DC - Orlovksy surprised by UConn's limited progress

[mikedog10]

College Football Notebook: UConn's Limited Progress Surprises Former QB Dan Orlovsky

Haven't heard from Desmond on the football team in a while... apparently, Dan O is disappointed by the lack of success over the years. He fairly accurately diagnoses what set UConn back,

"Things changed when Coach Edsall left," Orlovsky said. "We invested a lot, I mean a lot as players to help build the program, but Coach Edsall put everything he had into it, everything.

"And I think when that transition was made it lost the guy that was so invested in it. I think it would be hard to argue against that."

Edsall leaving was only half the equation, but I guess there's nothing to gain from throwing Hathaway/PP under the bus.

And then there's this:

The Power Five dis has meant even more of an open season on a football program that has won 34.4 percent of its games over the past five seasons, to the point that the drop-it song has returned along with a move to a conference such as the Mid-American for football while all other teams would go back to the Big East.

Who is singing the drop-it song? Some way to get the fans fired up on the Friday before homecoming!

 

[RedSoloCup]

Who is singing the drop-it song? Some way to get the fans fired up on the Friday before homecoming!

LOL, fairly easy to answer that... the dopey guy who hates UConn at the Courant... DC loves to snipe at the football team that fired his beloved coach.

 

[UConnTrumbull]

I'm hoping sometime soon we get DanO on the coaching staff. He still seems very invested in the program but I'm sure he's in no rush to leave back up QB life in the NFL.

 

[Excalibur]

I've said it many times before -- Edsall was a good, but replaceable coach. We happened to do a really lousy job replacing him.

 

[UConnMatt813]

LOL, fairly easy to answer that... the dopey guy who hates UConn at the Courant... DC loves to snipe at the football team that fired his beloved coach.

I'm glad he's off the UConn beat. I can't even understand how he has a job there. His work is often uninspired & reflects the bare minimum. Not to mention he is as thin-skinned as they come.

 

[pnow15]

Progress?

 

[Skiblets]

Who has ever brought up Uconn to the MAC? Dez needs to be fitted for clown shoes

 

[huskymedic]

Who is singing the drop-it song? Some way to get the fans fired up on the Friday before homecoming!

You don't spend much time on the basketball forum I guess...

Who has ever brought up Uconn to the MAC?

Mark Blaudschun and then this guy just last week. Why UConn, Big East will reunite before long


Weak article by Des - if you're gonna bring it up at least ask DannyO what he thinks the solution is.

 

[freescooter]

Agree that Edsall's replacement was a disaster. And it came at the worst possible time. But there are a huge number of college teams that are 1 coaching mistake away from a mess. We need to correct the problem if it it's clear that Diaco is the wrong guy. Worst thing you can do is allow the program to wallow in mediocrity.

There are a couple of things about the Big East that people ignore too. First is that it is at its peak as a league. #2 it's not drawing viewers and is likely to be dumped or get a greatly reduced deal when the current one ends. Fox overpaid badly for a property that doesn't deliver eyeballs. Say what you will Villanova-Georgetown does ok but DePaul-Creighton not so much. #3 the Big East is a bad match for us. It is mid sized urban mostly Catholic schools. And it and it has as much dead wood as the AAC.

And despite it all football still drives the bus and as Memphis and Temple among others have shown with the right coach it is possible to put a good team on the field that is capable of competing with anyone except the very cream of the P5. UCF and Houston show you can even do that. But you need the right guy and we obviously got it wrong with Edsall's replacement and the jury is still out on the current occupant.

 

[Dooley]

I'm just excited that our alum are engaged and continue to follow the program. Many of them tweet live during our games - they're powering through some of the same snoozefests we all are and are every bit as frustrated as us. They busted their tails off to elevate the program so far and so quickly that to see it constantly dumped on has to be incredibly frustrating for them.

Bad job by Des for bringing up the MAC but failing to mention anything about what UConn can do to get into Power-5 conference (winning, attendance, fan support, etc). It had the makings of a good piece - our best QB in program history being frustrated with the lack of progress - but it had to at least attempt to offer possible solutions on how to fix it/build it back up again...not discuss MAC or dumping football altogether. Bad job, Des.

 

[sub legacy]

College Football Notebook: UConn's Limited Progress Surprises Former QB Dan Orlovsky

Haven't heard from Desmond on the football team in a while... apparently, Dan O is disappointed by the lack of success over the years. He fairly accurately diagnoses what set UConn back,

Edsall leaving was only half the equation, but I guess there's nothing to gain from throwing Hathaway/PP under the bus.

And then there's this:

Who is singing the drop-it song? Some way to get the fans fired up on the Friday before homecoming!

The drop it song never stopped. There's always some clueless oaf who thinks a knee jerk demolition of the football program will save the rest of the athletic department.

 

[BlueDogs]

I'm glad he's off the UConn beat. I can't even understand how he has a job there. His work is often uninspired & reflects the bare minimum. Not to mention he is as thin-skinned as they come.

There's really no surprise. The real surprise is how he never siezed the opportunity to better his craft with the opportunities given, although, giving credit where due, last year he seemed to have had a fire lit under him and was much more engaged. His overall journalistic skills on a whole are not up to the standards of a state paper of record.

 

[tduconn]

Who has ever brought up Uconn to the MAC? Dez needs to be fitted for clown shoes

Unfortunately its been postulated over the airwaves........not only in CT.

 

[uconnphil2016]

Sounds like DC wanted to write a hit piece after being booted from the football beat. Still, I'd love to see Orlovsky coach here.

 

[ZooCougar]

I've said it many times before -- Edsall was a good, but replaceable coach. We happened to do a really lousy job replacing him.

Ding ding ding!

 

[HuskiesFan1014]

You don't spend much time on the basketball forum I guess...

Mark Blaudschun and then this guy just last week. Why UConn, Big East will reunite before long


Weak article by Des - if you're gonna bring it up at least ask DannyO what he thinks the solution is.

This X 1,000!
I got to the end of the article and kept looking for the rest. Typical DC journalism...shoddy and incomplete. What's good? Not him.

 

[Adios]

So according to Desmond Connor, we're going from being considered by the Big 12, being the most distant candidate, to leaving the AAC for the MAC.

Can we create a petition to get him fired? Also, can we post this as bulletin board material for our road game at SU next year?

 

[huskyinfl]

It would be great to have Dan on the staff but this is horrible writing. Dan's comments read so poorly to me. Whats up with his limited progress in the NFL, thought he was going to have some bright moments?

 

[weyuo]

The one thing that hurts UConn football more than anything is recruiting. I don't care if it's Diaco, Paqualoni, Edsall or any of the top names in the coaching world. Trying to get P-5 quality recruits to come to Connecticut is rare at best. You may get one in a recruiting class. The others are all projects. It's much easier for Houston and USF to recruit kids that play football practically year round in Texas and Florida than it is for UConn to recruit CT kids that don't. For one...the pool of candidates is drastically smaller even if you consider all of New England. And that is never more apparent than recruiting offensive linemen which is vital if you want any kind of offense to compete on a top 25 level. When you have to reach out to Denmark to snag a kid that never really excelled at O-line before going to college, well that kind of sums up what caliber offense your going to end up with. Andreas Knappe is a big guy that gave it his all for the ole blue and white but not quite a Lombardi or Outland trophy candidate. Hopefully Diaco can polish enough diamonds in the rough to get UConn ranked for a couple years in a row, raise some eye brows and possibly get a few 4 stars to start considering Storrs as a cool place to spend 4 or 5 years. Then the snow ball might gain some momentum.

 

[HuskiesFan1014]

The one thing that hurts UConn football more than anything is recruiting. I don't care if it's Diaco, Paqualoni, Edsall or any of the top names in the coaching world. Trying to get P-5 quality recruits to come to Connecticut is rare at best. You may get one in a recruiting class. The others are all projects. It's much easier for Houston and USF to recruit kids that play football practically year round in Texas and Florida than it is for UConn to recruit CT kids that don't. For one...the pool of candidates is drastically smaller even if you consider all of New England. And that is never more apparent than recruiting offensive linemen which is vital if you want any kind of offense to compete on a top 25 level. When you have to reach out to Denmark to snag a kid that never really excelled at O-line before going to college, well that kind of sums up what caliber offense your going to end up with. Andreas Knappe is a big guy that gave it his all for the ole blue and white but not quite a Lombardi or Outland trophy candidate. Hopefully Diaco can polish enough diamonds in the rough to get UConn ranked for a couple years in a row, raise some eye brows and possibly get a few 4 stars to start considering Storrs as a cool place to spend 4 or 5 years. Then the snow ball might gain some momentum.

Winning the ConnFLict again can't hurt, either. Those 4-star kids can't pass up a winner.

 

[sub legacy]

The one thing that hurts UConn football more than anything is recruiting. I don't care if it's Diaco, Paqualoni, Edsall or any of the top names in the coaching world. Trying to get P-5 quality recruits to come to Connecticut is rare at best. You may get one in a recruiting class. The others are all projects. It's much easier for Houston and USF to recruit kids that play football practically year round in Texas and Florida than it is for UConn to recruit CT kids that don't. For one...the pool of candidates is drastically smaller even if you consider all of New England. And that is never more apparent than recruiting offensive linemen which is vital if you want any kind of offense to compete on a top 25 level. When you have to reach out to Denmark to snag a kid that never really excelled at O-line before going to college, well that kind of sums up what caliber offense your going to end up with. Andreas Knappe is a big guy that gave it his all for the ole blue and white but not quite a Lombardi or Outland trophy candidate. Hopefully Diaco can polish enough diamonds in the rough to get UConn ranked for a couple years in a row, raise some eye brows and possibly get a few 4 stars to start considering Storrs as a cool place to spend 4 or 5 years. Then the snow ball might gain some momentum.

I could never fully grasp why it's that hard to recruit football talent to Connecticut. Is it exclusively about geography and proximity to top talent? If it's weather, then I don't understand how Wisconsin and Michigan State does it then. The weather isn't that miserable up here during football season with the exception of maybe one or two home games. Do people have us geographically confused with Nova Scotia or Iceland? Is it because the campus is a giant cow-town and not located right next to a major city with the hottest night clubs? If so, again, how does a school like Wisconsin get by as a regularly competitive football program (granted, I know nothing about Madison)? Don't Notre Dame and Stanford have harder academics and requirements than UConn? I kinda don't get the "well it's Connecticut, what do you expect" logic in terms of recruiting and general perception (on the part of recruits and recruiting analysts).

 

[huskymedic]

Trying to get P-5 quality recruits to come to Connecticut is rare at best. You may get one in a recruiting class.

We have plenty of "P5 quality players" on this roster and have had them on previous rosters -it's not rare.

I will stipulate that there is a difference between "P5 quality recruits" and the "4-5 star recruits" people covet. Our issue is primarily depth of our roster and playing catch up to build that depth and maintain it.

 

[Huskygamble19]

If you build a winning program in football they will come. that means you have to make the lower star recruits play to the best of their ability and play totally together as a team. It can be done. Basketball team seems to flourish despite being in the AAC. It looks like a very competitive team this year. The football team, unfortunately, will have to make winning an everyday thing to attract the 4 and 5 star recruits. It can be done though and I am not giving up hope. It just needs patience for the program to take hold..GO HUSKIES!!!

 

[gtcam]

Dez C as a reporter is on par with Hathaway being an effective AD

 

[ktuck911]

LOL, fairly easy to answer that... the dopey guy who hates UConn at the Courant... DC loves to snipe at the football team that fired his beloved coach.

Get your facts in order bro. Way off with that. Decisions are made. DC ain't mad trust. Maybe it's that Dan O preferred to talk to him and not the other guy at the Courant.
BTW Dan October had valid points.