Offense |
Defense
| Depth Chart
| Further Analysis
Chalk up 2005 to a perfect convergence of a coaching staff at
the end of its run, a program desperately needing some love after
being unceremoniously dumped by a Big East that would rather have
South Florida and Cincinnati as members, academic issues among
several players, and bad, bad, bad football.
So let's wipe the slate clean. We know the first year of the Al
Golden era has to start out better than the last campaign of Bobby
Wallace when it was outscored by an average of 45.3 to 9.7 per game and was
one of the most inept teams in the history of college football in
every phase possible. How bad was the offense? It scored seven
points or fewer in six games with a high scoring game of 17.
Head coach: Al Golden
1st year
Returning Lettermen:
Off 19, Def 20, ST 4
Lettermen Lost: 31 |
Ten
Best Owl Players
1. S Chris Page, Sr.
2. OT Elliot Seifert, Sr.
3. DE Devin Tyler, RFr.
4. OG Tariq Sanders, Sr.
5. C Alex Derenthal, Soph.
6. RB Tim Brown, Sr.
7. NT Terrance Knighton, Soph.
8. RB Jason Harper, Fr.
9. WR Bruce Francis, Soph.
10. LB Keith Holt, Soph. |
|
2006
Schedule
CFN
Prediction: coming |
|
8/31 |
at Buffalo |
| 9/9 |
Louisville |
| 9/16 |
at Minnesota |
| 9/23 |
at Western Michigan |
|
9/30 |
at Vanderbilt |
| 10/7 |
Kent State |
| 10/12 |
vs. Clemson |
| 10/21 |
at Northern Illinois |
| 10/28 |
Bowling Green |
| 11/4 |
Central Michigan |
| 11/11 |
at Penn State |
| 11/18 |
at Navy |
|
|
2005
Schedule
CFN
Prediction: 1-10
2005 Results:
0-11
Preview
2005 predicted wins
|
| 9/1 |
at Arizona State L 63-16 |
| 9/10 |
at Wisconsin L 65-0 |
| 9/17 |
Toledo L 42-17 |
|
9/24 |
Western Mich
L 19-16 |
| 10/1 |
at Bowling Green L 70-7 |
| 10/8 |
Maryland L 38-7 |
| 10/15 |
Miami L 34-3 |
| 10/22 |
at Clemson L 37-7 |
| 10/29 |
Miami Univ. L 41-14 |
| 11/5 |
at Virginia L 51-3 |
| 11/19 |
at Navy L 38-17 |
|
Like all new coaching
staffs and new eras, Golden and his young group comes in bringing a new
energy with big ideas and bigger dreams. Give Golden this; he's not
afraid to take on a challenge. His first goal is the change the mindset
of Temple football taking this city college that has no interest in
football and coming up with something to get excited about before
becoming a full blown member of the MAC.
Greg Schiano tried to turn around Rutgers by saying he could recruit the
talent-rich states and would put together a tough defense. Northwestern
went from the bottom to a competitor with the first wave of the spread
offense. It is possible to turn things around even in the darkest of
places, and step two will be to show that it can be decent
against MAC teams. Step one will simply to be more
competitive and forget about everything that happened in the past. This
is truly a program that's wiping the slate clean.
The
Schedule: It's not awful. There are four don't-even-think-about-it
games against Louisville, at Minnesota, Clemson and at Penn State, but
there's no reason the Owls can't put up a fight against the other eight
teams on the slate. A win at Buffalo to open the season would do wonders
for a team that desperately needs a little bit of confidence. A loss
likely means an 0-5 start before a home game against Kent State that'll
be a must-win with Clemson, at Northern Illinois, and the program's main
demon lately, Bowling Green, coming up.
Best
Offensive Player: Senior OT Elliot Seifert. RB Tim Brown will be the
main focus of the offense early on and WR Bruce Francis should grow into
the team's most dangerous receiver, but the line has the beef and the
potential for the biggest improvement. Center Alex Derenthal is a good
one, guard Tariq Sanders is back from injury, and the 6-7, 300-pound
Seifert should turn out to be the best of the veteran front five.
Best
Defensive Player: Senior S Chris Page. The senior corner will move
to safety now that top tackler Garrett Schultz is no longer with the
team. Page has the speed, but he's only 5-10 and 175 pounds and needs to
prove he can be a big hitter.
Key player
to a successful season: Quarterbacks Colin Clancy,
Shane Kelly, and/or Jarrett Dunston. The three are young and relatively
inexperienced, so there's time to mold them into what the coaching staff
wants. In a perfect world, one steps up and becomes the starter to build
the offense around learning the ins and outs of the offense this year
before hitting the ground running when 2007 rolls around.
The season
will be a success if ...
Temple wins
three games and plays better against the big boys. It'll take a major
upset or three to pull this off considering the overall talent level
isn't quite up to par, but there's no reason the team can hang around
with Buffalo, Kent State, Western Michigan or Central Michigan. A
measure of success would also be not getting bombed by teams like
Bowling Green and Northern Illinois.
Key game:
August 31st at Buffalo. While beating the Bulls wouldn't make much
of a blip on the national scale, it would break the 12-game losing
streak and end all speculation about when the next win might come. The
team needs to learn how to win and nothing would end memories of last
year faster than getting out of the gate with a victory.
2005 Fun
Stats:
- First quarter scoring: Opponents 135 - Temple 27
- Touchdowns passes: Opponents 29 - Temple 4
- Punts: Temple 76 for 2,742 yards - Opponents 25 for 987 yards
The Last Time Temple…
…played in a bowl game…1979 (Garden State Bowl vs. Cal)
…missed a bowl game…2005
…pitched a shutout…1992 (Boston University)
…was shutout…2005 (Wisconsin)
…scored 50 points…2001 (UConn)
…went undefeated…1907
…won a conference title…1967 (Middle Atlantic)
…had a 3,000-yard passer…never
…had a 1,000-yard rusher…2002 (Tanardo Sharps)
…had a 1,000-yard receiver…never
…had a first-round draft choice…1987 (RB Paul Palmer)