Six games, 12 punts

[champs99and04]

Five of them came in the span of eight drives against Syracuse. Of course, that was after they had racked up 31 points in their first five possessions.

Beyond that, you're looking at three against Rhode Island, one fairly early in the game against UCF when they inexplicably decided to not go for it on 4th and inches, and three courtesy punts in garbage time from Boise, Cincinnati, and Memphis, respectfully.

The schedule hasn't done them any favors to this point, but the results are ugly no matter the scale. This is essentially what you'd get if every player on the roster was a replacement level FCS recruit.

We'll have to hope that they show something more over the second half of the season. Otherwise, it's hard to envision much of a ceiling moving forward.

 

[BugsyCT]

Gotta wonder how many drives the opponent has had that ended with them scoring a TD. They're probably batting around .750 or .800. And that includes end of halves and garbage time.

 

[ShakyTheMohel]

I think I have said this before...but I still don’t understand why this defense is not only a bad FBS defense....it’s a bad FCS defense. So was Diaco not only recruiting FCS players....but they were bad FCS players?

 

[Dooley]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

 

[NavinRJohnson]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

This is genius. I like it.

 

[huskyblooz]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

Yes! And no more punts!

 

[Hoophound]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

I presume this is said somewhat tongue in cheek. While it might make sense statistically, it won’t do much to develop these guys into normal football players. I think you really have to look at the players we are using, their age, experience and size and decide if the current results are really an indicator that we have a dim future. I haven’t bothered to really do that, but true freshmen are almost impossible to win with in large numbers. My guess is that a year of physical development will help improve these guys quite a bit and two years will give Randy a squad he can win 6 games with. From there we can try and think bigger. I really don’t think he will have an issue building a .500 team. He knows talent and he understands the athleticism his recruits need to have to compete. I’m just not sure how much better than .500 we might get. On-side kicks and eliminating punting will just create two more areas we aren’t practicing. These guys need to practice playing real football, not gimmick football for a cheap win somewhere.

 

[cohenzone]

I’ve said for a few weeks,this is a team to watch. Will set NCAA record for fewest punts allowed. If you’re going to be bad, take advantahpge of it and set a few records.

 

[uconnphil2016]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

You should e-mail this to everyone on the coaching staff. They won't do it because of pride, but they absolutely should.

 

[SubbaBub]

This doesn't require a lot of deep thinking. We give up TD's on nearly every drive because the freshman defense with trot out there isn't physically up to the task.

This is why freshmen don't normaly see the field and why two and three star freshmen never see the field.

I hope they learn something an come back ndxt year strong and fast enough to dictate an FBS football game.

 

[champs99and04]

I think I have said this before...but I still don’t understand why this defense is not only a bad FBS defense....it’s a bad FCS defense. So was Diaco not only recruiting FCS players....but they were bad FCS players?

I choose to take the more optimistic viewpoint that they are are good FCS players that look bad because they're freshman.

 

[kobe]

our back up true freshman RB weighted the same as one of your DT's. Not a good sign bois.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

I choose to take the more optimistic viewpoint that they are are good FCS players that look bad because they're freshman.

But, FCS players nevertheless. And, of course, UConn is a FBS program playing other FBS teams.

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

Completely agree. I also think Magliozzi should get the rest of the year off. No reason to punt. He’s got a good leg though so we can make it a 4 man platoon at PK.

 

[Dooley]

I presume this is said somewhat tongue in cheek. While it might make sense statistically, it won’t do much to develop these guys into normal football players. I think you really have to look at the players we are using, their age, experience and size and decide if the current results are really an indicator that we have a dim future. I haven’t bothered to really do that, but true freshmen are almost impossible to win with in large numbers. My guess is that a year of physical development will help improve these guys quite a bit and two years will give Randy a squad he can win 6 games with. From there we can try and think bigger. I really don’t think he will have an issue building a .500 team. He knows talent and he understands the athleticism his recruits need to have to compete. I’m just not sure how much better than .500 we might get. On-side kicks and eliminating punting will just create two more areas we aren’t practicing. These guys need to practice playing real football, not gimmick football for a cheap win somewhere.

Yeah, I get what you're saying. Only practice and more game reps will give these guys experience and, hopefully, confidence. Saying "we should onside kick more" sounds like fan-speak, but I really do think there could be some tactical coach-up experience to gain from it too.

The angle I'm coming from is that they can get similar experience defending the 45-to-goal line. If getting beat by a deep ball or long play is a concern, you're defending less yardage. You can play 2-deep inside a 45 yard chunk...not a 75 yard chunk. Less yards to defend. Keeps it simple - it let's the defense keep plays in front of them. Just worry about making the right reads and taking the proper tackle angles. Once the D starts forcing FG attempts instead of TDs, then we can go back to being more "conventional".

I absolutely understand your point though and it's completely valid. I just raise the question more out of curiosity if the coaching staff has thought of it, from either a confidence builder or from an analytics angle. Our D is so overmatched each and every week that, at some point, I wonder if considering some sort of unconventional approach could help keep it more simpler.

And I agree with everyone here that wants less punts and, yes, that is absolutely my own fan-speak. Punting in college on anything shorter than 4th-and-3(ish) once the offense hits midfield makes zero sense. Especially with our struggling D. It literally makes no difference is opposing offenses start inside their own 25 or at midfield. We're giving up points no matter what.

 

[Dooley]

You should e-mail this to everyone on the coaching staff. They won't do it because of pride, but they absolutely should.

I think they have my email set to junk/spam mail. Ha!

 

[RSTuthill]

Ironically the Huskies still have a good shot at one more win and maybe even two more. If the latter happens they will have met expectations.

 

[jbdphi]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

One other (minor) consideration to this is that in the very few cases where we have stopped the other team after 3 downs, if they're in plus territory, they almost always go for it given the downside is so limited. On-side kicks every time means they're always operating in plus territory and they've basically got four downs to get that 10 yards which means we literally have no chance of ever stopping them. That said, I'm a fan of trying at least a few on-sides kicks to a) give us real practice with it, b) give us an actual chance recovery and easier scoring and c) to keep the other team guessing a lot more on kickoff returns.

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

I've said this before and I'll say it again - you have to really wonder when the staff will consider onside kicks as a kickoff option. It makes zero difference where opponents start their drives...they all end up in our end zone. So try kicks that give us a chance at recovering a loose football off a bad bounce. It's sad but it's probably our only realistic option to create a "turnover". It takes FBS offenses, what, 2 or 3 plays to go from their 25 to our 45? So what? Try to get the football and score points. That's our best defense right now.

But we need to score to kickoff

 

[Dooley]

But we need to score to kickoff

Yeah, there's that too. We're not a high octane offense by any stretch. But I do think our offense is light years ahead of our defense. Probably speaking more to the limited number of times we kick off to start a half and those 3 or 4 times we might kick off after some sort of score.

 

[BugsyCT]

Our offense hasn't been good either really - they just get overshadowed by how horrific our D is. They haven't been able to get much done against anyone except URI. But at the same time it's hard to really evaluate them based on a game-situational perspective because UConn gets so far behind so quickly.