One day, two blown opportunities

By Mike Gibson
You can say Saturday's 24-14 loss to Central Michigan was another blown opportunity for the Owls.
You could say that, but you could make a better argument the Owls blew two rather enormous opportunities.
That's because the team just ahead of Temple in the MAC East standings, Buffalo, blew a 22-6 lead and lost a 34-28 game at overtime to Western Michigan.
Think about it.
Had Temple beaten CMU, the Owls would have been in first place in the MAC East.
Come to think of it, had the Owls scored as few as eight points against Western Michigan and capitalized on knocking out the Mid-American Conference's best quarterback, Dan LeFevour, they would have been sitting pretty.
The disturbing and over-riding thought here is that they have run out of opportunities for this season. To get to seven wins, they would have to win out and beat a Navy team that beat No. 21 Wake Forest.
Their opportunities for being the kind of team many of us thought they could be appear to be in the rearview window.
Western Michigan, Miami, Central Michigan ... those are the games they could have ... should have ... won, even without Adam DiMichele.
One and two in those games just didn't cut it.
Would they have won three straight games by burning quarterback Vaughn Charlton's redshirt?
I think so, but I'm not getting paid $575,000 to make those decisions so I defer to Al Golden on that one.
I think the salient point here is that it was much more important to win this year than to count on something Charlton MIGHT have been able to do the next two seasons.
You win as many games as you can now.
I could be wrong, but I don't think so.
Ugh.
I predicted before the game that I was wary of the Central Michigan game because I knew there would be a big and questionable penalty at a bad time that would cost the Owls the game.
I was right. The following quote is from my post of two days ago. I didn't need to be a Nostradamus to make this pre-game observation. Every other Temple fan with two good eyes sees the game thing week after week:

"It's gotten so ridiculous at times this year that every time Temple makes a big
play or scores a touchdown, I expect to see a flag."

So it was with no surprise that penalties and mistakes hurt the Owls. A 40-yard run by Kee-Ayre Griffin was called back on a holding penalty. Bruce Francis also appeared to have a 38-yard touchdown catch on 4th and 11, but Francis was hit by teammate Dy�Onne Crudup in the end zone to break up the touchdown catch.
It was reminiscent of the time Derek Dennis tackled his own Owl teammate in the open field last year at Army.
Freak plays seem to only happen TO Temple and not for Temple.
It's both frustrating and disgusting.

Francis was hit by
teammate Dy'Onne Crudup
in the end zone to break up
the touchdown catch. It was
reminiscent of the time Derek Dennis
tackled his own teammate in the open
field last year at Army. Freak plays
seem to only happen TO Temple.

If the penalties are the officials' fault, it's criminal. If they are the Owls' fault, you have to wonder what they are doing in the 15 hours of practice allotted for each week.
The guess here is that the truth lies somewhere in between.
�Penalties and mistakes killed us,� Golden said. �The penalties are just coming at really bad times in the game.�
Golden was seen yelling at the officials several times in the waning moments of the game. Yet he made no mention of his disaproval with the officials during the post-game session.

If the penalties are
the officials' fault, it's criminal.
If they are the Owls fault,
you have to wonder what they
are doing in the 15 hours
of practice alloted for each week

Let's hope he makes his feelings known to the MAC Supervisor of Officials.
The squeaky wheel gets the oil and unless Golden becomes a pest to the officials and they know they are going to hear about it in review sessions, the Owls will not be the beneficiary of any calls down the line.
Just what help that gets Temple now is debatable.