Owls sputter in second half, drop Pennsylvania battle to #16 Nittany Lions

PHILADELPHIA – Do not let the box score fool you, this game was closer than many believe. 

The Owls welcomed the #16 Nittany Lions to Philadelphia for their first matchup since 2016 in Happy Valley, and with it being Temple’s biggest game in years, the crowd was nothing to sneeze at.

The Owls welcomed in 61,714 Penn State and Temple fans Saturday afternoon, nearly 3.5 times their average attendance from last season., 

On the first play of the game, Penn State QB Rocco Becht found an open receiver for a 56 yard strike, with a face mask penalty to top it off, giving the Nittany Lions a quick 71 yards to the Owls 9 yard line. 

What followed was the Owls defense standing strong and forcing a field goal attempt.

The crowd roared as kicker Ryan Barker missed the field goal from 33 yards out to turn the ball over on downs. 

Owls safety Saboor Karriem described the opening drive as confidence inducing, but knew there was still work to be done.

“Definitely gives you confidence, but it’s a four quarter game.”

Karriem also highlighted riding the momentum of the game after the strong defensive stand to open the game.

“And from there, when they miss the field goal, it’s like all right, fresh start. So you know, just like I said, ride the highs, pick up the lows.”

After a scoreless first quarter, Temple got on the board first after QB Jaxon Smolik broke off for a 47 yard run, which allowed the Owls to kick the field goal to go up 3-0, after a long 15 play, 91 yard drive that chewed eight minutes off the clock.

Nearing the end of the half it was a 3-3 game, but Penn State struck late with a little over a minute left, as Becht found a wide open man for a 23 yard touchdown to put the Nittany Lions up 10-3 at the half.

Coach K.C. Keeler mentioned how a miscommunication led to the eventual touchdown.

“They hit us in behind, and we kind of knew they were going there, but there was a miscommunication there.”

In the second half, things got ugly for the Owls as they gave up 17 points in the half, allowing the Nittany Lions to go on a 27-0 run after Temple struck first.

Multiple flags stalled offensive drives for the Owls and extended Penn State offensive drives.

“I told them, it was more about us playing clean than anything else.” Said Keeler, “We didn’t play clean enough.”

But despite the penalties and shortcomings, Keeler also mentioned how the Owls battled.

“You know, all in all, I thought our kids battled all day long against a good team.”

Keeler also noted how they were running out there with a sort of makeshift offensive line. 

“We’re out there playing with a true freshman at left tackle, a converted guard at right tackle, and our starting left tackle was one of the better players in this league. So we’re out there without three starting offensive linemen.” 

But, even with the banged up offensive line, the Owls running game found success. Keveun Mason led the team in yards again with 76 yards on 14 attempts, good for 5.4 per attempt. 

Keeler mentioned that Sam Brown V will be back for next week’s game against Toledo, and that he would have made an impact on this game along with Mason.

“I think Sam Brown would have made a difference in this game. Sam’s right there, he’ll play next week… .But you know I think that one-two punch, the way we ran the ball, would have helped a lot.”

Even with Mason’s continued success, it was Smolik who impressed with his legs. Smolik managed to escape multiple collapsing pockets and make something happen with his legs, as he had 71 yards on seven carries, which is over 10 yards per attempt. 

Smolik saw a majority of snaps, which was reportedly the gameplan according to Keeler.

“The thought process was that we couldn’t just go back and forth, and if you look at the first three drives Jaxon had in the first half of last week’s game…so we felt that Jaxon was the guy who could best keep this offense in rhythm.”

While the run game succeeded again, the pass game is still finding identity, as they finally got standout TE Peter Clarke involved this week, as he had six receptions for 31 yards. 

Clarke and sophomore tight end Ryder Kusch led the receiving room this week, making up 60 of the team’s 107 receiving yards. 

Even though the passing game started to find some rhythm at times, Smolik still mentioned he and the team have to be better. 

“Yeah, I mean, we played well, but not well enough in my eyes. We have a lot of things to fix, I have a lot of things to fix, and we can get those things fixed and be a really great team.”

On defense, the Owls had good games from Karriem and LB Curly Ordonez.

Karriem recorded eight tackles, while Ordonez had 12 tackles, including the lone sack for the Owls and a TFL.

The Owls also held the Nittany Lions to under five yards per carry, and for hold a team whose identity has been the run for years now is no small feat. 

It was the passing game that Temple couldn’t keep up with, as the Owls had multiple blown coverages and allowed Becht to throw for just under 270 yards and three touchdowns. 

Late in the fourth, Ajani Shepard came in for Smolik and scored a late touchdown against the Nittany Lions backup players to help ease the sting of the loss. 

Despite there being some bright sides to the game, the first thing Keeler said when he sat down for his post game presser was “No moral victories in our world.” 

The final score wound up being 27-9, not nearly as bad as many may have thought, but it still hurts knowing that it could have been closer had there been less mistakes. 

The Owls will travel to Ohio next weekend to face Toledo (1-1) for what will hopefully be a bounceback game with Brown making his season debut.