Temple not quite ready for prime time as Stan Drayton era begins

So now we know, a coaching change can not produce miracles for Temple football.

A new staff brought in by Stan Drayton could not get much more out of Owls players than the previous coaches -- at least not right away. Nothing looked terribly different Friday night in Temple’s opener at Duke.

Duke practically looked like Clemson, which obviously says more about Temple than it does Duke since the Blue Devils are picked last in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

This, we can now confirm, after a 30-0 Duke victory, will be a total Owls rebuild, brick by Temple brick, a multi-year project. Any progress this season will be incremental and maybe not always noticeable to the outside eye.

» READ MORE: Stan Drayton’s Temple tenure off to an inauspicious start as Owls get blown out by Duke

Let’s also remind that Rod Carey didn’t ultimately fail at Temple because his staff somehow forgot how to game plan or even teach football techniques. The man had won 23 games in his last two years at Northern Illinois, and eight in his first at Temple. Carey failed because of greater sins, deciding he’d do it all his way, which was an insular way. Carey floundered in recruiting, especially locally, and ultimately his own players stopped believing, the greatest sin in sports.

For the new man, easy to root for, this all represents a huge challenge and a great opportunity. Nothing about Drayton’s task is easy, when basic competencies need to be restored. Forget dreams about proving they are attractive right now to the ACC. That is way off in the distance. Right now, Temple would be an underdog to Villanova, a top performer one level down in FCS.

The Drayton era began with a couple of missed tackles on a big early Duke pass play, with a botched handoff by Temple ending the first Owls drive. A team loss in every way.

The score could have been way worse. The Blue Devils could have put up 50. Forcing Duke to attempt six field goals (only making three) is a win for Temple -- may as well give that to the Owls, who never got in field-goal range themselves. Duke averaged 7.7 yards per play, only punting twice. Temple managed only one first down on its first five drives, and promptly failed to gain a yard before punting after that solo first down. Duke got the ball back and scored four plays later for a 24-0 lead, over 7 minutes still left in the second quarter.

There were only a few nice Owls defensive plays to really spotlight, and you have to assume the defenders making those few plays had some misses too, since there were a lot of misses out there.

» READ MORE: Stan Drayton's path to Temple

This game returned memories of just how awful Temple really was last season before Carey got fired. Take away the Wagner game (please) and Temple only scored more than 14 points twice all of last season. It’s impossible to say the players didn’t quit on the season when the average score of the seven straight AAC losses that closed the season was 42.7 to 8.4. The Owls were 127th of 130 FBS teams in scoring offense and 122 of 130 in scoring defense.

So, yes, the hype you might see on social media is true, how there are more players in the NFL right now from Temple than any other non-Power 5 school and more than from a lot of Power 5 schools … That’s all past tense, a teasing aspiration. The top recent additions to that list got to the pros after transferring away from Temple.

With the new college football 12-team playoff format headed to the finish line, scheduled to be up and running between 2024 and ‘26 … Temple should be OK if it’s 2026. The Owls might need 2036. Let’s assume the Owls were about 100 teams away from making the top 12 last season. Let’s stipulate Temple needs to have its act completely together to be the one and only Group of 5 representative among the 12 teams. The 2015 and ‘16 Temple teams would have been just misses.

Again, let’s not act like Temple has anything but years of hard work ahead to get back to where the Owls were taking the field against Penn State and Notre Dame in 2015. It’s better to think of this as early Al Golden era than early Matt Rhule era. Not in terms of needing more infrastructure at Temple. All that exists to compete in the American Athletic Conference. Mainly, in terms of getting the recruiting paths back open, giving recruits reason to think Temple can be a path to the NFL.

Friday night, while one team could barely find a first down or get across the 50-yard line, the other was playing pitch and catch, Duke quarterback Riley Leonard completing his first 13 passes. St. Joseph’s Prep graduate Sahmir Hagans had more fun than anyone else from Philly. He just happens to play for Duke. Hagans got away deep down the sideline for a TD catch late in the first half.

Not everything was completely sloppy, but it was hard to notice anything scheme-wise that really suggested these new coaches could provide advantages. It’s good to remember, that’s not how things usually work with coaching changes. The line advantages favored Duke, on both sides of the ball.

Here was a chance for a late defensive highlight: Fourth-and-1 for Duke, late in the third quarter. Could the Owls make a stop? Nope, a gap was found, first down Blue Devils. Next play, a 20-yard gain, a quarter still to go … a season just beginning.