A look ahead

Final exams start in two days, and that means another school year is about to come to a close. Before anyone realizes, though, August will be here, and Temple Athletics will be back on the field/court for another season filled with sports.

Football
The Owls finished the 2008 season with a 5-7 record, their best record since 1990, when they finished 7-4. Yes, it’s really been 18 years since Temple football recorded at least five wins. And for the second consecutive season, the Owls also finished at .500 in the Mid-American Conference at 4-4.

Coach Al Golden and his squad should be capable of repeating that MAC record, just by looking at 2008’s opponents. The Owls recorded victories against Miami (Ohio), Akron and Ohio last season but lost to Kent State, Buffalo and Eastern Michigan. Their two remaining MAC games will come versus teams Temple did not face last year – Toledo and Ball State. The Cardinals went undefeated until a MAC Championship loss to Buffalo.

Non-conference opponents again include road contests at Penn State and Navy, as well as a home matchup with Army. Last season, the Owls lost two of those three games.

That leaves the home and season opener against city rival Villanova Sept. 3 at Lincoln Financial Field. At least if the Owls can’t beat the Wildcats on the basketball court, maybe they’ll be able to defeat a Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA) team.

Temple lost nine starters to graduation, and all eyes will be on the quarterback battle between redshirt junior Vaughn Charlton and redshirt sophomore Chester Stewart when summer camp breaks.

Men’s Basketball
The Owls’ chances in the upcoming 2009-2010 season hinge less on opponents and more on components.

The Owls will face the typical Atlantic Ten Conference slate, although they get Dayton, Xavier and Massachusetts at home in the Liacouras Center this year. Big 5 rival Villanova, Penn State and Kansas will also travel to North Broad Street.

But the real question is who will take the place of senior guard Dionte Christmas and his 19.5 points per game.

Right now, it looks like it will have to be junior guard Ryan Brooks.

The departures of senior center Sergio Olmos and senior guard Semaj Inge are accounted for with sophomore forward Lavoy Allen and freshman guard Juan Fernandez.

That still leaves two open slots in the starting lineup, though.

Coach Fran Dunphy can choose among junior Luis Guzman, freshmen Scootie Randall and T.J. DiLeo and incoming freshman Khalif Wyatt for the backcourt.

His options in the frontcourt are a little more limited, with only incoming freshman Rahlir Jefferson and the injury-pending return of sophomore Craig Williams and freshman Micheal Eric.

So, it might be a little overly optimistic to expect a third consecutive A-10 Championship and NCAA Tournament appearance with the current question marks. But then again, Dunphy has until November to figure those out.

Women’s Basketball
Coach Tonya Cardoza will have one full season as a coach under her belt, and in the first one, she led a team full of players recruited by former Temple coach Dawn Staley to an NCAA Tournament berth and a regular season upset of then-No. 13 Xavier.

She lost only two seniors, forwards Shenita Landry and Shanea Cotton, to graduation and has already signed four incoming freshmen to National Letters of Intent: forwards Alyssa Bennett and Natasha Thames, point guard Tiffany Davis and center Victoria Macauley.

As a result, there’s really no reason, sans injuries, not to expect the Owls to repeat last season’s performance.

Non-revenue sports
Two fall non-revenue sports reached A-10 postseason play last year.

The field hockey team, which finished 8-12, lost senior defender Mary Catherine Kinneman, senior goalkeeper Erin Hanshue and senior forwards Liz Watto and Jamie Adams but returns otherwise intact. The Owls have made it to five straight A-10 semifinals.

The men’s soccer team also reached the A-10 semifinals, losing, 2-1, to Dayton. Junior forward J.T. Noone will lead the Owls next year, as he scored seven goals and assisted on 12 more. Only two seniors won’t return to the team, which ended the season 10-5-4 overall.

Jennifer Reardon can be reached at jennifer.reardon@temple.edu.

Backbone stands tall in the net

All the pressure rests squarely on her shoulders and her ability to keep the ball out of the back of the net.

It’s been that way every game for the past three years.

And senior goalkeeper Erin Hanshue wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I tried playing the field and hated it,” Hanshue said. “My older sister was a goalie, so I tried that and loved it.

“The pressure is hard,” Hanshue said. “Everybody else is allowed to make mistakes on the field, but when I make a mistake it goes on the scoreboard. But you’ve got to learn from it and move on. That’s all you can do, try not to make the same mistake twice.”

Hanshue has handled that pressure pretty well during her career at Temple.

After redshirting her freshman year, she’s played every game since then in goal for the Owls, including every minute of all 21 games last season, when she posted a career-high 124 saves and .805 save percentage. That save percentage was good for third in the nation, while her 124 saves placed her second in the Atlantic Ten Conference, behind Saint Louis’ then-junior Amy Wasserman.

“I think when she plays well the stats kind of come, which is nice,” coach Amanda Janney said. “She was a very good goalkeeper to begin with, and she’s continued to get better and better. We see the improvements in games. It’s unfortunate right now that it’s not showing in her senior year because she is playing better than she has before. She’s making a lot of good saves for us.”

Through eight games this season, Hanshue has faced 95 shots and allowed 18 goals to score.
“I think being a goalie is about 50 percent skill and 50 percent luck,” Hanshue said. “I think I’ve just gotten lucky. I’m never [going to be] perfect. But mostly I’d still like to improve on just being the leader and being able to direct everybody and have everybody keep their respect for me.”

Last year, the Owls had five seniors on the squad, including all-American midfielder Alli Lokey and A-10 Defensive Player of the Year Ashley Bird. This season, Hanshue is one of four seniors expected to lead Temple back to the four-team A-10 Tournament.

“She leads by example, and she really works hard and challenges herself every day to become better,” Janney said. “She’s a captain this year, and we’re looking for the leadership. I think she already possesses that.”

Hanshue will be leading a defense split almost exactly down the middle in terms of underclassmen and upperclassmen. Although she’s a midfielder and not a defender, Hanshue will also be leading her younger sister, Kimmi, a sophomore transfer from West Chester.

“I’ll just be giving her little tips,” Hanshue said. “We have a lot of similarities in that we’re both very hard on ourselves. When you’re hard on yourself you can bring yourself down, but you’ve got to keep bringing yourself back up. So we can help each other.

“It’s a different relationship on the field, though. On the field, we’re not sisters. You have to get over that, and you have to treat each other like teammates.”

Janney doesn’t foresee any problems.

“I think all the goalies hold themselves to really high standards,” she said. “I think she’s a great leader for us [because of] her competitiveness and her personal characteristics.”

Once Hanshue steps on the field, though, that personality transforms into one that’s able to handle the pressure between the pipes.

“I think I like [goalkeeping] because it’s the opposite of my personality,” Hanshue said. “I’m not the type of person who’s going to step up and take control of everything and be the first person to say, ‘You do this, and you do this,’ but when I’m playing in the game that’s my job.

“It’s something that I don’t get to do every day, but when I step on the field, I can take control and it’s in my hands.”

Jennifer Reardon can be reached at jennifer.reardon@temple.edu.

Field Hockey team looks to defend A-10 title

After winning the Atlantic Ten Conference regular season championship last season, the field hockey team expected to go into this season favored to repeat.

They were wrong.

The Owls, who finished 15-6 overall and 6-1 in the A-10 last season, were picked to finish second in the A-10 standings in a vote by the league’s coaches.

While the other coaches may feel content with the vote, Temple is not. Entering her fourth season as the
team’s coach, Amanda Janney was not very pleased with the preseason prognostications.

“We are not happy that we’re second, but we need to have a chance to play [Massachusetts] to prove otherwise,” she said. “It gives us extra motivation to defend the regular season championship.”

The team will also need to build off last season’s results, as it will be without the services of Alli Lokey, the A-10 offensive player of the year, and Ashley Bird, the conference’s defensive player of the year. Both graduated after stellar careers at Temple.

As for this year, according to Janney, it’s going to be a collective team effort that will rely heavily on veteran leadership.

“[We have] four strong seniors who won a lot of awards, as well as the other upperclassmen,” she said. “The team looks good right now.” Two veteran leaders on the team are senior goalkeeper Erin Hanshue, a 2007 A-10 honorable mention, and junior forward Dannah Brehm, an A-10 first team selection last season.

But they just factor into the entire equation that is the field hockey team.

With high expectations and a focus on winning their first A-10 Championship since 1994, every game is
important for Janney and her team.

“It’s important that we step up on every game and play our best,” she said. “We need to be really focused on every game like it’s the A-10 Championship.”

This focus began when Janney took over the reigns in 2005. Under her guidance, the Owls had their first winning season since 1992 and made the A-10 tournament for three consecutive seasons. This season, that very tournament will be hosted by the Owls, which just serves as extra determination to bring home the crown.

“Having all of our fans there, a lot of positives are in place, [but] everyone needs to contribute to get what we want,” Janney said.

The Owls will open the season at home with a non-conference game versus Lehigh University on Aug. 30
at Geasey Field.

“The team is going to play hard. It doesn’t matter what conference [it’s] from.”

Nick Hollenstein can be reached at n.hollenstein@temple.edu.