Following Temple's 13-10 loss to Bowling Green over the weekend, we questioned whether the Owls' unbalanced offense—demonstrated by their refusal to throw the ball—was generated by a lack of faith in the passing game or, instead, an err in play-calling.
During his Monday morning MAC Coaches' Teleconference, Steve Addazio spoke out on questions surrounding Chester Stewart performance and his own team's trouble throwing the football. The quotes are courtesy John Di Carlo at Owlscoop.com. From Addazio:
"I think we need to do a little better job around [quarterback Chester Stewart] in terms of protecting him and giving him an opportunity to have a little bit more balance on first and second down, and that's kind of where that is right now."
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When asked what it would take to fix the Owls' ailing passing attack, one that is ranked 11th out of 13 teams in the Mid-American Conference, Addazio responded by saying, "I think by nature we're going to run the football. We are a run team, and we've done that pretty effectively throughout the year and we mix in play-action passes. I don't think anything's broke. I just think it's a matter of making sure that we have more balance in what we choose to attack with."
So there you have it. I mean, you didn't actually expect him to throw his quarterback under the bus, did you? And, really, there was no reason to do so. There were some drops that weren't Chester's fault, and he really was put in a less than stellar position at the end of the game given Temple's particular make-up on offense. 3rd and longs are not this quarterback's or this team's forte.
The coach, more or less, just needs to put Chester in a better position to make....
Sorry, couldn't resist.
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Head on to OwlScoop for the full audio of the Monday teleconference.