Temple

This is the Year That Temple Football Goes OVER 5.5 Wins and Makes a Bowl Game

By Kevin Kinkead

Published: Aug 13th, 2026 · 11:42 AM EDT

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We’ve reached that point in mid-August when it’s time to start scraping the bottom of the barrel for content until football begins. The dog days of summer are upon us and the Phillies are annoying.

To that end, it’s time to open up PA sports betting apps and New Jersey sports betting apps and hammer the Temple Owls to win OVER 5.5 games and qualify for their first bowl game since 2019, when they were smoked 55-13 by the pre-Belichick North Carolina Tar Heels in the Military Bowl presented by Northrop Grumman. Anthony Russo went 12-20 for 128 yards and a pick in that game, which was not an instant classic.

As a refresher, K.C. Keeler’s boys started 5-3 last season and then proceeded to lose four in a row to miss out on bowl eligibility. They did cash early on their over 3.5 win total with a road victory against Charlotte, but they blew the East Carolina game at home and lost a 14-13 rock fight to Army on the road. Those were the two games that really bit them in the butt. Nobody had them beating Tulane or North Texas to end the season, since those were the toughest conference games on the schedule.

This year, the slate looks like this:

• vs. Rhode Island
• vs. Penn State
• at Toledo
• vs. Army
• at South Florida
• vs. UConn
• vs. Charlotte
• at East Carolina
• at Navy
• vs. UAB
• vs. Rice
• at Memphis

Rhode Island is an FCS team playing in the Coastal. The Owls should handle their business at home to improve to 1-0.

Then it’s Matt Campbell’s Penn State team coming to the Linc. It’s an interesting matchup considering that this is a brand-new Nitter squad in the post-James Franklin era, and while we all know what happened the last time PSU came to Philadelphia, Rocco Becht is not Christian Hackenberg, nor is Jahad Thomas walking through that door. So the Owls will battle, but probably be out-talented by Penn State in South Philly.

Then comes Toledo, which is a true barometer game. We’re going to find out how good this Temple team truly is when they go on the road to play a MAC program that consistently wins 7+ games. The quirk here is that the Rockets lost head coach Jason Candle to UConn, who is also on the Owls’ schedule this season. Toledo is a little bit harder to project this season because of the coaching change, but both of these games feel like even matchups on paper and could go either way. I think Temple has to at least split between Toledo and UConn to get to a bowl game.

The good thing about the conference schedule is that the Owls do play some bums at home. Charlotte, Rice, and UAB are all being projected to finish at the bottom of the conference and all three happen to travel to Lincoln Financial Field this year. Temple should win all three of these games, and if they don’t, it’s probably a failure.

Hitting the over probably hinges on the Army game, which feels like another toss-up/slugfest kind of matchup. No clue how to predict that one, but at Memphis, at Navy, at ECU, and at USF is rough. USF did lose Alex Golesh to Auburn, and Memphis lost Ryan Silverfield to Arkansas, but all four of these teams have a good amount of talent. USF and ECU feel like the possibly winnable road games, but I wouldn’t bank on it.

I can see it playing out like this:

• vs. Rhode Island – WIN
• vs. Penn State – LOSS
• at Toledo – LOSS
• vs. Army – WIN
• at South Florida – LOSS
• vs. UConn – WIN
• vs. Charlotte – WIN
• at East Carolina – LOSS
• at Navy – LOSS
• vs. UAB – WIN
• vs. Rice – WIN
• at Memphis – LOSS

6-6 and bowl eligibility. The boys will clear the over, but they need to win that home game against Army to kick off the conference slate.