Instant analysis: ECU 45, Temple 3
Temple dropped its fourth straight game with a 45-3 loss to ECU Saturday. This is Temple’s fourth straight multi-score loss, dropping the Owls to 3-6 on the season and 1-4 in American Athletic Conference play.
“We gotta coach better,” third-year head coach Rod Carey said after the game. “We need to play better. There is a lot of things we need to fix. We gotta keep making those strides and getting that done.”
The Owls had some chances to score early in the game, but special teams mishaps and a stagnant offense kept them from capitalizing on ECU’s mistakes and their own long drives.
Temple starting quarterback D’Wan Mathis suffered an injury in the middle of the second quarter after a sack. He went down and grabbed his left ankle before leaving the game and getting replaced by true freshman backup Justin Lynch.
Carey said postgame they will know more about Mathis’ injury on Sunday or Monday.
Mathis finished the game going 7 of 13 for 37 yards and no touchdowns. Lynch finished the game going 6 of 20 for 20 yards and zero touchdowns.
The Owls’ defense started the game off well, stopping ECU on its first two drives. But eventually, the flood gates opened.
ECU’s offense finished with 444 total yards and quarterback Holton Ahlers went 15 of 23 for 191 yards and three touchdowns.
Here are a few other key moments and takeaways from Saturday’s game:
TURNING POINT
Saturday’s turning point came late in the second quarter when ECU faced a fourth-and-15 from Temple territory, but not quite in field goal range. The Owls already trailed 14-0 and needed a stop to keep the game within reach.
Instead, Ahlers escaped the pocket and hit Audie Omotoshofor a gain of 16 yards along the left sideline with a perfectly-placed pass, netting ECU a critical conversion.
Then a couple of plays later, Ahlers found C.J. Johnson for an easy touchdown from nine yards out, putting ECU up 21-0 with just 1 minute and 33 seconds left in the half. It was Ahlers’ third touchdown pass of the half.
Temple was outscored 21-3 the rest of the way.
The fourth-and-15 play felt like a moment where Temple could have made a stop, gotten good field position and then tried to build off that momentum. However, none of that happened, and the Owls ended up down by three scores in the first half once again.
The play exemplified a lot of what has ailed Temple this season. They dropped nine players into coverage on that fourth-down conversion, and yet somehow, ECU converted anyway.
Even when the Owls’ thought process and play calling is good, things still aren’t going their way this season.
THE OFFENSE CONTINUES TO STRUGGLE
Temple’s offense was supposed to be a strength of the team this season. They returned an experienced offense line, proven playmakers and added a highly-touted recruit at quarterback. Despite this, the Owls’ offense has looked like it’s been stuck in a slough for weeks now.
Temple accumulated just 72 yards in the first half, including recording just one net yard in the second quarter, and didn’t start to generate much momentum until ECU was leading the game 28-0.
Temple’s offense squandered some opportunities with good field position in this game, too. Jalen Ware intercepted Ahlers early in the second quarter, giving Temple’s offense the ball at the ECU 25.
The Owls’ offense then proceeded to run three plays for a total of minus-one yard. Rory Bell then missed a 43-yard field, one of his two misses in the game.
Things didn’t get much better in the second half either. Temple finished with just 168 yards for the game.
While the Owls’ passing attack was quite underwhelming, the running game was essentially nonexistent. Malik Copper picked up 14 yards on an impressive run where he made multiple people miss in the first half, but outside of that, Temple couldn’t do anything on the ground.
Lynch racked up 54 rushing yards, but Temple’s actual running backs only gained 36 yards on the ground.
Temple fell behind quickly, so it went away from the running game early in this one. With that said, it is obvious that the offensive line is still struggling to move people up front and create open holes.
ECU was getting consistent penetration into the backfield, forcing Temple’s backs to make people miss early in reps. The Owls’ running backs are just not dynamic enough to deal with contact behind the line and pick up good yardage.
It’s difficult to find a remedy to the Owls' offensive woes when absolutely nothing they are doing is working. They’ve tried to get the ball into the hands of their playmakers on easy plays all season with little success. They’ve tried using six different running backs this season, and they have the worst rushing offense in the AAC.
It’s cliche, but Temple’s offense doesn’t have an identity. There is nothing the Owls can hang their hat on right now.
THE DEFENSE ISN’T EXECUTING THE LITTLE THINGS
Unlike the Owls’ offense, the defense has had something to hang its hat on this season — the Owls’ pass defense.
However, that doesn’t seem to be the case after last week’s loss to UCF, when they gave up five passing touchdowns, and Saturday’s game, when they gave up three passing touchdowns.
Two of ECU’s passing touchdowns came from blatant screw-ups from the Owls’ secondary.
The first came in the first quarter when Ahlers hit Ryan Jones for a 33-yard touchdown. Jones was wide open after a play-action fake sucked in safety M.J. Griffin, leaving nobody covering the deep half of the field.
The next one came with 8:17 remaining in the second quarter. Ahlers threw a 28-yard touchdown to a wide-open Jones, who got behind safety Amir Tyler after another play-action fake.
Griffin and Tyler are both coming off of injuries, but they know better than to get sucked that far in off of play action. In their defense, Temple’s lack of ability to stop the run likely forces them to compensate a bit by getting into the box.
Tyler mentioned after the game that Jones was not his man, but the pre-snap motion threw things off. Either way, it’s a miscommunication that shouldn’t be happening this late in the season.
The Owls couldn’t stop the run again Saturday and gave up 246 rushing yards. Keaton Micthell finished the game with 137 yards and two touchdowns, and Rahjai Harris finished the game with 47 yards.
Temple has struggled with maintaining gap integrity and tackling all season. Both of those things led to a 57-yard touchdown run by Micthell to open the second half, as he ran right through Temple’s defense with Ahlers as his lead blocker, putting ECU up by 28-0.
The Owls’ defense even had some trouble lining up at times Saturday. With 4:38 remaining in the third quarter, Mitchell scored again as he ran right up the middle from four yards out, putting ECU up 35-0.
Before the snap, William Kwenkeu looked like he realigned redshirt-freshman defensive lineman Jacoby Sharpe, who was lined up in the wrong gap.
If a defense can’t line up correctly, it is hard to really focus on things like scheme and play calling. There is no fix for biting on play-action and not holding gaps in the running game.
Players know those things. They just aren’t executing.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN GOING FORWARD?
It’s difficult to say anything about this Temple team that hasn’t been said already. The same mistakes pop up week in and week out with little to no improvement across the board.
Temple was outscored 7-0 in the first quarter Saturday, increasing its first-quarter scoring deficit to 74-7 on the season. The Owls were unable to move the ball on offense and the defense couldn’t stop ECU in any facet.
Temple can technically still win out this season, finish 6-6 and become bowl eligible. However, the Owls have been outscored 180-27 in their last four games. Expecting them to win one more game this season might be too much to ask for.
Blowout losses are starting to become commonplace for the Owls. This was their 13th loss by more than 20 points since 2019.
Tyler said after the game Temple’s players are still focused and buying in.
“Everybody is definitely locked in,” Tyler said. “I think we need to turn it up just a notch, but a lot of the young guys are out there getting experience. They are getting better and better, but I would definitely say everybody is still locked in.”
ECU isn’t a bad team, but there is no reason for Temple to look like it didn’t belong on the same field.
That’s where this Temple program is at right now. The Owls don’t look like they belong with even average AAC teams.
Nothing has changed from last week. Fans should still be concerned about Temple’s future.