staff jobs seems to be a trend, not an outlier.

Kelly wasn’t the only HC to be fed up. Nick Saban quit at Alabama. No doubt they’d still be in the same spots if they didn’t have to deal with the NIL and portal.

No head coach wants to go into a recruit’s house when the first words that 17-year-old kid says is “how much are you going to pay me?”

With the recent rumors of a more equitable payout of the TV money across the board, the solution for schools like Temple is to hang in there and ride this out.

Giving up is not an option and Drayton has one chance to prove to Temple that he hasn’t.

Get a big-time quarterback in here STAT.

He has no more than three weeks to do that. If he doesn’t, we will have our answer.

Monday: Succession Planning

Laying the foundation means something different now

Right after the Cherry and White game was over, construction crews started working on a whole new Edberg-Olson Complex practice surface, laying the foundation the old-fashioned way.

"Rome wasn't built in a day,
but they were laying sections of field turf
every hour." #TempleTURF #KeepBuilding pic.twitter.com/8uSzXQ9YPG

— Adam Scheier (@CoachScheier) April 30, 2024

Ripping up the E-O field, putting the piling underneath and foam padding on top of that and finally the new turf.

It’s going to take six weeks to get it up and in shape for use.

Fortunately, fields can be built the old-fashioned way.

College football programs no longer are built the way Al Golden and Matt Rhule built Temple into a respected one. Golden and Rhule could recruit high school kids, put them through a rigorous weight program for a redshirt year, then work them slowly into the lineup by the second year.

Now you can’t afford to recruit high school guys. You need ready-made players.

That was pretty much illustrated perfectly in the CBS Sports article yesterday. In it, the author, Ryan McGrady, debunks the popular notion that the G5 is getting raided without getting anything in return. The first part of that last sentence is true; the second is not.

McGrady points out that, while the G5 lost 239 players to Power 4 schools, they got 325 incoming players from Power 4 schools.

What’s that mean?

Charlotte and North Texas should be two of the most improved AAC teams as they seem to get how to build a team in this transfer portal era. The Owls are on the clock. Temple’s only chance to win is to get a big-time quarterback.

The G5 schools who load up on P4 talent probably will be successful. The G5 schools who rely on JUCO transfers probably won’t.

There was a reason those P4 guys got scholarships at the highest level of college football in the first place and it was because they were at one time deemed good enough to play in the SECs and the Big 10s of the world. A G5 scholarship gives a P4 player something no amount of NIL money can give him: A chance to be a starter.

McGrady’s example of Peny Boone should be of particular interest to Temple. Boone was stuck as the second-team running back at Maryland two years ago, gaining 258 yards and scoring a pair of touchdowns in two seasons. His transfer to Toledo turned out to be a genius move on his part as he had 1,400 yards and 16 touchdowns. In Antwain Littleton, Temple has a backup from Maryland this year with better incoming credentials –with three times as many yards and seven more touchdowns at Maryland than Boone had.

If he duplicates at Temple what Boone did at Toledo, the Owls are going to win a lot of games.

Temple had the right idea to go out and get a productive Big 10 player but it might have dropped the ball, figuratively speaking, in putting the emphasis on JUCOs rather than productive P4 backups.

There is still time to get a P4 quarterback who actually was productive at that level and, unlike the field being installed at the E-O, the clear evidence is that from a personnel standpoint, laying a foundation really isn’t a priority.

In this new era of college football, fields are built from the ground up but programs are built from the top down. The sooner Temple recognizes that, the better the Owls will play on that field.

Where is Temple football’s Jamal Mashburn, Jr.?

Oklahoma’s General Booty is in the portal. He would give Temple the best-named QB in the nation and a guy supremely motivated to do well on Aug. 31.

Where is Temple football’s Jamal Mashburn Jr.?

Or Lynn Greer III?

Or even Jameel Brown?

Fair questions.

While your one millionaire major sports coach was busting his ass signing people who made impacts for big-time programs and helped at least one make a post-season splash, your other millionaire coach was sitting on his hands doing absolutely nothing.

The transfer portal closed on May 1 and Temple football has done nada.

Squat.

Zero.

Let’s go.

Let’s get on the stick and get not only me (but long-suffering Temple fans) a big-time quarterback who doesn’t need an NIL deal but does need a starting job at an FBS school.

Texas’ Maalik Murphy was also available. If Temple could not sign him to be starting QB, (and it did not because he went to Duke), what good is it for Temple to give $2.5 million to a Texas RB coach and another $1 million to a Texas Football Director of Operations?

Let’s get a quarterback who wasn’t the second-best guy at the 129th-ranked FBS offense. Hell, the best guy at the same 129th-ranked offensive school entered the portal yesterday and I don’t want him either.

I want a guy who is better than the guy who left for Rice and so far Temple doesn’t have that guy.

The good news is that the closing of the transfer portal Tuesday doesn’t stop Temple from getting the best quarterback available in the portal now. It does stop guys already at 10th and Diamond from leaving, and that’s not a bad thing. There are OBJECTIVELY at least five better quarterbacks in the portal than E.J. Warner right now and Temple needs to go out and convince at least one of them to come here, just like Adam Fisher used his persuasive powers to convince Mashburn, Greer and Brown to come here.

The concerning thing is that the Temple team that practices on the one side of Broad Street is doing nothing to get better while the Temple team that practices on the other side of Broad Street hasn’t let the transfer portal create a malaise in the program.

Temple has invested millions into both its football and basketball facilities. It needs to show a return for both investments in terms of wins.

There’s a real energy and synergy coming out of Broad and Montgomery that does not exist at 10th and Diamond and people in Temple Town are noticing.

Right now, it appears that the plan of the Temple brain trust at 10th and Diamond is to go into the house of the eighth-best team in the country with the backup quarterback from the 129th-best offense under center.

That does not compute.

The plan on the other side of Temple Town is to have a guard who led his team to a win in the NCAA tournament lead the basketball Owls next season.

That sounds like a well-thought out plan.

Let’s rip a page out of the master Temple basketball plan and start using our football noggins for something other than a hat rack. There is a way to beat this transfer portal and NIL system and Temple basketball has a leg up on the football program right now.

Signing the Oklahoma backup quarterback with a huge talent upside over anyone in the Temple QB room right now to start the season at Oklahoma sounds like a well-thought-out plan as well.

We could do that or we could do what we’ve done since November (comparatively, speaking to our other AAC cohorts).

Sit on our hands and do nothing.

Monday: Laying a Foundation

Friday: A guy to keep an eye on

Jordan Magee provides a much-needed splash

Just when the Group of Five schools in general and Temple football in particular needed a splash, both Toledo’s Quinyon Mitchell and the Owls’ Jordan Magee were there to provide it.

First, Mitchell.

bringing @Magee11Jordan to DC@NWFCU | #RaiseHail pic.twitter.com/1ZXTUiBUKn

— Washington Commanders (@Commanders) April 28, 2024

“You are one of the guys we were most passionate about.”

The Toledo corner was the first DB in the draft and went to the Philadelphia Eagles. GM Howie Roseman said they did their due diligence on Mitchell’s background and one of the reasons they were so excited about him was “because he remained loyal to Toledo” and didn’t take the NIL offer Alabama had on the table.

Temple players should be taking notes. The NFL–at least the Eagles–put a value on loyalty.

Closer to home, Magee displayed those same traits at Temple where he became a single-digit player two years ago and did not follow other Owls out the door.

We could not find any quotes from the Commanders saying anything about Magee’s Temple loyalty but that had to factor into him going higher than any of the projections we’ve seen.

Still, the Commanders were excited about Magee, who went just before the Eagles made a splash of their own by grabbing Jeremiah Trotter Jr. with the next pick. That sets up an interesting scenario to follow.

Will Magee have the more impactful career or will Trotter?

Since Washington passed up on Trotter to grab Magee at the same position, the Commanders seem to be convinced of the former.

Maybe if more G5 guys follow the path forged by Magee and Mitchell, it will help stop the bleeding to the P5 and keep schools like Toledo and Temple viable.

We can only hope.

Friday: The Monster Mash

Special Qualities for 5 Temple guys

Antwone Santiago was a beast at Platt and made these same kind of plays at Temple last month.

Every once in a while, someone comes from out of nowhere to surprise the Temple football community.

Who would have thought, for example, that an obscure running back from Gainesville, Fla. named Kenny Harper would be such a leader of the 2014 Temple Owls or that a fullback named Nick Sharga would be the guy to a power offense built around his skills that led to a couple of double-digit win seasons?

Sharga is now a priest and we can only thank God for him.

Harper was the guy who got up at the end of the end of a 6-6 season in 2014 and told the team to “leave no doubt” the next season.

They did not, going on to the first of consecutive 10-win seasons and a couple of appearances in title games.

Sharga helped facilitate those wins by being the lead blocker for running backs Jahad Thomas and Ryquell Armstead, the epitome of Temple TUFF, and keeping the offense on the field for 7-8 minutes of each quarter and keeping other offenses off the field. That helped the defense stay rested and effective unlike the first two years of Matt Rhule’s spread offenses.

Now it is time for a new generation of guys with “special qualities” and, just from watching the Cherry and White game, some Temple fans are able to identify at least five:

One, linebacker Antwone Santiago __ Santiago made plays all over the place in the month-long spring practice and had perhaps his best outing at Cherry and White. Drayton: “He’s got a chance to be a special player here at Temple,” after the game. Still, he’s 6-3, 215 and to play effective linebacker he needs to both put on weight and hit the weight room in the next few months ahead.

Two, wide receiver Dante Wright __ Wright didn’t make first-team freshman All-American at Colorado State for fraudulent reasons. He was an impact player for the Rams and, last year, at Temple, was the Owls’ best receiver. He’s a terrific punt returner as well.

Three, defensive end Tra Thomas__ In a 27-23 loss to a bowl team (USF) last year, Thomas had a a pair sacks and had a career-high tackles (8) against Rutgers last year and, at times, looked unblockable against a Big 10 team. He had a great spring and appears poised to give the Owls one of the top edge pass rushers in the AAC.

Four, tight end Reese Clark__ A star for a three-time large school Pennsylvania state champion, St. Joseph’s Prep, Clark caught the lone touchdown pass in a 41-7 loss to Miami last year. Now, out from under the shadows of David Martin-Robinson, Clark is going to get plenty of opportunities to display his pass-catching and tackle-breaking ability at the position.

Five, running back Antwain Littleton _ At 6-1, 265 pounds, Littleton was a load to bring down at St. John’s (D.C.) and then, “slimmed down” at 6-1, 235 at Maryland, Littleton was able to make an impact in the running back rotation at a Big 10 school. When he left, Maryland head coach Mike Locksley bemoaned that his “second-team running back” demanded $100K or he would leave. Littleton was the only guy who fit that description and, hopefully, the Owls will get their money’s worth this season.

In a sport where 22 guys start, are five enough to produce a winning team?

No, but the past has shown that guys come out of nowhere and lead Temple football to big things and maybe that kind of history can repeat itself. The spring has shown Temple certainly has those guys in the building.

Monday: Splash Alert

A possible end-around for Temple football

International students probably won’t be included in NIL deals, which could save schools like Temple.

Otherwise, it was a forgettable moment in Temple football’s 59-34 loss to UTSA.

The Owls’ quarterback, E.J. Warner, rolled right and improvised a throw to tight end Peter Clarke, who caught the first touchdown pass of his career.

Peter Clarke is part of a great TE room at Temple this season.

Clarke is from London, England, and became the first foreign player ever to score a touchdown for the Temple University football team and the Owls have been playing since 1884.

Clarke is still here mostly because that was his most notable moment for the Owls. Still, had Clarke caught 40 passes for 10 touchdowns he would also still be here because, as an international student, he is ineligible to sign NIL deals and that removes the main incentive to enter the transfer portal.

It is what makes Clarke the quintessential Stan Drayton player. Drayton came to Temple promising to build a culture of guys who both want play here and win an AAC championship here. Then the wheels came off. Guys who were building blocks of the program left for greener (i.e., money) pastures. A 3-9 season in 2022 turned into another 3-9 season in 2023.

Under this system, progress seems impossible.

However, if the Owls were able to recruit enough guys with Peter Clarke’s background–not just from London but from all over the world–they could build the kind of winning culture Drayton envisioned when hired without the axe of the NIL and the transfer portal hanging over their heads.

Imagine this: Temple puts an international all-star team together and keeps all of those guys for four years because there is no financial incentive to go elsewhere.

Penn State’s Matt Rhule (98) gets up after tackling Temple’s Henry Burris while another teammate piles on for a 15-yard penalty.

The problem with this, though, are there enough great international players for Temple to win? Maybe not from Europe, Asia or Australia, but there is certainly enough evidence to suggest that Canada could be a fertile recruiting ground for the Owls. McGill, one of the great Canadian Universities located in Toronto, not only plays football but plays it on a high-enough level to contribute twice as many starters to the CFL as any other college, including the American ones. The current “Oklahomas” and “Alabamas” of Canada are Western, Laurier and Montreal Universities. Plenty of good AAC-level players on those programs who might enjoy the opportunity to compete in the states. If these guys can play in the CFL and become stars there, and they have proven that over the last 50 years, they can play in the U.S., too.

When you consider Henry Burris, a former Temple great, is arguably the greatest CFL player of all time, that’s impressive. Burris could be a catalyst to send good Canadian players South and there just might be enough of them to make Temple a perennial AAC power.

The Owls are just banging their heads against the wall by developing players from high schools here and then having them leave for elsewhere once proven. Putting together an international all-star team might be the kind of end-around play Drayton needs for the stability that doesn’t exist now.

It’s worth a shot.

5 Guys in the Portal who can make Temple a winner

P.J. Walker parlayed his time at TU into an XFL MVP and a backup job in the NFL

HELP WANTED: Quarterback, Temple University. One of the nation’s great universities, the sixth-largest educator of professionals in the world and located in a Top Four TV market, is looking for a dynamic, playmaking quarterback to lead the Owls back to national prominence.

In the last decade alone, Temple was ranked in the Top 25 three times (the most recent in 2019), won one AAC title and also competed in another ACC title game. Its 2015 game against Notre Dame was the most-watched college football game in the history of the Philadelphia market. It has had one XFL MVP (P.J. Walker) and another Maxwell Award winner as the best player in college football (Steve Joachim). We don’t have a big NIL bag of cash for you but if playing college football for money is your only goal, please look elsewhere. If, on the other hand, you want to gamble on yourself and make a ton of money down the road, this is the place for you. Temple has three great wide receivers in Dante Wright (a first-team All-American freshman, 2019), Zae Baines and Ian Stewart, a transfer from Michigan State. Also, walk-on John Adams might be the fastest WR the AAC. Reese Clark leads a terrific tight end group. Your major competition for the QB job is a guy who has four career TD passes against six interceptions as a FBS QB and another guy who lost, 55-0, to SMU last year. If interested, please contact Stan Drayton at @standraytonTU on X (formerly known as twitter).

That’s it.

That’s the pitch.

Temple QB Steve Joachim won the Maxwell Award as College Football’s Player of the Year in 1974.

There are about 18-20 quarterbacks in the transfer portal better than anyone currently in the Temple quarterback room.

The very success of the 2024 Temple football team rests on Stan Drayton’s ability to get one of those guys. There are plenty of programs who would like to have those 20 guys but only a very small handful that could offer a realistic chance for the starting quarterback job in a still high-profile program that appears on TV on a regular basis.

Hell, Temple opens on a Friday night on ESPN. The Flagship ESPN. Not ESPN2, ESPNNEWS, ESPNU or ESPN+.

The real thing.

The stage for a quarterback who believes in himself and has some good WRs to throw to does not get any bigger. Opening weekend of the college football season and the first college football game most people will see. “Who is this guy making those throws for Temple? He’s good.”

That’s what’s on the plate for any one of 20 great quarterbacks in the portal now are smart enough to know that Temple offers them the best chance to start.

We’ve narrowed our choices down to five guys, two with Temple recruiting connections.

In no particular order, they are this:

Reece Poffenbarger

Does the former Albany quarterback, who has family within short driving distance of every home Temple game, really want to spend this 2024 season holding a clipboard at Miami for Cam Ward? I don’t think any competitive person wants to and I’m assuming that’s Poffenbarger’s makeup. This is a guy who can lead Temple to an AAC title and then name his price at the end of the season. Poffenbarger is not in the portal now, but he can be nudged in that direction as could any other FBS player.

Sol-Jay Maiava-Peters

There are a couple of would-be interesting connections between Peters and Temple. One, he was offensive MVP of the New Mexico Bowl in 2022 for BYU in a 24-22 win over SMU. Temple’s Chris Coyer, also a QB, was the offensive MVP of the same bowl in 2011. Two, he was a high school teammate of current Temple RB Antwain Littleton at St. John’s High School (D.C.). All Drayton has to do is call Littleton into his office, have Antwain dial Peters’ number and hand the phone to Drayton and Peters is on the next plane to Philadelphia.

Timmy McClain, QB UCF

If you want your program to bring in the most predictable, boring pocket passer, then Timmy McClain isn’t your guy. But if you want a dual threat option that makes absolutely insane plays from time to time, then McClain should be on the radar. Unlike the above three guys, McClain might be looking for a college payday over a chance to lead his team to a title but he’s still worth a shot.

Nick Evers, QB Wisconsin

Evers is a former 4* recruit who entered the portal after falling to No. 3 in the Badgers’ depth chart behind Tanner Mordecai and Tyler Van Dyke this spring. If you think Temple can’t attract 4* QBs, think again. In the past five years, the Owls were able to recruit Dwan Mathis away from Georgia and Re-al Mitchell away from Iowa State. Mathis was the starter on opening day in 2020 for Georgia and Drayton’s first opening day starter (2022). Mitchell, a backup to current 49ers starting quarterback Brock Purdy at Iowa State, never made an impact in Philadelphia. Both had ball security problems. Evers does not have that history.

Austin Smith, Eastern Michigan

Another Temple connection here is that Smith knows Nico Piriano, who is now Temple’s football director of operations. Piriano worked in the same capacity under Chris Creighton, a great head coach, at Eastern Michigan where he got to know last year’s EMU starter Smith. Would Smith be an upgrade over what Temple has now? Well, put it this way. Smith had more than twice as many TD passes (nine) in 2023 than Evan Simon has in his whole career (four).

Temple can get one of those five guys or another guy outside of those five currently in the portal or it can sit back and do nothing.

What would sitting back and do nothing tell you?

Stan Drayton is playing out the string at Temple and planning on pulling a Chip Kelly move to return to the P5 as an assistant coach.

Sitting back and doing nothing is not an option for Temple fans. Drayton owes it not only to those fans but his players to get the best quarterback available and not settle for the ones he has now.

Cherry and White game just one part of process

Maybe current Ohio State HC Ryan Day (seen here as Temple assistant) can do former OSU assistant Stan Drayton (now Temple head coach) a solid by sending him a 4* quarterback stuck deep on the depth chart.

Spring football ended on Saturday for Temple and a whole lot of other schools.

Pretty good crowd for the C&W game considering the 30mph wind and consecutive 3-9 seasons.

What we’ve learned over the last month is Temple probably hasn’t done enough to improve from 3-9 significantly.

Temple is probably a very few really good transfer portal starters at key positions from improving but the good news is that the transfer portal is getting ready to explode and maybe, just maybe, the Owls can fill those positions with an upgrade in talent.

Quarterback is one of those positions.

Temple is not going to have a bag of cash to give any of group of players in the portal but it does have something most schools can’t give–a real chance to grab a starting job.

There are 130 FBS teams and most of them have a starting quarterback at this time. Maybe five jobs are open and Temple is one of them.

TD celly‼️ @Reesexclark2 said…what’s up brother ☝️#TempleTUFF https://t.co/KdvqAsASjQ pic.twitter.com/xcdZhMw4Oh

— Temple Football (@Temple_FB) April 13, 2024

Reese Clark had to reach back and catch this TD pass, which is really a simple throw.

Temple would be a perfect place for a 4* quarterback like Wisconsin’s Nick Evers, who found himself third team after the spring and entered the portal recently. Miami transfer Tyler Van Dyke transferred in and grabbed the No. 2 job and former SMU quarterback Tanner Mordecai appears to have that job locked down.

Evers is a significantly more talented quarterback than anyone else in the Temple quarterback room but he’s the not the only one. According to portal experts, a good dozen or so accomplished quarterbacks will shake free starting today and several could be more talented than even Evers.

The Owls better get one.

Temple has some pretty good receivers in Dante Wright, Zae Baines and Ian Stewart. The Owls apparently have three good tight ends, led by St. Joseph’s Prep great Reese Clark.

They built depth among the both lines and their linebacking corp as a group appears better, even though they don’t have anyone as talented as Jordan Magee. The secondary, which was a disaster last year, was upgraded with a Texas State transfer. Another disaster, the kicking game, appears to have been fixed.

They’ve added two All-American running backs from the JUCO ranks and someone in Antwain Littleton who did some impressive running in the Big 10.

Their most pressing area of need, though, is the most important position.

The Owls are not that far away if … and this is a big IF … they are able to add a playmaking quarterback who can stick around for more than a couple of months this time.

Friday (April 19): Five Guys

Monday (April 22): A Possible Hail Mary For Temple

Friday (April 26): Special Qualities

Three stages of Cherry and White

Bruce Arians reminds all of us how young we were once.

Cherry and White are the two most glorious colors in the college football prism but the Cherry and White Day itself has manifested itself into three stages:

For me, it’s pretty much this:

LAST CENTURY–“We look so good we’re going to win a natty.” That might have been fueled by a fuel Rolling Rocks pre-game, but the Owls always looked good against the Owls. Some terrific performances by running back Ventres Stevenson (Bruce Arians’ Era) and a guy named Gibson (no relation, also Bruce Era) got us pumped for the next season. Interestingly enough, Temple’s GOAT (Paul Palmer) never played in a Cherry and White game due to injuries and what they refer to today as “load management.” In all my years of following Temple football, though, this was key: I never saw a 5-9, 190-pound player who was tougher than Paul and pretty much played almost every game of his three seasons when it counted (in the fall).

This 2015 Cherry and White Game was the prelude to the 27-10 win over Penn State four months later.

EARLY PART OF THIS CENTURY–With the arrival of Al Golden, Temple football fans saw a binder (not like Mitt Romney, of women) but a binder of great players up and down the East Coast who were going to take the Owls to prominence. Golden and Matt Rhule, his Lieutenant, followed that plan to a Temple T and did exactly that.

AFTER MATT RHULE–A collection of suspects and wannabes stayed only long enough to keep Temple relevant. Plenty of terrific moments for me at Steve Addazio’s first Cherry and White game when I talked to John Palumbo’s dad and he said: “Mike, my son said it was the difference between night and day between the Al Golden staff and this one because this is pretty much the staff that led Florida to the national championship last year.” Mr. Palumbo (and John) were right. Temple had the OC of the national championship Florida team as HC and the DC of the National Championship team (Chuck Heater) the VERY year after they won it. As a result, those guys took Golden’s recruits to Temple’s first bowl win in 30 years.

The 2012 Cherry and White Game was played at LFF.

TRANSFER PORTAL ERA–Rod Carey was a “my-way-or-the-highway” guy at the very time the most highways were built for the players. That turned out to be a disaster. Stan Drayton was able to plug a few holes in a sinking ship and point the program (“progrim” as pronounced by Bobby Wallace) in the right direction before taking a couple of torpedoes in his second year by hiring a completely incompetent DC (Everett Withers) to take over for a relatively competent one (D.J. Eliot). Loyalty to Withers surfaced its ugly head this season and the Owls handed over a defense that gave up 38.7 ppg to the same guy. If you think that bodes well for the 2024 prospects, Exhibit B was Withers being a worse DC for FIU only three years ago (39.7 ppg).

If Withers takes his buddy Stan down with the ship like he did Butch Davis and FIU in 2021, all that hole-plugging would have been for naught.

Ugh.

The Owls won’t improve as a team until AFTER Cherry and White Day and ONLY if they are able to grab a proven playmaking quarterback in the portal. Plenty will be available but Drayton telling OwlsDaily.com “we have four great quarterbacks” proves that he should take a day off next week and make an appointment with an Optometrist.

Song by Kevin Newsome, one of two 4* QBs to ever play in a C&W game (Dwan Mathis was the other).

So whatever you see tomorrow at Cherry and White, take with a grain of salt.

Make that a bolder.

The good news is that there are enough bodies for a real game for a change.

The bad news is that the Oklahoma game is one day sooner (pun intended) than it should be and the Owls don’t appear to be closer to making that a real competition today than they were at the end of last season.

Advice: Drink a lot of Rolling Rocks or brewski of choice and bring those Cherry and White colored glasses. The Owls added a lot of JUCOs but, if they are going to get better, they need a few more great players once that transfer portal explodes as expected on Monday.

Monday: Cherry and White Recap

Friday (April 19): Five Guys

Monday (April 22): A Possible Hail Mary For Temple

Friday (April 26): Special Qualities