Coach P and Edsall - a comparison.

[HuskyNan]

And DiMauro weighs in on Edsall. Some good points. warning: messy departure not mentioned

He mentioned the messy departure but only to point out some fans' "obsession" with it.

Criticism - hell, character assassinations - of a coach whose demands for accountability, academic achievement and discipline are unyielding, but whose record was 2-10 this season.
And so once again we learn that the greatest sin of all in sports is losing.

Well, yeah. I thought that the point of playing the game but apparently college football exists to mold disciplined young men. Who knew?

 

[noeynox]

RichRod proved his worth at Michigan. He was okay, not great prior to the Pat White years. He was okay even less than that without Pat White. Pat White is one of the greatest college QBs in some time.

 

[ZooCougar]

Such a one sided column.... Edsall would be s perfect Patriot League coach.

 

[noeynox]

Such a one sided column.... Edsall would be s perfect Patriot League coach.

Edsall would be the perfect coach for BCU. He has a ceiling of 7-5, 8-4, type seasons. A floor of 2-10, 5-7 type seasons. His kids graduate, and he started a career night. After pushing Tom O'brien out the door and having to endure Spaziani, I'm sure Edsall looks like Saban to BCU fans/Grads.

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

Everybody is perfectly free to discuss whatever they want so far as I'm concerned. But, presumably, that freedom includes me being able to express my longing for the day when a higher percentage of the traffic on a UConn football board is about UConn football.

People generally discuss UConn football when we're doing well. There isn't a ton to discuss at the moment. We've had a pretty mediocre season during a transition year and we don't really know what kind of team we are. We're playing a better team on the road, so it's hard to be foolishly optimistic.

I think, for a team with very little history and tradition, we are keeping as much interest as possible during a fairly off year.

 

[businesslawyer]

[I think, for a team with very little history and tradition, we are keeping as much interest as possible during a fairly off year.[/quote]


I agree with everything you wrote. Is it o.k., however, that I find it more than a little ironic that, in a thread full of people pretending that the coach's record can't be judged in the context of this being a start up program, you are posting that the fans have an excuse because we're a start-up program?

 

[Carl Spackler]

Come on BL, USF was a startup program. Look up USF football history prior to 1997.

UConn had been playing football for 102 consecutive seasons when Edsall arrived.

I'm not going to even try to say that UConn was an elite program for a century prior to Edsall's arrival, nor were they really elite for any significant amount of time at all, all time 482-504-38.

But there is history. Plenty of history in college football in these parts. Edsall largely ignored it. Edsall pretty much ignored everybody in the northeast that would have been able to help this program out, and many he disrespected, if he didn't ignore them. Maybe it wasn't intentional, just his personality, whatever, it happened, and I'm not elaborating any more on that than I have right now.

It was the university and the state that made the committment to building a division 1 football program at the state land grant college, and it went into effect well before Edsall arrived.

I'm not diminishing anything the guy did, he was perfect for this program. His best season was 2007. It was also about the same time that he seriously started looking elsewhere.

The guy was perfect for what we needed.

He went 74-70 at UConn during a major period of transition in level of play. Can't ask for better than that based on what we needed to do.

His failure, conscious or not, was to completely alienate any of the tradition around him in this cultural environment, and assume the role that he was everything there is about UConn football.

Irony that he's doing the same thing in Maryland?

Here's a little piece of history I found posted on youtube, posted it last week, I wonder if Sweitzer, actually put up there, if not, had to be a family member of is.

Dan Orlovsky wasn't the first QB drafted out of UConn to the NFL. Tom Landry and Tex Schramm drafted Ken Sweitzer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxLmG77NKvI

I'm looking forward to earning bowl eligibility this weekend. The Edsall era is done and over, long over.

 

[jdb50]

Carl, I watched the old video of the team from 1981 that you put up on another thread. Sweitzer was a big time player and made the Huskies exciting to watch. I watched that BU game from the hill and forgot that it was on ESPN. We lost at the end to Jim Jenson who went on to play for the Dolphin's. Seemed like BU was the team to beat back then and it's odd that they have no program at all now.

 

[Carl Spackler]

That BU game was a heartbreaker. Big time.

 

[Carl Spackler]

BTW, not odd at all that BU doesn't have a program anymore. BU had a really good football program for a long time, so did so many other colleges in new england, new york, and new jersey.

It's hard to keep a football program afloat unless you've got resources, and the same battle that went on 3 decades ago in this little corner of te country, is still going on now, just at a national level. I once wrote a long paper about this. When college football began to revolve more and more about money, and specifically revenue sharing, and division 1 status was tied to stadium capacity in the late 1970s, pretty much every dominant football program north of mason dixon, and east of chicago started going downhill. Why? Recruiting. The best recruits were going to go to the biggest football programs with the best facilities and programs, and that's all about money. No different then, than it is now. Yale was able to hold on to division 1 status for a while b/c of the size of the yale bowl, but the rest of the ivy's not, and they eventually downgraded conformity for the rest of the Ivy.

Only difference now, is that ticket revenue and stadium size has been replaced by TV contracts and broadcast areas. Where' 1-AA football was left behind in the 70s, the non-BCS teams now stand to be left behind, are being left behind.

The programs, that flourished in te 80s as a result? Syracuse, Boston College, and the architect behind it all, Penn State. Out west, down south, the culture is different, and there weren't as many different games to choose from on a college saturday, so the stadiums (stadia?) were huge.

 

[Duncan Idaho]

Come on BL, USF was a startup program. Look up USF football history prior to 1997.

UConn had been playing football for 102 consecutive seasons when Edsall arrived.

I'm not going to even try to say that UConn was an elite program for a century prior to Edsall's arrival, nor were they really elite for any significant amount of time at all, all time 482-504-38.

But there is history. Plenty of history in college football in these parts. Edsall largely ignored it. Edsall pretty much ignored everybody in the northeast that would have been able to help this program out, and many he disrespected, if he didn't ignore them. Maybe it wasn't intentional, just his personality, whatever, it happened, and I'm not elaborating any more on that than I have right now.

It was the university and the state that made the committment to building a division 1 football program at the state land grant college, and it went into effect well before Edsall arrived.

I'm not diminishing anything the guy did, he was perfect for this program. His best season was 2007. It was also about the same time that he seriously started looking elsewhere.

The guy was perfect for what we needed.

He went 74-70 at UConn during a major period of transition in level of play. Can't ask for better than that based on what we needed to do.

His failure, conscious or not, was to completely alienate any of the tradition around him in this cultural environment, and assume the role that he was everything there is about UConn football.

Irony that he's doing the same thing in Maryland?

Here's a little piece of history I found posted on youtube, posted it last week, I wonder if Sweitzer, actually put up there, if not, had to be a family member of is.

Dan Orlovsky wasn't the first QB drafted out of UConn to the NFL. Tom Landry and Tex Schramm drafted Ken Sweitzer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxLmG77NKvI

I'm looking forward to earning bowl eligibility this weekend. The Edsall era is done and over, long over.

You forgot Cornelius Benton '91? left Uconn with passing records and drafted by Steelers in the late rounds. Sweitzer was not drafted. Uconn did have a fair number of good players in the 80's, a few of them were drafted. There is a rich football history in the northeast, the problem we(UConn) face is that it never has been the sole or primary athletic identity of the university, even at the DII or 1aa level, like a Delaware, Montana. Yale, which Carl mentions, has held onto that athletic identity even after decades of decline. As far as Edsall is concerned, he accomplished what I wanted out of him. Given we started playing football at this level in the Rent in 2003, with full facilicties by 2006, we became a competative program within our BCS conference. This was demonstrated over his last 4 consecutive years. That represents a trend by definition. He can go. Time to raise the level of the program once again. It seems P is bringing in a more highly rated recruiting class(by site standards) and talented transfers than in years past even while the program faces an uncertain future as far as conference affiliation. I'm hopeful that this also is a beginning of a trend and am eager to see how the staff will utilize the talent it brings in and perhaps that athletic identity will become more diverse.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

BTW, not odd at all that BU doesn't have a program anymore. BU had a really good football program for a long time, so did so many other colleges in new england, new york, and new jersey.

It's hard to keep a football program afloat unless you've got resources, and the same battle that went on 3 decades ago in this little corner of te country, is still going on now, just at a national level. I once wrote a long paper about this. When college football began to revolve more and more about money, and specifically revenue sharing, and division 1 status was tied to stadium capacity in the late 1970s, pretty much every dominant football program north of mason dixon, and east of chicago started going downhill. Why? Recruiting. The best recruits were going to go to the biggest football programs with the best facilities and programs, and that's all about money. No different then, than it is now. Yale was able to hold on to division 1 status for a while b/c of the size of the yale bowl, but the rest of the ivy's not, and they eventually downgraded conformity for the rest of the Ivy.

Only difference now, is that ticket revenue and stadium size has been replaced by TV contracts and broadcast areas. Where' 1-AA football was left behind in the 70s, the non-BCS teams now stand to be left behind, are being left behind.

The programs, that flourished in te 80s as a result? Syracuse, Boston College, and the architect behind it all, Penn State. Out west, down south, the culture is different, and there weren't as many different games to choose from on a college saturday, so the stadiums (stadia?) were huge.

Interesting analysis. Hard to disagree with any of your points. Just seems an absolute shame that New England and the Northeast where so pathetically out of touch with the rest of the college football playing country. Same could be said for basketball. UConn, UMass, URI were classic big fish, small ponds. Win the Yankee Conference, look terrific throughout the season, then get push out of the tourney by the big boys from other parts of the country. Pretty much same can be said for BCU and PC (save for the Ernie D, Marvin Barnes run) programs. Really a shame for kids growing up in that era to see the really good versions of the game being played everywhere else but "around New England" and those parts of the Northeast that weren't Syracuse or Penn State.

Can remember reading about Tebucky Jones in the early '90s getting ready to play in a high school "All Star" game of sorts. The article reminded people that it was the last chance they would have to see him play in Connecticut. That was really pathetic. Now the good ones can perform right in the heart of the state. Only variables left? Can the Big East stabilize and stay BCS? Or, better yet, can UConn get into the ACC?

 

[Waquoit]

That BU game was a heartbreaker. Big time.

Sweitzer was a player. Remember, he came to UConn as a WR. The best game for me was at Holy Cross in the rain. Cross has the game in bag, up 7 late. UConn drives the length of the field. I still remember Reggie Eccelston with a diving 1-handed grab on 4th and 10. UConn scores on the last play of the game and goes for 2 and makes it. Catch by Kieth Hugger, IIRC. All those Cross fans that were so nice during the game weren't so nice leaving the game.