PHILADELPHIA – Temple football is exactly two weeks away from traveling to South Bend and opening their season against the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame. Although kickoff is rapidly approaching, head coach, Geoff Collins and his staff have not rushed in naming their starting quarterback.

True freshman, Todd Centeio, redshirt freshman, Anthony Russo, redshirt sophomore, Logan Marchi and redshirt junior, Frank Nutile, are all contending for the spot, but Collins has stated that two players, unnamed, have pulled away from the rest of the pack.

“It’s going to be exciting watching the tape of this scrimmage because last scrimmage, I felt like there was a little separation between two guys,” Collins said following an inter-squad scrimmage at University of Pennsylvania’s Franklin Field on Saturday. “And then today, it might’ve been a little bit more [separation], so we’ll just give the names out hopefully by the end of this week.”

Although the quarterback question has yet to be answered, Temple’s defense has embraced the opportunity of playing against four different quarterbacks of four distinctive styles during practice.

“I feel like that’s good honestly,” defensive back, Sean Chandler, said. “We’ve got guys that could run, guys that like to pocket pass, so we get to work on a lot of versatility.”

Chandler, who is on the 2017 Bednarik Award Watch List for the College Defensive Player of the Year, has 185 total tackles for Temple through three seasons. The 2017 season begins in 14 days, and Chandler feels like the team’s overall defense is ready.

“I feel like we’re right there,” Chandler said. “There’s a couple of wrinkles that we need to wrinkle out, but that’s going to come from the film room.”

Redshirt senior transfer, Mike Jones, feels similarly about the team’s defense, despite an obvious talent-gap between older players and younger players. Jones played last season at FCS North Carolina Central, where he was an All-MEAC First Team selection in 2016.

“I think we’re coming along, but we have our times when [starters] are out there really dominating [bench players] -- and they have their potential -- but I think we’ve come along real well,” Jones said. “It’s good for us to have the young guys rotating with the [starters] because they need that experience.”

Temple’s young guys did not only get to experience what it was like playing on the field with high level competition, but they were also able to participate in their first road experience as well.

Collins and his staff simulated their scrimmage at Franklin Field to feel like a road game. The team stayed overnight at a hotel, and treated the day as if it were a game day during the regular season, even setting up a tent as a makeshift locker room for the scrimmage.

“We did every single routine that we do. We had the walk throughs, we had the cheering drills, we had the pregame meal, just so that when we get ready to play a game, we’ve already done it.” Collins said. “The young guys who’ve never made a trip for us, they were there, they got to go through the whole process, so it was an unbelievable day.”

After today’s scrimmage, players felt confident about the upcoming season, and redshirt senior wide receiver, Keith Kirkwood, made it clear today that his own conviction in Temple’s offense is legitimate.

“[The wide-receiving corps] is tremendously deep. I think we have so much depth that any receiver in our group can play. I believe in my eyes that we’re the best receiving core in this country,” Kirkwood said. Kirkwood also mentioned the quarterback situation after scrimmaging, and said, “every quarterback on this team can play for us, so I’m pretty excited to play the first game.”

Collins used today’s scrimmage for prepping his team both mentally and physically, and with Notre Dame just two Saturday’s away, the Owls seem convinced on their potential, even without a starting quarterback named.

“Keith Kirkwood, Adonis Jennings, Brodrick Yancy are an unbelievable group of guys. They compete, they work hard,” Collins said. “Having those guys is huge, and then having three junior running backs and the best fullback in college football in Nick Sharga, is a special advantage for whoever is playing quarterback.”

Although initial reports stated that the team would name a starting quarterback two weeks prior to the Notre Dame game, Collins mentioned that he expects to name a starting quarterback by the end of this coming week.