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Mathis feels 'at home' with Temple's coaching staff

D’Wan Mathis had to learn how to walk and talk again.

Since his collegiate career began, the 6-foot-6, 205-pound quarterback from Oak Park, Michigan has consistently stared down adversity.

The Georgia transfer underwent emergency surgery to remove a brain cyst in 2019. He subsequently missed his entire freshman campaign, which he redshirted.

“It was a surprise for me and my family as well,” Mathis said during Temple’s Friday media availability. “I wouldn’t even call it a horrible experience. I’d call it a life-changing experience. Because before, I felt like I was full of myself. I thought I had arrived and everything.

"And now, with that being said, that’s helped me tremendously with dealing with adversity. I feel like now, no matter what anybody throws in front of me, I can beat it. No matter what the obstacle is. Whether it deals with football or real life, it doesn’t really matter. I’ll definitely explain that as a humbling experience. I’m thankful for it. It’s only made me stronger.”

Mathis started Georgia’s season opener against Arkansas last fall, completing 8 of 17 passes with 55 passing yards and an interception. He was ultimately replaced by former walk-on Stetson Bennett in the Bulldogs' 37-10 win.

From there, once USC transfer J.T. Daniels was deemed healthy enough to play, Mathis fell to fourth on the quarterback depth chart.

Mathis elected to enter the transfer portal and came out the other side an Owl. Once a highly-touted 4-star recruit, he left Athens, Georgia for what he believes are greener pastures ahead.

“It was definitely a tough decision leaving behind everything that I put in there and all the work,” Mathis said. “But coming here, I felt like the coaching staff was definitely a family feel. The players, the way the team is jelling right now, I feel like it’s the best decision that I could’ve possibly made for myself moving forward.”

For Mathis, it wasn’t just football pushing this decision. He’s been recruited by a lot of FBS schools in the country and he’s heard it all. Mathis was looking at what type of relationships would be on the horizon, rather than hearing what he’s already heard before.

“A lot of people don’t understand what goes into a college football player’s life every day,” Mathis said. “We’re more than football players in my eyes. Me being in college two years, I wanted to go play for a player’s coach, a coach that puts his players first and make sure that we’re always OK, no matter what the circumstances were.”

“Winning games and all that is all good," Mathis added. "But if your mindset, your mental is not in the right place ... at the end of the day when you step on the field, the last thing you’re gonna be worried about is we didn’t get a first down, we didn’t get a third, we didn’t convert on third down, none of that stuff really matters. My biggest thing for me was going to a coach that actually cared about me.”

Mathis feels like that’s Rod Carey.

He spoke with Temple’s third-year head coach every day during the recruiting process. Carey was the only head coach that Mathis directly heard from. Whenever Mathis needed to talk to his now-head coach, he was there.

Although Mathis feels at home with the coaching staff already, he’s had to win over the respect of his teammates.

It seems he’s done more than enough to already win over veteran receivers Jadan Blue and Randle Jones.

“As soon as [Mathis] committed to Temple, [building chemistry] was something that we worked on,” Blue said. “Just trying to figure out what we’re doing and where our heads are at. That carried over to when we got here. You kind of feel like you already know the person just from a few text messages.”

“I’m just happy that we’re able to connect ... this kid has a great arm,” Blue added. “Even when the ball might not be perfect, he is always trying to improve and critique himself.”

Now that Mathis has landed on his feet at Temple, his next obstacle awaits him.

That next hurdle is a wide-open quarterback competition that’s begun to heat up since the start of spring practice last week.

Although Mathis is the highest-rated recruit in the history to be part of the Temple program, he hasn’t been promised the starting job. It’s something that he’s had to come in and fight for. Now he’s battling it out with Re-al Mitchell, Mariano Valenti and Matt Duncan, as the Owls continue to search for their presumptive starter against Rutgers on Sept. 4.

For Mathis, he’s coming from a college town with a whole lot of history where the team and individuals are under a microscope. That’s not exactly the landscape of North Philadelphia, where it’s more about production and less about who you are.

“The biggest difference is tough guys only,” Mathis said. “Tough guys meaning, if you’re not built for this, you’re not gonna make it in this town. I mean, unless you actually want to be here and unless you’re ready to deal with the different things we got to deal with every day like the weather. Going outside, you never know what you might get. It might be 68 one day, might go out there and it may be 20.

“But, we know when we step out there we got to go to work. And I mean, having everything set up for you here, you’ve got to put your work, you actually got to take care of yourself and do what you got to do. And I’ll say, the biggest thing for me was the coaches being able to support like they support us here. I mean like no other. It feels like when we come in here, we can say, we can voice our opinions to the coaches and they’ll actually listen.”

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