Cal Bears vs. Temple Owls
--By Mike Jensen (INQUIRER STAFF WRITER)
Temple's new football coach walked inside Veterans Stadium last night
and got a stomach-turning look at how far the Owls' program has to go to
become a winner. Coach Ron Dickerson saw a crowd that might have fit
inside McGonigle Hall, an opponent that scored touchdowns at will, a
final score that was right up there with the worst in Owls history.
The Owls took a 58-0 shellacking from 21st-ranked California that really
could have been worse. Temple has absorbed some brutal defeats in
recent seasons, but this was one tied for the second-worse losing margin
in Temple history. "Like the said, 'Don't expect miracles,'" Dickerson
said. "We've got to learn from this defeat. There's a lesson from
this, and we are gong to learn it. We're going to dissect the film and
dissect the film until we find out everything we want to get out of it .
. . and we're definitely going to find the players that really want to
play."
The coach held up his national championship ring from his time as a Penn
State assistant and said, "There are guys that don't know what it means
to gt this ring. They are going through the motions and think they can
play half-speed and do things on their own. The result was just a
thorougly depressing nilght. Players sat on benches, staring vacantly.
Assistant coaches slowly rubbed foreheads up in the press box. A group
of Army enlisted men who had come to check out the Owls walked out
before the first quarter had even ended.
California (3-0) scored as many ways as they could find. Two plays into
the second quarter, the Bears had a 31-0 lead. They had scored on a
punt return, on an interception return, and right after a botched punt
snap. The Bears scored on bombs and they scored on sweeps. They didn't
know how 'not' to score.