Tuesday notebook: Talking about SMU
A handful of Temple football players from both the offensive and defensive sides of the ball spoke to reporters Tuesday to reflect on the loss to Tulane and talk about preparing for Saturday's home game against SMU at Lincoln Financial Field.
Between having players in the COVID protocol on top of the growing number of injuries, Temple felt the scarcity in its depth during last week’s 38-3 road loss.
The Owls were without a few key starters like quarterback Anthony Russo, linebacker Isaiah Graham-Mobley, tight ends David Martin-Robinson and Darius Pittman, right guard Adam Klein and BUBO Yvandy Rigby.
Starting in Russo’s place under center for the second straight week will be Trad Beatty, who said he feels more comfortable in the position.
The upside is that he now has a complete game under his belt and a week of practice knowing for certain that he’ll be under center for at least the opening drive. From there, head coach Rod Carey intends to stick with the same scheme of bringing in Re-al Mitchell soon after, alternating between the two with the hope of one heating up.
That, of course, netted the Owls just three points last Saturday, which came on their opening drive. Beatty completed 11 of his 18 passes for 122 yards, threw an interception and was sacked three times. Mitchell completed 5 of 8 passes for 23 yards and finished as the Owls' leading rusher (37 yards on seven carries) on a day when Temple managed just 222 yards of total offense.
Safety Amir Tyler was in good spirits about his minor injury after tackling a Tulane player the wrong way. The redshirt senior safety said it was just a low ankle sprain and nothing too serious. He said he will be good to go for Saturday’s game.
Here are some excerpts from conversations with each of the players made available to reporters Tuesday:
Trad Beatty on alternating with Re-al Mitchell:
“I wouldn’t necessarily say [it adds pressure]. I think a lot of people will understand it from that perspective. But for me personally, I try not to look at it that way. I just want to go out there and do the best I can for my teammates and do what I can to try and help the team win.”
Defensive end Arnold Ebiketie on losing both sides of the ball against Tulane:
“I definitely feel like we could have done better, especially on the defensive side and the offensive side. I don’t waste time to improve, so that’s why we go back to practice and fix things that we can do better so we can be better the next game…. You watch film and it always comes down to the little things. It’s not really that Tulane beat us. It’s more like we beat ourselves by the mistakes that we saw on both sides of the ball.”
Amir Tyler on helping out with underclassmen:
“Some of the guys like (safety) MJ [Griffin] and Alex [Odom], Trey Blair might be coming back this week. He missed a lot. So I’m just trying to make sure if anything happens that any of those guys could be ready. Anything they need, they know they can call my phone. I’ll help them with plays, formations and adjustments. They’ve been a lot better going on knowing that they’re actually going to get into the game and knowing that anything can happen at any time. I think I kind of trust them more than they trust themselves sometimes.”
Tyler on SMU quarterback Shane Buechele:
“He looks better. He has a good relationship with his receivers and tight ends. I would just say he looks more developed and more mature back there. He looks more under control in his offense. This will probably be the most up-tempo team we play this year, not counting UCF.”
Chauncey Moore, who initially came to Temple as a cornerback, on moving from safety back to corner:
“Coach always says if you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready. With Linwood [Crump] getting injured, it wasn’t really like a big change because safety and corner you’re really doing the same thing -- either guarding a man or guarding a zone. I wouldn’t say it was that big of a difference really."
Linebacker Will Kwenkeu on bouncing back from the loss:
“It’s really about attitude. Everyone is banged up and it’s true it is a short season, but there’s been a lot going on this year. As a leader and a guy who’s been around the block for a few years now, I’m just trying to keep the morale up, even if my own morale is down at times. It’s also counting on the other leaders. We’re all human beings, so it’s just making sure we are there for each other and complementing each other.”
Kwenkeu on bringing energy to the game without fans:
“The biggest thing is our attitude and bringing our own energy to the party, bringing our own juice to the party. It really starts with us. There’s going to be ups and downs in a game and we can’t just depend on a crowd to be all the way juiced up for us. We have to make sure that we bring that energy the entire time. We have to make sure that we are communicating, doing our job and holding each other accountable and ourselves accountable. It is great having that atmosphere giving us chills having fans around, but that’s not our primary focus. Our primary focus is executing our job and making sure we are bringing that energy and maintaining that energy at a high level throughout the game.”
Wide receiver Randle Jones on playing with Beatty and Mitchell:
“We just got to do our job each and every play. We can’t really do much about who is throwing the ball, but we can do something about who is catching it. That’s what we do in our room, so we just got to execute what we’re doing.”
Tayvon Ruley on struggles in the run game:
“Every day at practice, we go over points of attacks and how Coach wants us to be decisive. Our problem in the running back room right now is we second guess a lot. In the game, we’ll have a zone run play and we’re missing a hole because we’re not decisive. I would say the first four games, it was more of us being indecisive. I feel like going along, we’re going to get better at that because we make it a big point at practice and we focus on that more. So I feel like we’re going to start being more decisive and execute on our run plays.”