Colin Chase and Owls "flushed" last week's loss in looking ahead to Army

Two days after Temple’s 45-14 blowout loss to East Carolina last Saturday, wide receiver Colin Chase was taking questions about what went wrong on offense against one of the nation’s better defenses.

“So on our end, we didn’t help out our OC (offensive coordinator Tyler Walker) on some plays,” Chase said. “We didn’t take care of the little details in our job. We had a couple misalignments or missed assignments, myself included. So today, we’re cleaning up those mistakes and making sure, because if we play a talented team like ECU, we can’t afford to have those mistakes, or else that’s going to be the result.”

Chase’s answer came in response to a question pertaining to the offensive struggles the Owls faced against the Pirates. Chase led Temple with five catches for 57 yards, but quarterback Evan Simon only threw for 80 yards on 11-of-20 passing before being taken out in the fourth quarter, failing to throw for a touchdown while tossing his first interception of the season.

Factoring in 18 lost yards on two sacks, Temple produced  just 82 yards on 30 attempts as a team, averaging 2.7 yards per carry, although the Owls did score both of their touchdowns on the ground with Jay Ducker‘s 4-yard scoring run in the first quarter and Keveun Mason‘s 29-yard run that tied the game at the 11:24 mark of the second quarter. 

But Temple never scored again. Head coach K.C. Keeler said after Saturday’s game that the Pirates seemed to have taken advantage of having 16 days off to prepare and looked like they were sitting on some of the Owls’ routes on pass plays. 

Chase said he could attest to his head coach’s statement.

“ECU is a very talented team,” said Chase, who has caught 26 passes for 264 yards and two touchdowns through Temple’s first nine games. “Sometimes we ran certain concepts and they just flooded the zone. They prepared very well.” 

What awaits Temple Saturday in West Point is an Army defense ranked 57th among all FBS teams in points allowed at 23.12 per game and 49th in total defense, giving up an average of 347 yards per contest. Senior inside linebacker Andon Thomas leads the Black Knights in tackles with 69 to go with two tackles for loss and pass breakups, while senior outside linebacker Eric Ford, sophomore defensive lineman Jack Bousum and sophomore nickelback Cole Searight have contributed six of Army’s nine sacks with two apiece. 

A Temple team still in search of its sixth win of the season wants to get bowl-eligible and end the program’s five-year drought in that capacity. That means forgetting about the ECU loss and looking ahead to a 4-4 Army team coming off a 20-17 win over Air Force.

“We flushed it,” said Chase, who said the team was going to dive into the Army film Monday.  “The good thing about this conference is everyone’s good, so we’re always going to play meaningful games.”

Army owns the American Conference’s third-best pass defense unit, having allowed just 201.9 yards per game and nine touchdowns. Only ECU (six) has given up fewer passing touchdowns. Chase said he “initially noticed their toughness and discipline” in watching Army’s film. 

Chase believes the way Temple’s receivers have come together as a unit and complimented each other’s abilities will help get the offense back on track this weekend. He’s part of a receiving corps that includes Kajiya Hollawayne, who is having a career-best season with 33 catches for 439 yards and six touchdowns, and JoJo Bermudez, who has added 29 catches for 405 yards and four scores. 

And tight end Peter Clarke, like Hollawayne, has broken out this season. The junior from London has 24 catches for 383 yards and four touchdowns, all career highs, although Clarke, Bermudez and Hollawayne were held to a combined four receptions by ECU. 

“If they drop an extra guy over here, well, we have a great receiver to throw to over there,” Chase said, “or even at the tight end position. So I feel like everyone compliments each other very nice. And then obviously, we have a veteran quarterback, Evan, who’s one of the best I’ve ever been around. So it’s a good deal.”

When asked about Army’s defense Monday, Keeler pointed to the way the Black Knights shift and move their defensive alignments between three- and four-down lineman fronts, and are efficient in doing so.

“It’s like one of those things where they move enough that they drive you crazy, but they’re really efficient at doing it, too,” Keeler said, “It’s not like they do 50 things and they’re not good at it. The things that they do, they’re really good at.”