Felt like Christmas again | Page 3 | The Boneyard

Felt like Christmas again

Will check out HuskyNan site later. Agree Purple Stein, overall feels like quality will be comparable if not better. Until we start playing, inconceivable that we will “replace” the 3 musketeers of Joe Skyler and Cam. Have a lot of hope for both OL and DL. Will we take a step back or is it possible we don’t miss a beat? Inexperience individually and as a program look to be limiting factors. Candle may have brought enough coaches and players that we lean towards not missing a beat. Gonna be fun to watch!
 
Jetskies said:
interesting. if indeed Candle's approach is longer term development of the boys, wonder if Candle has been already given the grace by UConn/DaveB to have a trash season next year, with the higher difficulty and whatnot. I hope this is not the case, since there's absolutely no guarantee those young guns will stick around beyond 2026 anyway. I'd rather just win now and play the recruitment carousel game over and over every winter (i don't actually want that but the landscape forces me to choose that).
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I doubt there was any grace given to not be competitive next season. Benedict/Candle knows that won’t fly with UConn fans. I’m just thinking that maybe Candle has more of an eye for high ceiling guys that maybe need a bit of development than going all in on immediate impact 1 year guys for next season.

Who knows, he still has a lot of roster spots to fill, maybe he plugs in some more immediate impact guys. It’s not like he’s gone all in on guys who haven’t played, it’s been somewhat of a balance.
 
The take that he’s been given grace to build the program is not one I share at all. I think his actions prove otherwise.
He has addressed the QB position,DL, LB, TE, WR and OL needs with guys we can expect to be very good. Yes we lost good RB and OL talent, but he’s done a great job addressing those losses. I’m excited for what this team can do NEXT year and beyond.
Regarding “unproven” comments; not going to get P4 starters to jump ship very often, so yes some guys may not step up to the opportunity. No guarantees ever.
 
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HuskyHawk said:
I can’t read all these individual threads. I see so many transfers coming in and a lot of them from P4 programs. Does anybody have a holistic view of where we are? We lost a lot. Candle seems to be working portal miracles but is he? I don’t have a good sense of whether this is impressive or merely looks impressive to someone like me who doesn’t know who these guys are.
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I'm going to use context clues. Candle has a rep for recruiting talent. That he's bringing in the players he's choosing to bring in speaks more to their ability than some rando internet nobodies, imo.
 
Lotsa new folks, lotsa interesting back stories and backgrounds. Sure seems like he's got some ballplayers in there! Osborne and K'Van Sherman still seem to me the most potentially impactful individuals, and they were two of the first portalers to commit.
 
UCFan1513 said:
Relatively novice football fan here (mostly MBB) so this is a genuine question. What makes Candle’s transfers and recruits markedly better than Mora’s? It seems a lot of the transfers have limited on-field experience from what I’ve seen - are they more highly rated coming out of high school than a Mora recruit?

Looking at 247 Sports a similar proportion of last year’s recruits to this year’s are 3-stars vs unranked, and this year has a slightly higher average rating, but not a huge jump. Not tapped in to the world of football recruiting - what am I missing?
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You apparently missed this year's rose colored glasses ceremony. It is an annual affair in which we all partake. We normally remain in this state, fed constant optimistic press releases and Courant stories until the first game of the season against a P4 opponent comes around. Then our heads explode.
 
So, according to our outbound
/inbound list, there are 5 guys still uncommitted from our portal that I'd like to hang onto

Diomande-Produced for us last year, 2 years left
Mills-Some production, mystery dnp much after
Mollette-Experienced solid player
Hoffman-Didn't he get decent amount of snaps?
Toy-How good is he?? I'd be guessing
 
Waquoit said:
I'm going to use context clues. Candle has a rep for recruiting talent. That he's bringing in the players he's choosing to bring in speaks more to their ability than some rando internet nobodies, imo.
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I'm not doubting talent evaluation. I'm just surprised at what I'm seeing. A guy who was at Toledo, did pretty well at Toledo sure, but it's not even close to the top MAC school traditionally, is now at independent UConn and seems to be doing really well in the portal. Kids are coming from Wisconsin, ND State and USC (4* CB from 2025 class and another safety) a former 4* Rutgers RB, TE from NC, WR from OK State, a DB from Duke, a DL from Texas. I mean, this is wild. Mora was a former NFL HC and UCLA HC and he never managed that.

Maybe these are all kids who didn't get a shot or didn't make it at those schools, but convincing them UConn is the place still can't be easy.
 
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Curious, does anyone know if we are targeting any other QBs in the portal right now? I realized that none of our current roster has significant experience and that somewhat concerns me
 
HuskyHawk said:
I'm not doubting talent evaluation. I'm just surprised at what I'm seeing. A guy who was at Toledo, did pretty well at Toledo sure, but it's not even close to the top MAC school traditionally, is now at independent UConn and seems to be doing really well in the portal. Kids are coming from Wisconsin, ND State and USC (4* CB from 2025 class and another safety) a former 4* Rutgers RB, TE from NC, WR from OK State, a DB from Duke, a DL from Texas. I mean, this is wild. Mora was a former NFL HC and UCLA HC and he never managed that.

Maybe these are all kids who didn't get a shot or didn't make it at those schools, but convincing them UConn is the place still can't be easy.
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I agree with everything but Coach Candle had Toledo at or near the top of the MAC standings while he was there, so I wouldn't say Toledo is not a top MAC school. He may be advising players that UConn is much much closer to a P4 program than G5, which it really is going by AD metrics. Then he has prime examples of why they should come to UConn to get noticed in this portal era more so than at another P4 or G6 program: Skyler Bell from P2 Wisconsin, Bryun Parham from San Jose State and Washington, and Joe Fagnano from FBS Maine all
 
AllHusky said:
So, according to our outbound
/inbound list, there are 5 guys still uncommitted from our portal that I'd like to hang onto

Diomande-Produced for us last year, 2 years left
Mills-Some production, mystery dnp much after
Mollette-Experienced solid player
Hoffman-Didn't he get decent amount of snaps?
Toy-How good is he?? I'd be guessing
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Down to 3 of those with Mollette to Arizona and Toy to CSU.
 
FfldCntyFan said:
One thing I realized when I turned 65 on my most recent birthday: there are a lot of old people out there who are younger than i am.
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You're 65? Holy ****.
 
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I haven't sunk the time to evaluate the recruits coming in, and frankly at the insane pace they're coming in, in would be a full-time job. I hope they end up being as good as they seem.

Not too long after Mora left, I posted that free agency and NIL had left me not caring about college football. I said I hope that turned around once summer practices rolled around. Well, I have to say Coach Candle has my head spinning with the speed and quality with which he replaced his staff and has aggressively attacked the portal. I have no idea how good we will be, but he's given us a lot of reasons to hope.

Now, if you'll forgive me, I have to go ice my thumb. I've got a little bit of tendinitis from liking so many commitments and offers on Twitter.
 
What is the protocol for evaluating all the newcomers(besides the obvious W-L)? I am not in tune with all of the data available, but i know it exists.
 
CL82 said:
I haven't sunk the time to evaluate the recruits coming in, and frankly at the insane pace they're coming in, in would be a full-time job. I hope they end up being as good as they seem.

Not too long after Mora left, I posted that free agency and NIL had left me not caring about college football. I said I hope that turned around once summer practices rolled around. Well, I have to say Coach Candle has my head spinning with the speed and quality with which he replaced his staff and has aggressively attacked the portal. I have no idea how good we will be, but he's given us a lot of reasons to hope.

Now, if you'll forgive me, I have to go ice my thumb. I've got a little bit of tendinitis from liking so many commitments and offers on Twitter.
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All the players look like 5 * when they are wearing the Husky helmet with the visor. But yeah, I'm sure HCJC and his staff are working over-time evaluating and recruiting the players coming in. Just have to have faith. I keep checking their 247 pages to see what other programs made offers.
 
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If the big boys want to go to 24 team playoffs, UConn as independent could be in a sweet spot for talent escaping P4 benches, last year guys wanting to show out (ivy or fcs) and solid high school kids who think they can show out by getting playing time in year 2 or 3. As a 1968 UConn guy who rooted for Toby, Wonderful Wes, Penders, Bill Corely, etc. not any more unlikely than getting 18 NCAA championships in basketball since then.
 
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