As bad as the AAC is..

[CTBballfan243]

Right now, I don't think it is realistic to expect UConn to win recruiting battles against BC, Syracuse, or Rutgers. Most high school kids that have offers from P5 schools and G5 schools are going to choose the P5 school. Especially over a G5 school that doesn't win football games. It's natural for athletes to want to try and play at the highest level possible. Lets face it, the AAC is double A and the P5 are the major leagues. UConn needs to focus on getting the kids that are a rung or two down on the talent level and then make them better. We need to out recruit UMass in our region, make sure we are getting the kids on that next rung and not them. If we do that, and win football games on the field, then you will see our recruiting start to improve. It's going to take time, but we can do it.

 

[blue93]

Right now, I don't think it is realistic to expect UConn to win recruiting battles against BC, Syracuse, or Rutgers. Most high school kids that have offers from P5 schools and G5 schools are going to choose the P5 school. Especially over a G5 school that doesn't win football games. It's natural for athletes to want to try and play at the highest level possible. Lets face it, the AAC is double A and the P5 are the major leagues. UConn needs to focus on getting the kids that are a rung or two down on the talent level and then make them better. We need to out recruit UMass in our region, make sure we are getting the kids on that next rung and not them. If we do that, and win football games on the field, then you will see our recruiting start to improve. It's going to take time, but we can do it.

Agree 100%. I try to look at recruiting without any bias. If I were a 17/18 year old kid with no significant connection to UConn and an offer list of G5 and low level P5 schools, would I choose UConn? Probably not. I love UConn football, but realistically, we don't have a whole lot going for us in terms of attractiveness to recruits (outside of facilities, draft pedigree, and opportunity for PT). So IMO it isn't fair to crucify HCBD for his lack of recruiting the guys with more impressive offer lists with all that is stacked against him.

What is important is developing the guys who do choose to play for this school. If that development leads to wins, maybe the bigger recruits start to take notice.

 

[USNA90]

American from Navy's perspective..

http://www.navysports.com/ot/american-athletic-conference.html

I don't know if that's Navy's position as much as it is an ad for the AAC. Most Navy fans would probably rather remain independent, but the harsh reality is that in these days of conference realignment, Navy was having a difficult time with scheduling. By way of example, last year's schedule looked like something a Sun Belt team would play. While not our preference, most of us recognize that something needed to change sooner rather than later, and the AAC is a good fit for Navy in football. My regret is that with eight conference games, and guaranteed out of conference games against Air Force, ND, and Army, there will be little variation in the schedule from year to year, and that will be a big change. Unfortunately, that's life in the current age of college football.

 

[uconnflyer88]

Accepting that the AAC is painfully bad.... Can someone please explain to me how UConn beats their conference mates when they are recruiting against teams in the CAA.

How does the staff get a pass when they lose every recruiting battle?

Rome is burning but everyone looks away. Is it an inferiority
complex? We don't deserve to recruit like awful SMU or Houston or Tulane?

If you think recruiting out of CT is even REMOTELY close to recruiting out of TX...well then....I don't know what to tell you

 

[Redding Husky]

If we can get competitive, recruiting will pick up. UConn has a lot going for it (academics, a history of athletic success, our location in the Boston-Washington megalopolis).

The problem is that other schools in the AAC are improving their recruiting exponentially. SMU, Houston, and Memphis are in high gear right now. Keeping up with Joneses is going to be hard.

 

[Carl Spackler]

No, many are just waiting on the Villanova game before they pickup their pitchforks.

 

[Duncan Idaho]

 

[CTMike]

Other than "everyone loves to pile on against Whaler"... I don't see what is so awful about his OP. Is there anyone here that would be upset if we were winning recruiting battles against BC, Cuse, Pitt, Rutgers? Even against peers in our league? We'd all be thrilled if we were doing that, and we are not. You are being dishonest if you say otherwise.

We are a bad football team in a league that doesn't get respect. That is our reality. That makes recruiting that much harder. Diaco has the deck stacked against him. Now some might say - tough, you are the coach, figure out how to get more "vetted" recruits - but he's taking the only approach he can right now. Good, hungry, overlooked kids with chips on their shoulder who want to work hard. It can work. I think he's crazy enough and smart enough to pull it off given enough time - but we will have to see if Diaco earns more time this year. I blame no one for being concerned after year 1.

We are prone to like our recruits because we are fans with no other option. We would all be lying if we said we wouldn't feel better if we were beating out BC for recruits in the process.

 

[Ldandy]

Recruiting to CT is always going to be a challenge regardless of what conference your team is affiliated with. The talent pool in state and throughout New England is shallow and is recruited hard by all of the "local" programs in competition with UCONN for resources. The handful of truly elite prospects such as Redd, Fortt, Wilkins, Clark etc. will all be recruited nationally as well. The only thing UCONN can do at this point is develop a method of scouting that allows them to pinpoint athletes and be able to coach them up once they get them to Storrs. Once the team starts winning again, recruiting will pick up with higher rated players.

TCU has an interesting philosophy where in they are less concerned with positions and more concerned with athletes coming out of HS. They will take a bunch of dual threat QBs, RBs, and WR with some eventually growing into tight ends, LBs, or moving to CB or S. Patterson loves having players with ball skills on both sides of the field, and although their teams are often undersized they make up for it with speed and skill. This system was born out of necessity from when they joined the MWC, and they were not able to go head to head with the major programs of the region for top recruits. It worked very well for them, and their consistent winning has allowed them to up their recruiting game while staying true to their philosophy.

I do have one question for those who follow the program closely. Given whomever else potentially may have been available at the time, would Bob D. have been your choice for HC? I see the qualities that would make him attractive to an AD, such as youth, charisma, local ties, and pedigree. That said he is such a strange bird, who lacked experience on the offensive side of the ball, and who's defenses often benefited from being paired with great offenses.

I wonder would it not have made more sense to go after an offensive mind who could have installed his system and then recruited to it? Maybe a MAC, CUSA, or even FCS HC or a top FBS offensive assistant? Looking at recent AAC Hires that definitely seems to be the line of thinking. I think both SMU and Houston will see big jumps in offensive performance.

Please keep in mind I'm not advocating that Diaco be let go, he deserves a shot to see if he can make it work. I'd give him a full cycle of recruits, and with that a few seasons to hopefully cultivate an offensive identity. If after 4-5 seasons UCONN is a middling AAC Team and missing bowls, I'd go after offensive minds only. You can win with scheme in college football even with a large disparity in talent. You can't win with lesser talent and no discernible offensive philosophy.

 

[uconndogs]

I've been on these boards far too long. Seems to me we've always recruited this way. Athletes that we red shirt and develop. I don't think anyone in the AAC is leaps and bounds ahead of us in recruiting with the exception of the two highly rated recruits Houston has got verbals from and we all now how verbals can go.

We are simply not going to beat out Cuse, BC and Rutgers very often with our current conference affiliation. We never faired all that well against them anyway.

The two recruits for this 2016 class are very interesting. HS QBs tend to be the best athletes on their teams and these kids are long. Can they run, throw and hit. We'll know in about 2-3 years.

To my eye, last year's disaster was far more about transition, and in my opinion a poorly managed one by Diaco, and poor conditioning. P was a total and utter disaster and I have it on some reasonably good account that summer conditioning programs were not a point of emphasis with the stupid twins. Hence, OLmen who can't bench press more than your average LB or DB - to say nothing of the DL.

 

[Duncan Idaho]

Other than "everyone loves to pile on against Whaler"... I don't see what is so awful about his OP. Is there anyone here that would be upset if we were winning recruiting battles against BC, Cuse, Pitt, Rutgers? Even against peers in our league? We'd all be thrilled if we were doing that, and we are not. You are being dishonest if you say otherwise.

We are a bad football team in a league that doesn't get respect. That is our reality. That makes recruiting that much harder. Diaco has the deck stacked against him. Now some might say - tough, you are the coach, figure out how to get more "vetted" recruits - but he's taking the only approach he can right now. Good, hungry, overlooked kids with chips on their shoulder who want to work hard. It can work. I think he's crazy enough and smart enough to pull it off given enough time - but we will have to see if Diaco earns more time this year. I blame no one for being concerned after year 1.

We are prone to like our recruits because we are fans with no other option. We would all be lying if we said we wouldn't feel better if we were beating out BC for recruits in the process.

Of course everyone wants our recruiting to improve. Whaler used to have a terrific acerbic wit, I loved it. But he doesn't give people enough credit for recognizing they are eating a sandwich and he is becoming incessant in tell us so. He is and will always remain a great poster, an ardent fan of the program and worth his read whether you agree with him or not. Our current coach was faced with a situation in which he determined the best path to a better future was to start like he did last year. No one has ever seen anything like it. It was unconventional, crazy, WTF are you doing/saying type things. It was dangerous and scary. Its done. Lets just see if it bears some fruit this year.

 

[rich1122]

Recruiting, in general, has been pretty much the same. But our recruiting plan was awful. Beginning in Edsall's last year (the Difton class) we just lost kids. Kids either never showed up or quit. We have been through the numbers at length. Edsall left no D1 QB. Frye and Todman left early. PP never recruited any OL kids and the one's that he did left early or were busts. The balance was really screwed up. We had some individual talent but could not put it together as a team.

We need to get to a point where we get a higher percent of kids to stay all four or five years and be committed to the program and coach. We win more then. We have not had enough of the the Zach Hurd, Twyon Martin Donald Thomas Robbie Frey types that were two stars and just grew up in the program by gutting it out for four years and becoming better every year.

Diaco did the right thing last year by taking the scorched earth approach. The value of having seniors that are in the program 5 years, love football and committed to the school is invaluable. We need to start there.

 

[UConnDan97]

I just want to make sure that I get this right. And this is not meant to be a shot at Whaler or anyone else who agrees with him.

We are concerned about an early commit 3-star prospect who is a top40 player in the state of Virginia because he doesn't have a lot of big offers???

Unlike in the past when we were concerned with late-committing 2-star players or unrated players with FCS-only offers, I'm not at all worried about this pick. Granted, I haven't seen more than a minute of his highlights, but it seems that he got ratings love even without the other offers. Otherwise, he wouldn't be a 3-star, top40 Virginia player. This is likely a very solid pickup, and I'm glad he was smart enough to immediately choose the greatest university in the world rather than to wait for offers from lesser universities to "pad his stats"...

 

[Confident Carl]

I've been on these boards far too long. Seems to me we've always recruited this way. Athletes that we red shirt and develop. I don't think anyone in the AAC is leaps and bounds ahead of us in recruiting with the exception of the two highly rated recruits Houston has got verbals from and we all now how verbals can go.

We are simply not going to beat out Cuse, BC and Rutgers very often with our current conference affiliation. We never faired all that well against them anyway.

The two recruits for this 2016 class are very interesting. HS QBs tend to be the best athletes on their teams and these kids are long. Can they run, throw and hit. We'll know in about 2-3 years.

To my eye, last year's disaster was far more about transition, and in my opinion a poorly managed one by Diaco, and poor conditioning. P was a total and utter disaster and I have it on some reasonably good account that summer conditioning programs were not a point of emphasis with the stupid twins. Hence, OLmen who can't bench press more than your average LB or DB - to say nothing of the DL.

I disagree that we never faired well against them. That is just not true.
Going back to 2003, below is UCONN's record against Cuse, BC, Rutgers and Pitt.

vs. Cuse UCONN is 6-3
vs. Rutgers UCONN is 4-6
vs. Pitt UCONN is 4-4
vs. BC UCONN is 0-2

Overall Record against above 14-15. I call that holding there own.

 

[Jerry27]

I disagree that we never faired well against them. That is just not true.
Going back to 2003, below is UCONN's record against Cuse, BC, Rutgers and Pitt.

vs. Cuse UCONN is 6-3
vs. Rutgers UCONN is 4-6
vs. Pitt UCONN is 4-4
vs. BC UCONN is 0-2

Overall Record against above 14-15. I call that holding there own.

I could be wrong but I believe he was talking about recruiting, not games.

 

[Confident Carl]

Recruiting to CT is always going to be a challenge regardless of what conference your team is affiliated with. The talent pool in state and throughout New England is shallow and is recruited hard by all of the "local" programs in competition with UCONN for resources. The handful of truly elite prospects such as Redd, Fortt, Wilkins, Clark etc. will all be recruited nationally as well. The only thing UCONN can do at this point is develop a method of scouting that allows them to pinpoint athletes and be able to coach them up once they get them to Storrs. Once the team starts winning again, recruiting will pick up with higher rated players.

TCU has an interesting philosophy where in they are less concerned with positions and more concerned with athletes coming out of HS. They will take a bunch of dual threat QBs, RBs, and WR with some eventually growing into tight ends, LBs, or moving to CB or S. Patterson loves having players with ball skills on both sides of the field, and although their teams are often undersized they make up for it with speed and skill. This system was born out of necessity from when they joined the MWC, and they were not able to go head to head with the major programs of the region for top recruits. It worked very well for them, and their consistent winning has allowed them to up their recruiting game while staying true to their philosophy.

I do have one question for those who follow the program closely. Given whomever else potentially may have been available at the time, would Bob D. have been your choice for HC? I see the qualities that would make him attractive to an AD, such as youth, charisma, local ties, and pedigree. That said he is such a strange bird, who lacked experience on the offensive side of the ball, and who's defenses often benefited from being paired with great offenses.

I wonder would it not have made more sense to go after an offensive mind who could have installed his system and then recruited to it? Maybe a MAC, CUSA, or even FCS HC or a top FBS offensive assistant? Looking at recent AAC Hires that definitely seems to be the line of thinking. I think both SMU and Houston will see big jumps in offensive performance.

Please keep in mind I'm not advocating that Diaco be let go, he deserves a shot to see if he can make it work. I'd give him a full cycle of recruits, and with that a few seasons to hopefully cultivate an offensive identity. If after 4-5 seasons UCONN is a middling AAC Team and missing bowls, I'd go after offensive minds only. You can win with scheme in college football even with a large disparity in talent. You can't win with lesser talent and no discernible offensive philosophy.

Bob Diaco is not overly concerned about recruiting. He has said that in the core region there are like 50,ooo,ooo people. (Boston -Washington/VA west to PA). He also talks about direct flights to all AAC cities from Bradley. He stated on signing day that the UCONN brand was solid and they actually turned away some good players who couldn't qualify or were not RKG's that want what UCONN (top 20 public University) had to offer.

Asking at this point in time if Diaco was the right choice for Head Coach is way too premature. Give him 2-3 seasons under his belt with his players. Making a value judgement after 1 year is silly.

 

[sportsart]

For the life of me, I can't figure out why there are only some 50 posters, if that, who post regularly on this forum. Being that there are thousands who have registered over the years.......oh wait....now I remember.

 

[Confident Carl]

I could be wrong but I believe he was talking about recruiting, not games.

Wouldn't a near .500 record indicate that we have been on a par in recruiting? Subjectivity regarding recruiting means little. It's the results that matter.

 

[Srqhusky]

I just want to make sure that I get this right. And this is not meant to be a shot at Whaler or anyone else who agrees with him.

We are concerned about an early commit 3-star prospect who is a top40 player in the state of Virginia because he doesn't have a lot of big offers???

Unlike in the past when we were concerned with late-committing 2-star players or unrated players with FCS-only offers, I'm not at all worried about this pick. Granted, I haven't seen more than a minute of his highlights, but it seems that he got ratings love even without the other offers. Otherwise, he wouldn't be a 3-star, top40 Virginia player. This is likely a very solid pickup, and I'm glad he was smart enough to immediately choose the greatest university in the world rather than to wait for offers from lesser universities to "pad his stats"...

Or what about the fact that it's June and there's only 13 spots

 

[UConnDan97]

Or what about the fact that it's June and there's only 13 spots

I'm not sure what you're getting at. I can't tell if you agree with me or not.

Just in case you don't; Am I to assume that all 13 spots will be filled by players with better credentials than 3 stars and top40 Virginia-type talent? Because the only way that anyone can be mad about picking this kid up is if they truly believed that ALL of the spots would be occupied by people with better credentials. And to that, I would say to them that they should check our recruiting history over the last....ever....

 

[freescooter]

Nobody is saying Diaco is not the guy based on his first recruit of 2016. But some of us saw a number of worrisome signs. A coach who essentially threw the season. A team that was often disorganized and always ill prepared. A coach who basically quit against a beatable opponent. What can at best be called odd substitution patterns. Continuously bad mouthing his predecessor. A team that seemed not to respond at all for the last quarter of the season. If he also can't recruit he's a bigger liability than Pasqualoni was. But I agree it is too soon to make that decision.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

For the life of me, I can't figure out why there are only some 50 posters, if that, who post regularly on this forum. Being that there are thousands who have registered over the years..oh wait....now I remember.

Yeah whaler drove them away. Not the miserable records.

Whaler and I stand outside the Rent and get 15k to turn around and go home. We have that much juice.

Not surprised at the majority of responses given that most people tend to ignore reality around here.

 

[whaler11]

For the life of me, I can't figure out why there are only some 50 posters, if that, who post regularly on this forum. Being that there are thousands who have registered over the years..oh wait....now I remember.

I agree passive aggressive clowns who use eye roll emojis in 75% of their posts are tiresome.

I wonder what the reason is that 500 people saw the end of the last two games and they might not sell 10k non student season tickets is?

 

[Carl Spackler]

I agree passive aggressive clowns who use eye roll emojis in 75% of their posts are tiresome.

I wonder what the reason is that 500 people saw the end of the last two games and they might not sell 10k non student season tickets is?

Ummmmm....that's how many people in CT are willing to stay and watch the end of a 41-0 no show of a game, and then stay to the end of a loss to an 0-11 team and then renew a full season of tickets again?

For the record, I think pissing and moaning about attendance when we have sucked as bad as we have and progressively worsened for 4 consecutive years is a waste of time. Attendance issues with a winning program would be a problem, but we've never had that yet since 2003.

As for rdcruiting, i've said my piece before. Recruiting is not what concerns me about Diaco.

 

[whaler11]

Ummmmm....that's how many people in CT are willing to stay and watch the end of a 41-0 no show of a game, and then stay to the end of a loss to an 0-11 team and then renew a full season of tickets again?

For the record, I think pissing and moaning about attendance when we have sucked as bad as we have and progressively worsened for 4 consecutive years is a waste of time. Attendance issues with a winning program would be a problem, but we've never had that yet since 2003.

As for rdcruiting, i've said my piece before. Recruiting is not what concerns me about Diaco.

2 things here that aren't surprising.

1. You missed the point.
2. You are worried about the wrong things.