"On offense, we have a third-down issue. Looking at the tape on Sunday and Monday, third down is where we're really getting hurt, three of 12 on third down. You can't do that, so what's happening is we're not staying on the field on offense to be able to give us our explosiveness, to get our run game going, we're not staying on the field, and on defense we're not getting off the field. And that's the problem we're in," said Addazio, whose team has a bye this week.
"On defense, we feel like we have a good mixture of pressure, but we've been in some situations where we had some good pressure calls, some blitzes coming, we kind of throttled on the blitzes, we get a quarterback double-clutching, we should be hitting them and [we're] not.
"We've got to rally to the ball a little bit better and we've just got to put ourselves in those situations and develop. That's what football is. On offense, it starts, No. 1, with protection. We've got two young freshmen in there and a guy who hasn't played a lot before . . . so that's a work in progress."
Addazio also pointed out the youth that the 1-2 Owls showcased at Happy Valley. Eleven freshmen and redshirt freshmen saw playing time, including left tackle Zach Hooks and right guard Kyle Friend, who filled in for the injured Jaimen Newman.
"I felt coming into the bye week we really needed to get back to the fundamentals and start to develop again because we're a very young football team right now," Addazio said. "We were playing two freshman offensive linemen, three freshman wide receivers, three sophomore redshirt players on the offense, four on the defense. So you've got to grow and you've got to develop."
Even with the lack of success on third down and the youth movement, Addazio is confident that, with hard work, the Owls will bounce back.
"Now that we've identified it, we're going to go into the bye week and we're going to come right back in and we're going to go right after those areas that are our major concerns and try to get a little bit better," Addazio said. "If we can all - coaches and players alike - continue to grow, address the issues, and have a great attitude and great determination, which we do, we'll start to slowly get better and improve and become more competitive."
McManus honored
Temple senior kicker/punter Brandon McManus was named Big East specialist of the week.
McManus had two field goals against Penn State and averaged 48.5 yards on six punts. He is one of eight players in the country who handle all kicking duties.
USF kickoff
Temple's Big East opener against South Florida will kick off at noon on Oct. 6 at Lincoln Financial Field. The Owls (1-2) have a bye this week. USF is 2-2, 0-1 in the Big East, and hosts Florida State on Saturday.
