PSWA TO HONOR TEMPLE, MATAKEVICH
Rock Hoffman
P.J. Walker, the Temple quarterback throws a pass during the Marmot Boca Raton Bowl. The Owls will be honored by the PSWA (photo courtesy Boca Raton Bowl) The Philadelphia Sportswriters Association are the latest to bestow awards on 2015 Temple Owls football team and their star linebacker continue to add honors after the team tied a school-record for wins and Tyler Matakevich was named a consensus All-American.
PSWA president Sam Carchidi announced that the Owls have been chosen as Team of the Year, while Matakevich has been selected as Outstanding Amateur Athlete. The awards will be handed out at the PSWA’s 112th annual dinner Feb. 1 at the Crowne Plaza in Cherry Hill. Tickets are still available for $95 each at www.pswadinner.com.
The Owls finished the season at 10-4 (matching the 1979 team for total wins) and won the American Athletic Conference East championship. The earned a spot in the AAC’s first-ever title game and played in the Marmot Boca Raton Bowl. On the way to their first 7-0 start in school history, the season began with the school’s first win over Penn State since 1941. Also, the Owls were ranked in the Top 25 for the first time since that ’79 campaign.
A senior from Connecticut, Matakevich, was named first team All-America by the Associated Press, the Football Writers Association of America, USA Today and the Walter Camp Football Foundation. He also won the Bronko Nagurski Trophy and Chuck Bednarik Award, both given to the nation’s best defensive player.
Temple linebacker Tyler Matakevich
Matakevich is the first-ever Temple defensive player to garner first-team All-America honors, and the first at any position to be selected since running back Paul Palmer in 1986. He was also named the American Athletic Conference’s Defensive Player of the Year and became just the seventh player at the FBS level to more than 100 tackles in each of his four season.
The Owls and Matakevich are only part of a very special evening. Already on the dais for the Feb. 1 dinner: Flyers star Jake Voracek (Outstanding Philadelphia Pro Athlete) and Carli Lloyd, the star of the World Cup champion U.S. women’s soccer team who is the Athlete of the Year. Eagles broadcaster Merrill Reese will be on hand as the inaugural winner of the Bill Campbell Broadcast Award Former heavyweight boxing champion (and the pride of Easton, Pa.) Larry Holmes will claim his Living Legend award, and Phillies chairman David Montgomery will accept his Ed Snider Lifetime Distinguished Humanitarian Award. Stellar New Orleans Saints offensive lineman Jahri Evans of Bloomsburg University and Frankford High School will claim his Native Son award.
Jahri Evans (No. 73), of the New Orleans Saints, blocks for Drew Brees. Evans will be honored by the PSWA. (photo by Michael C. Hebert courtesy New Orleans Saints)
More honorees will be named in the next couple of weeks. As an added bonus, Lloyd and Voracek will remain to sign autographs after dinner.
Comic Joe Conklin will lighten things up with his Philly sports observations, and Michael Barkann of CSN and WIP will serve as the dinner’s emcee.
The banquet’s signature event is the naming of the Most Courageous Athlete; the honor is kept a secret until it is presented at the end of the evening.
The annual PSWA dinner started in 1904, and some its past honorees include Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Stan Musial, Reggie Jackson, Joe DiMaggio, Muhammad Ali, Robin Roberts, Wilt Chamberlain, Julius Erving, Chuck Bednarik, Brad Lidge, Cole Hamels, Cathy Rush, Lloyd, and Elena Delle Donne.
As previously mentioned, tickets are still available to the general public. Fans can go to www.pswadinner.com to purchase tickets.
