Notre Dame football holds serve over the Owls for a Week 1 victory

2. It may be a long year for the Owls

This game was far removed from the 2015 contest between these two teams. That game was decided on a last-minute touchdown pass from DeShone Kizer to receiver Will Fuller. It was a great game that set up for somewhat of a letdown today.

It will be interesting to see whether this game was one in which Notre Dame played great or if Temple played poorly. Unfortunately, this game may not set the bar quite like the Owls hoped it would. It’s hard to tell if this Temple squad simply played a bad game, or if they were merely the victims of a revamped Irish unit.

Sophomore quarterback Logan Marchi played decent in the season opener, throwing for 245 yards and two touchdowns without any interceptions. This was a solid outing for the former redshirt. It should give the Owls something to work with over the course of this season.

While Marchi played well, it was the defense that was of the most concern. The Owls will certainly be able to manage games with Marchi, but it will be hard to pull out wins while letting up over 600 total yards.

Temple will hope that this game was merely a fluke. Unfortunately, that may not be the case given how frequently their defense was exploited.