Finally we can run off some upperclassmen

[ktuck911]

I wouldn't be surprised if a few RS Sophs are gone as well.. There's a couple that I can clearly see that they see the writing is on the wall for them, but I'm surprised about one of them.. Thought he'd be great playing for us, but his PT got diminished drastically....

 

[ktuck911]

We need 8-10 JUCO’s.

Word!

 

[ktuck911]

Life isnt fair. Edsall should have done more. 5 wasn't enough, he could have found 5 more. From everything I could see in his recruiting, we did not hit the JUCO circuit very hard at all. He should have entered this fall with at least another DL body and Corner.

I'm not talking about 5 Fatusaki's, I'm talking about finding 5 more middle of the road bodies to take the reps and lessen the sting of these losses. These freshman should be doing weight room activities this fall instead of getting run over every Saturday.

So you can't sell the program to JUCO's, then how do you sell it to high school seniors? Now the current crop of 2019 kids has miles of tape watching the 2018 class get exposed.

Good point.. Mature bodies were needed.. more of them anyways... It'd be nice to take a different approach and go with mainly HS kids, but we MUST hit the prep school (kids that are like 19 going on 20 already), JUCO, & GS route... Yeah, the pups will be a little better in '19, but only a little, because every other school's program should be that much better because they have depth we don't currently have...

 

[uconnfan68]

And so with that, here are the redshirt juniors below. I think we have to have a min class size of 20 this year. 20 broken down as: 9 graduating seniors + 4 currently unfilled scholarships + 5 redshirt juniors that do not return for their final year of eligibility (5 is a guess!) + 3 underclassman leave early (there are always 2 or 3).

Senior day should be telling when we play Temple in late Nov.

Current Redshirt Juniors:
1) Brandon Bisack (RS)
2) Donevin O'Reilly (RS)
3) Zordan Holman (RS)
4) Tyler Davis (RS)
5) Bryan Cespedes (RS)
6) Ian Campbell (RS)
7) Matt Peart (RS)
8) Philippe Okounam (RS)
9) Kevin Murphy (RS)
10) Connor Freeborn (RS)
11) Eli Thomas (RS)
12) Marshé Terry (RS)
13) Michael Tarbutt (K) (RS)

Have to think Thomas isn’t going to play again after a stroke. Will he keep a scholly until he graduates? Taking it away would be pretty cold.

 

[HartfordHank]

However, we needed probably six more of those upperclassman coming in this fall which didn't happen.

Which six freshman recruits are you going to pass on? You are still limited by the number of players you can bring in each year. Going the JUCO route can be dangerous. For every JUCO you take you sacrifice a freshman. If you cannot balance the Juco Freshman ratio you all of a sudden become very dependent on JUCOs. If your AD is giving you four to five years to turn the boat you need the freshman.

 

[HartfordHank]

Have to think Thomas isn’t going to play again after a stroke. Will he keep a scholly until he graduates? Taking it away would be pretty cold.

NCAA provides for special circumstances like this. Player is moved to a non-athletic scholarship and the football team has access to use his scholarship. Has to be a legit situation which this obviously meets.

UConn had a center a while back that had a similar situation with a medical condition.

 

[Exit 4]

Which six freshman recruits are you going to pass on? You are still limited by the number of players you can bring in each year. Going the JUCO route can be dangerous. For every JUCO you take you sacrifice a freshman. If you cannot balance the Juco Freshman ratio you all of a sudden become very dependent on JUCOs. If your AD is giving you four to five years to turn the boat you need the freshman.

The staff is at 81 scholarships deployed based on our best information with 4 unused. Three of those four were taken away (for this season only) by the NCAA for paper work errors last winter. Yep, the school shot itself in the foot with technical mistakes. This was disclosed by Edsall last winter. So, we could have 4 JUCO/grad transfer kids here this fall if things were done right w/o losing a single recruit.

As for who should have been passed on from the 2018 class? Well obviously I'm not naming names. I think it would be pretty easy to pick two or so that we could have afforded to have passed on. If we passed on just two and had the four, that would be six and perhaps we'd have a better product which would boost recruiting for 2019. However, I dont disagree that passing on as many as six from the 2018 would have been easy.

 

[huskymedic]

NCAA provides for special circumstances like this. Player is moved to a non-athletic scholarship and the football team has access to use his scholarship. Has to be a legit situation which this obviously meets.

UConn had a center a while back that had a similar situation with a medical condition.

... Joe Akers under Edsall.

 

[hardcorehusky]

Everyone keeps forgetting about the admissions requirements- a kid has to have the grades to get in. It might be harder for Edsall to get JUCO's in than you think. Grad transfers- different story- but that is not how you build a program. A few yes- a lot and you have to replenish every year.

 

[Exasperated]

I wouldn't be surprised if a few RS Sophs are gone as well.. There's a couple that I can clearly see that they see the writing is on the wall for them, but I'm surprised about one of them.. Thought he'd be great playing for us, but his PT got diminished drastically....

Don’t be surprised if you see more than just one.

 

[huskymedic]

From everything I could see in his recruiting, we did not hit the JUCO circuit very hard at all.

They chased quite a few JUCO/Community College kids through 2018. More than I thought RE2.0 ever did. Heck, Corey spent time up and down the West Coast and through Arizona and Texas sniffing around if you remember. Wholley was all over Monroe and ASA. They were in the mix/on the radar for Murray (LB) Texas, Bradley (OL) Lackawanna, Johnson (DE/LB) Pasadena, Amanfo (LB) Eastern Arizona, the Hawaiian kid (?OL/DL) from CA... They knew they needed help on D. There were quite a few others that seemed to have mutual interest (at least from a coach/player connection on social media). Not getting them signed, sealed and delivered I get, but they were mining the landscape.

 

[Exit 4]

They chased quite a few JUCO/Community College kids in 2018. More than I thought RE2.0 ever did. Heck, Corey spent time up and down the West Coast and through Arizona and Texas sniffing around if you remember. Wholley was all over Monroe and ASA. They were in the mix/on the radar for Murray (LB) Texas, Bradley (OL) Lackawanna, Johnson (DE/LB) Pasadena, Amanfo (LB) Eastern Arizona, the Hawaiian kid (?OL/DL) from CA... They knew they needed help on D. There were quite a few others that seemed to have mutual interest (at least from a coach/player connection on social media). Not getting them signed, sealed and delivered I get, but they were mining the landscape.

I thought some of these names you listed from his short 2017 recruiting effort rather than 2018. Regardless, I don’t consider that list to be a great effort. Granted the JUCO pool is smaller, but you probably need to be seriously on 5 recruits for every one you land. By seriously on, I mean thinking it’s down to you and one other program. To me your list is representative of what an established program does to supplement rather than the bigger effort we needed to soften our rebuild.

PS Corey should really stop spending time in the pacific and mountain time zones if he doesn’t net anything this cycle.

 

[Exit 4]

Conversely, does everyone think the path we took to 2018 still lies solely at the feet of Diaco and Randy really has taken the right route with this last class? When I look at these freshman I can’t help but think that Randy would like a do over as he over estimate what a squad of freshman would really look like. I think if he could go back he would redouble his efforts for more upper classman. Diaco put us in this spot, but Randy might have missed fired with his 2018 rebuild plan. So now let’s see how he can get this righted with the 2019 class. Happy to be wrong, I’m still in camp Randy.

 

[Exit 4]

Don’t be surprised if you see more than just one.

Definately thinking there will be several and if so, that might get us all the way to a class of 25. That’s a lot of new names between now and Feb signing day.

 

[whaler11]

Conversely, does everyone think the path we took to 2018 still lies solely at the feet of Diaco and Randy really has taken the right route with this last class? When I look at these freshman I can’t help but think that Randy would like a do over as he over estimate what a squad of freshman would really look like. I think if he could go back he would redouble his efforts for more upper classman. Diaco put us in this spot, but Randy might have missed fired with his 2018 rebuild plan. So now let’s see how he can get this righted with the 2019 class. Happy to be wrong, I’m still in camp Randy.

This season would be a tire fire either way.

If he didn’t run off Diaco’s players they would be almost as terrible.

Are these kids better or worse off for this debacle? On average I’d say no.

Throw out the record. Throw out the roster. Throw out the blame.

Flat out they aren’t recruiting well enough to fix this mess. Unless that changes they are going to win 3 games a year for eternity.

 

[huskymedic]

PS Corey should really stop spending time in the pacific and mountain time zones if he doesn’t net anything this cycle.

I don't necessarily disagree on time/effort component but my sense is that is where the vast number of talent producing junior/community colleges are located (west/southwest). There are a few in the central time zone and a few in the northeast.

 

[uconnbill]

Have to think Thomas isn’t going to play again after a stroke. Will he keep a scholly until he graduates? Taking it away would be pretty cold.

He can keep it and UConn can use it at the same time if he can't come back like what happened with Joe Akers who couldn't play because a narrowing of his spinal cord. He still received a UConn education for free, but the scholarship was freed up for another person.

 

[whaler11]

I don't necessarily disagree on time/effort component but my sense is that is where the vast number of talent producing junior/community colleges are located (west/southwest). There are a few in the central time zone and a few in the northeast.

Yeah if you want quality JUCOs you aren’t any closer to Storrs than Texas.

 

[uconnfan68]

NCAA provides for special circumstances like this. Player is moved to a non-athletic scholarship and the football team has access to use his scholarship. Has to be a legit situation which this obviously meets.

UConn had a center a while back that had a similar situation with a medical condition.

Thanks, was hoping something like that was available.