No. 13 Oklahoma too much for Temple in 42-3 rout
Oklahoma is building its roster with the help of approximately $12 to $13 million in revenue share and a robust NIL collective that has distributed a fair share of its $32 million in payments to its football program.
Temple, meanwhile, was hoping to knock off the 13th-ranked Sooners Saturday at Lincoln Financial Field as a 21.5-point underdog and about 15% of Oklahoma’s revenue share total. The momentum of a 2-0 start, the Owls hoped, coupled with a key turnover here or a special teams score there, could perhaps close the gap and pave the way to an upset or at least a game that would be competitive headed into the fourth quarter.
It wasn’t to be.
The difference in talent and resources, especially along the line of scrimmage, showed in Oklahoma’s 42-3 rout of Temple before a crowd of 24,927. The loss dropped the Owls to 2-1 ahead of next Saturday’s road game at Georgia Tech, which improved to 3-0 with an upset win over No. 12 Clemson Saturday.
Heisman hopeful John Mateer, a quarterback Oklahoma wrested away from other Power 4 programs as a transfer out of Washington State, completed 20 of his 34 passes for 282 yards and a touchdown and accounted for 63 more on the ground in a little less than three quarters of play. On his last play of the day, the 6-foot-1, 225-pound redshirt junior ripped off a 51-yard run on a keeper that really put the game on ice at 42-3 with 5:04 still left to play in the third quarter. He also got plenty of help from highly-touted freshman running back Tony Blaylock, who ran for two touchdowns and 100 yards on 14 carries.
Oklahoma’s defense sacked Temple quarterback Evan Simon three times and kept him uncomfortable most of the day, stifling him into a 13-of-25 passing performance for just 75 yards before backup Gevani McCoy finished off the game.
Oklahoma (3-0) scored on its first four drives – including three touchdowns – in building an early 25-point lead it never came close to relinquishing. Although the sack total could have been worse, the Sooners’ defense ruled the line of scrimmage, often stacking eight players in the box and daring Simon to make quick throws into single coverage.
On a few occasions, Simon held the ball a tick too long. On others, he had little to no time to throw.
“You look for consistency,” a dejected Simon said after the game, “and there really was none (on Temple’s end) in what they did. They did what they wanted, whether that was bring the house or play coverage, so respect to them.”
Beyond the revenue share and NIL disparities, Temple still played a poor football game. Its defense, particularly its secondary, missed tackles and played flat-footed. Save for a Carl Hardin 34-yard field goal, the Owls were substandard on special teams. Tyler Stewart stepped out at the 1-yard line on a second quarter kickoff return, and Dante Atton couldn’t do much to flip the field, averaging just 38.3 yards on 12 punts, including a 19-yarder he shanked badly off his right foot.
And when Temple had even the earliest opportunity to grab some momentum, it squandered it by surrendering a long third-down conversion to Oklahoma. More on that later.
Oklahoma outgained Temple 515-104 and held the Owls to just 26 net rushing yards and an average of an anemic 1.9 yards per play. The Sooners racked up 10 tackles for loss on the day and held Temple to just 3-of-16 on third down, including two stops that deflated early drives. On a first quarter third-and-1 at the Owls’ 34, sophomore defensive lineman David Stone dropped Jay Ducker for a three-yard loss. Later in the quarter, with Temple at third-and-1 and in solid position at the Oklahoma 48 and trailing 11-0, Reggie Powers III sacked Simon for a 10-yard loss.
“There’s a handful of plays you look at, like some third-and-ones, where now we’re punting the ball,” Temple head coach K.C. Keeler said. “They were just really good up front, and we really struggled with them. Our offensive line, as I said earlier, (is) probably the most improved position we’ve had. We didn’t bring any new guys in. [The starting five] is all guys that were here, and they’ve played well. [Oklahoma’s defense] was a different animal.”
Keeler was most disappointed by the fact that his team didn’t play clean early, something he harped upon several times in the postgame press conference.
“We’re not going to be significantly better than anyone else on our schedule right now,” Keeler said, “so we’d better play cleaner early on.”
Later on in his postgame presser, Keeler succinctly summed up the biggest difference between the season’s first two weeks and Saturday.
“The reality is, the first two games, we didn’t really face anyone that if we made a mistake, we usually could cover up,” Keeler said. “We misaligned at UMass, they busted one down the sideline, we caught the guy at the three and we ended up getting a goal-line stand, and we fixed all that. Against these guys, you can’t do that. You can’t make a mistake up front, because they’re going to hurt you bad.”
Mateer also squirmed out of a handful of plays where he otherwise would have been sacked, something he has done and will likely do later this season, but it gnawed at Temple defensive tackle Sekou Kromah after the game.
“We’ve got to limit the self-inflicted wounds for sure,” said Kromah, who finished with seven tackles, including 2.5 tackles for loss and a sack. “We left a lot of food on the plate out there.”
Listen to Saturday’s postgame audio here:
Turning point
We can have our pick of a few here, but a couple of moments really mattered early on. One was a missed opportunity for the Owls, while another helped the game get out of hand.
Temple won the coin toss and elected to receive the opening kickoff but went three-and-out on its first possession. The Owls had the Sooners facing third-and-19 from the Temple 32 on the ensuing series, and holding the Sooners to a field goal there would have been a positive development. Instead, Mateer had plenty of time to throw and found a wide-open Jaren Kanak to his left, with the Sooners’ tight end getting down to the Temple 9-yard line. Two plays later, Jovante Barnes scored from three yards out, and Oklahoma shifted into a trick-play formation to get a two-point conversion pass from Kanak to punter Jacob Ulrich that spotted the Sooners an early 8-0 lead.
Later in the half after a Blaylock six-yard touchdown run helped lift Oklahoma to an 18-0 lead at the 12:11 mark of the second quarter, Tyler Stewart fielded the ensuing kickoff near the front-left corner of the end zone and stepped out at the 1-yard line. Temple was fortunate to avoid a safety, went three-and-out, and Atton mustered a punt of just 38 yards on fourth down.
Three plays later, Temple erred again in a moment that was really a microcosm of the game as a whole. On third-and-10 from the Owls’ 45 after two incompletions, Mateer had way too much time in the pocket and threw incomplete again, but cornerback Ben Osueke was flagged for holding, giving Oklahoma the automatic first down it needed to keep the drive going. Two plays later, Blaylock scored his second touchdown of the day, this one from 18 yards out as the Sooners pushed their lead to 25-0 with 10:05 still left in the second quarter.
How Temple got its only points of the day
Trailing already by 25-0 late in the second quarter, Temple pinned Oklahoma at its own 9-yard line with 3:42 left before halftime. On first down, Mateer threw over the middle of the field to Keontez Lewis, but Owls linebacker Ty Davis drilled him and wrestled the ball for him for an interception that set Temple up at the Oklahoma 13.
From there, Simon threw incomplete on first down and then offensive coordinator Tyler Walker tried a trick play on second down in which Simon flipped to McCoy, but McCoy had to throw the ball away. Simon lost three yards on third down, and Hardin came on for his 34-yard field goal that made it a 25-3 ballgame with 2:33 left before halftime.
Up next
Temple will play on the road next Saturday at 4:30 p.m. against a 3-0 Georgia Tech team that is likely to move into the Top 25 after knocking off No. 12 Clemson Saturday in Atlanta thanks to an Aidan Birr 55-yard field goal as time expired.
After facing one of the nation’s best quarterbacks Saturday in Mateer, the Owls will have another significant challenge on their hands in Yellow Jackets signal caller Haynes King, who missed last week’s game with a lower-body injury but returned Saturday to complete 20 of his 28 passes for 211 yards and rush for 103 yards and a touchdown on 25 carries.
