I believe Cam DeGeorge went to Louisville. Leon was very good run blocker and clearly better than our current center. The other two were backups but they got some playing time and losing them hurt our depth. My point is that our offensive line roster is worse now than it was two years ago. Christian Haynes is a good player but Van Demark is graduating as you stated. Although they may develop into good players, to my eyes neither Lundt, Walker or even Fortin look like they are ready to start. Fixing the talent issue on our offensive line will have to be a major priority for our next coach.
According to the MTSU QB...
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NowInStorrs
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We had a "drive" that consisted of three straight plays for a loss and then a punt. It almost seems like the offense is designed to lose yards with all these passes to the side and lateral runs for loss of a couple.
I agree with everything you said but I believe SK is not as good as people on this board think he is TP is a lot better QB and he is a true Freshmen.
Undoubtedly the most frustrating UCONN game I've been to in the 13 years I've been going. Steven Krajewsk should have been pulled and replaced by... well, how about Jonathan. He couldn't do much worse. The defense is dysfunctional and can't tackle or cover receivers.... so many open receivers time and time again. This team is so bad that I fear there is no rebuilding the program. No matter what new HC they are able to attract, I'm afraid this submarine is headed to the bottom.
But, hey, the tailgating was great....
But, hey, the tailgating was great....
FfldCntyFan
Texas: Property of UConn Men's Basketball program
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There have been countless things about the program this season that (to be kind) have been disappointing. In my eyes, without question the most disappointing has been our defensive line play.
I had considerable expectations for this unit and to be fair, I believe that I had valid reason for these expectations. During the first iteration of RE, our defensive linemen were always able to punch above their weight class so to speak. As this unit would a good amount of time within the system, considerable size and athleticism (led by someone who may be a top 50-60 pick in the upcoming NFL draft), we should have been able to at worst, perform as an equal match to the best offensive lines we would face prior to the trip to Clemson. I don’t know where the offensive lines from Holy Cross or UMass rank in comparison to the remainder of teams we’ve face so far but I do know that there is no reason either team should have been able to run the ball against us as easily as they had. In full candor, we should have been able to shred their offensive lines with just our front four, resulting in their offenses appearing as inept against us as ours did for the bulk of the game against Purdue.
Perhaps it was the superiority of Hughes as a teacher in comparison to Dottin-Carter. Beyond that I am at a loss as what we’ve seen (getting pushed all over the field against UMass, giving up a near length of the field run at a critical point against Holy Cross) would be massive failures against the better teams we’ve faced this season.
There have been major failures at every level of our defense (which is primarily why I believe nobody, especially Spanos should be retained). What is infuriating about the defensive line play is that there should have been major expectations from this unit.
I had considerable expectations for this unit and to be fair, I believe that I had valid reason for these expectations. During the first iteration of RE, our defensive linemen were always able to punch above their weight class so to speak. As this unit would a good amount of time within the system, considerable size and athleticism (led by someone who may be a top 50-60 pick in the upcoming NFL draft), we should have been able to at worst, perform as an equal match to the best offensive lines we would face prior to the trip to Clemson. I don’t know where the offensive lines from Holy Cross or UMass rank in comparison to the remainder of teams we’ve face so far but I do know that there is no reason either team should have been able to run the ball against us as easily as they had. In full candor, we should have been able to shred their offensive lines with just our front four, resulting in their offenses appearing as inept against us as ours did for the bulk of the game against Purdue.
Perhaps it was the superiority of Hughes as a teacher in comparison to Dottin-Carter. Beyond that I am at a loss as what we’ve seen (getting pushed all over the field against UMass, giving up a near length of the field run at a critical point against Holy Cross) would be massive failures against the better teams we’ve faced this season.
There have been major failures at every level of our defense (which is primarily why I believe nobody, especially Spanos should be retained). What is infuriating about the defensive line play is that there should have been major expectations from this unit.
FfldCntyFan
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One major criticism (and this goes to the entire defensive staff) is that across the board it appears that nobody on our defense knows how to close on a ball carrier while maintaining contain leverage. I don’t see how this is possible but we have had countless missed tackles (or worse, whiffed tackles) that were followed by an additional 8, 12, 20 yards gained. We’ve seen our defensive linemen make reasonably mobile QBs look like Michael Vick. We’ve seen flare outs or bubble screens turn into 25, 35, 50+ yard gains. We’ve seen ridiculously poor fundamentals when it comes to containing and tackling the ball carrier.
An additional item that I cannot see how it continues is we often are outnumbered (usually two defenders covering three WRs on one wide flank) in a standard defensive set. This is exacerbated when the opponent is aware enough to run a WR screen, where the two defenders are easily blocked by two WRs, allowing the third (who caught the ball) a huge gain. How is it that our coaching staff hasn’t learned how to defend this?
An additional item that I cannot see how it continues is we often are outnumbered (usually two defenders covering three WRs on one wide flank) in a standard defensive set. This is exacerbated when the opponent is aware enough to run a WR screen, where the two defenders are easily blocked by two WRs, allowing the third (who caught the ball) a huge gain. How is it that our coaching staff hasn’t learned how to defend this?
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ShakyTheMohel
Is it 11:11 yet?
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Those of you who love harping on the decision to not play last year....I have a question...
UConn sucked in 2018...they sucked in 2019...they sucked in 2021....do you really think cobbling together 3 or 4 games in 2020 would have changed that?
Whether UConn played or not last year has had absolutely no impact on where this team is today. As we have seen after 9 games this season....playing more isn't improving their performance. This is just not a good team.
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Umm, that's what was decided after the Holy Cross game. People on this board created the narrative that Spanos or any of these other guys would be back.
uconnbill
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UConn has to do one thing Edsall refused to do and that is hit the transfer portal and hit it hard. All the schools using it and yet UConn doesn't. Time to go out and bring in 10-15 if possible with defensive back, offensive lineman, a quarterback, another running back and more depth in others areas.
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There were people on this board who said not playing any games for a whole season would be good for them and the team would be better for it, that's totally insane.
They were going to suck no matter what because of Edsall but thinking they would get better from not playing is an insane take.
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Always the case. We gotta get away from this style if play....because we clearly haven't perfected it in practice... and it doesn't appear our practices are as physical as they once were. It's clear when we play the games.
One last thing. Our OL needs to grow a pair. It's not a tough bunch. Not in games from what I've seen.
Can't argue with you on this brother. Offense looks offensive since Mazzone's influence disappeared. Very vanilla....very
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That and get the right assistant coaches... retreads allowed here. Ones who've seen quite a bit
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ShakyTheMohel
Is it 11:11 yet?
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It's not "insane".
No one knows if cobbling 3 or 4 games together in a tough covid environment would have been better than focusing on physical and mental development on a set schedule.
It turns out....it doesn't matter. It wasn't playing games....or physical development this team needed. It was better coaching and more talent.
The coaching is horrifically ineffective. They may be too slow, too weak, etc.. but if you have two arms you can tackle (heck you got players missing one hand that make better tackles). The persistent allowance of submarine, turn a shoulder and don’t use your arms to tackle is symptomatic of utter incompetence by staff or unwillingness to hold players accountable for executing basic football plays. Same goes with DBs not turning to find the ball, LBs and DEs that can contain or take angles or get off blocks. They have done nothing to help these kids get better, putting aside talent issues.
We all would have seen how bad they were and maybe RE would have been fired last year instead! The canceled season was a cover up by RE on how bad they really were/are.
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"Focusing on physical and mental development" lolz. Of course it's an insane take, you're never better off as a team not playing.
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You're taught at a very young age that the baseline or sideline is your friend. Watts as an example takes very bad angles to the QB. I was hoping for big things from him.
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No worries. I don’t lose sleep over it just being sarcastic about our former coach.
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I’m curious as to why you think Tyler P can read defenses. He appears to have a ton of supporters here but I did not see an above average, or average passer - to be expected from a frosh.
I still don’t think our starting qb is on the current roster.
SwingDog
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Based on his performance (albeit a small sample) prior to his season-ending injury, I think Tyler had earned the opportunity to grow into the role. To say it another way: the QB position was his to lose.
I think you’re wrong about that. Calhoun, Geno, Jim Penders, Dan Hurley, Joe Moorhead, Rob Ambrose, Rhett Lashlee, Andrew Breiner, Skip Holtz, TJ Weist, and Todd Orlando. Even Jay Paterno, Kirk Ferentz, Lou Holtz and Sam Rutigliano have coached for UConn football. We also have had a couple of great AD’s in Lew Perkins and John Toner, and I have a sense that Dave Benedict will follow them with a good hire for the next head football coach and his staff.
Our biggest issue is that PP and Edsall 2.0 should have never been considered. PP was hired because he liked CT and the high school coaches like him and Edsall was hired because he was willing to come here for cheap. All ridiculous reasons. Diaco at least had things going for him on paper. He ended up being a terrible hire, but every program has made terrible hires. You should be able to survive one. When you don't even give yourself a chance to strike gold though its a killer
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That's a fair assessment. When you're losing really bad consistently nobody's safe.
I still think Tyler has way more potential out of the current crop of QBs we have though.
phillionaire
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yeah the team would definitely not suck if we were still in the AAC and we'd get to play a tournament at an arena named after jeans