Matt Rhule coaching the Temple Owls during the AAC Championship game

Matt Rhule is gone. He’s off to Baylor to try and do in Waco, TX what he did on North Broad Street. It won’t be easy, very serious off-field issues derailed what was a great story at Baylor. The Bears have always been a little brother to Texas and Texas A&M but Art Briles used a high-powered offense to change the narrative. Briles left amid the scandal and Rhule will step in and use the same things that made him successful as the Owls mentor – hard work and toughness.

“I’m going to recruit Texas high school football players,” Rhule said when he met the media at Baylor, “get them here, develop them, watch them grow over four or five years and then see the team that you have. It worked at Temple. It’s a different world but there’s a lot of similarities. Kids are kids.”

It’s been a few day since the announcement so Temple fans should be over their shock and disappointment and they should have had those emotions. Rhule’s leaving was sudden although as a successful coach at a Group of Five school it was a question of when not if he would leave for a Power Five job.

It’s a shame that Rhule won’t be on the sidelines at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium when the Owls play Wake Forest in the Military Bowl presented by Northrop Grumman on December 27 but that’s the way college football operates. A coach leaving one school for another is gone before the bowl game, he’s not around to fully celebrate a great season at his old school because he’s got to hire a staff and start recruiting at his new one. In the end however, for Temple alums and fans all they can really do is thank Matt Rhule for the job he did. How many thought it would ever be possible to do what the Owls have done, back-to-back 10-win seasons and the American Athletic Conference championship. Now, is the time to celebrate that and hire the next “right” guy.

A name that was put forth on Football Stories The Radio Show on Wednesday was that of Old Dominion head coach Bobby Wilder. Reportedly, he has shown interest in the job and there is speculation that he’s on Temple Director of Athletics Dr. Patrick Kraft’s list as well.

In a text message to the Daily Press, a Hampton Roads area newspaper, Wilder said,

Old Dominion head coach Bobby Wilder

Wilder, a graduate of his home state University of Maine where he played quarterback for the Black Bears, led the Monarchs to the Bahamas Bowl in just their fourth season of FBS football. He was the head coach when ODU restarted football in 2009 after not having a team since 1940. They spent four years at the FCS level, two as an independent and two in the tough Colonial Athletic Association (the CAA is home to Villanova) where they made the playoffs both times and finished ranked third in the country in 2012. The Monarchs were 8-4 during their transition year to FBS in 2013 then they moved into Conference USA. They were 9-3 this year, with their only league loss coming to the conference champion Western Kentucky. Overall, Wilder is 66-30 at ODU and 28-20 in the four seasons the school has been at the FBS level.

Additionally, Wilder has had success in recruiting in Pennsylvania and South Jersey. Monarchs junior running back Ray Lawry, the 2013 Football Stories High School Player of the Year for South Jersey while playing at Kingsway Regional, has gain 3205 yards and scored 38 touchdowns in his career. He is one of several players on the roster from South Jersey while in 2016, they signed three players who were ranked between 52nd and 65th in the state of Pennsylvania.

Email Rock Hoffman at Rock@footballstories.com