Temple football team’s biggest task this spring is moving forward after last season’s major setback

Before last season’s total collapse due largely to injury and COVID-19 issues, Temple was considered among the more formidable football teams in the American Athletic Conference.

The AAC is considered the best Group of Five conference in college football, so what Temple accomplished the five seasons before last year was impressive.

From 2015 through 2019, Temple played in two AAC championship games, losing in 2015 and winning in 2016. The Owls also placed second in the East Division in 2018 with a 7-1 mark. (Starting last season, the AAC did away with two divisions and now has one 11-team conference.)

Temple earned a school record five consecutive bowl berths and went 43-24 overall and 30-10 in the AAC.

Then came last year, when the Owls went 1-6, all against AAC competition before the season was mercifully cut one game short when the game against Cincinnati was canceled due to COVID-19 issues with both teams. In what was its final game, Temple was using its fifth quarterback, walk-on Kamal Gray, in what would be a season-ending 28-3 home loss to East Carolina.

Since the season ended, the Owls have seen 12 players leave through the transfer portal, including three-year starting quarterback Anthony Russo, who is now at Michigan State.

» READ MORE: Temple coach Rod Carey starts spring practice with the task of sorting out the QB position

Temple, however, did welcome nine from the portal, including players from the SEC, Big 10, ACC, and Pac-12.

Now the big task as Rod Carey enters his third season as head coach is to get Temple back in the consciousness of the contenders in the AAC, no easy feat in such a competitive conference.

Spring practice, which began April 5, has been used to set the tone for this season. The theme has been to learn from last year but focus on the present.

“You have to forget it and move on,” said receivers coach and passing game coordinator Thad Ward, whose unit remains among the strongest on the team. “Whether good or bad, you have to forget and move on. Don’t forget the feeling, how it felt, but move on.”

For Temple to do so, the older players will have to provide leadership. Despite all the defections, there were several longtime members of the program who decided to stay. The NCAA didn’t count last season on a player’s eligibility, so Temple and many college teams will have veterans who have been in the program for as many as six seasons.

One of the key sixth-year players is cornerback Freddie Johnson, who was recruited by Matt Rhule, began as a wide receiver, and moved to the secondary in the summer of 2019.

He said he had no thoughts of leaving.

“I have good relations with [cornerbacks] coach [Melvin] Rice and Coach Carey,” Johnson said.

The football team’s standard is to be “Temple tough.”

Last season, it was difficult to tough it out with so many blowout losses. The Owls lost their last five games of the season by an average of 24.2 points.

As Ward suggested, the Owls this spring have put last year’s miserable season behind them. The only time it is usually mentioned is when a media member asks about it.

“We got to grind, get back to where we were. We have to get that mentality back, that Temple tough mentality,” said Johnson, who has appeared in 41 career games with three starts. “I believe we are on our way to get right back there. We know we are good, and I don’t think we are too far off in that mentality.”

Like Johnson, receiver Randle Jones is in his sixth year at Temple. Both Johnson and Jones hail from Florida, so it isn’t as if they’ve had a lifelong attachment to Philadelphia. Each has already earned his undergraduate degree, and both feel another year at Temple could help their chances to play at the next level.

Jones has grown an attachment to Temple and said, even though many of his teammates departed via the transfer portal, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

» READ MORE: Five questions heading into Temple’s football spring practice

“The school is family-oriented. I felt like I belonged here,” said Jones, who has appeared in 41 games at Temple, making seven starts. “Leaving to go somewhere else, you never know what can happen. But I’m here now and just focused on the season.”