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Just a great way to end the season yesterday. If you had told me after shutting out the Gamecocks it would be 15 years until another bowl win, or after going to the Fiesta Bowl it would be 14 years until we got a shot at another power school in a bowl game, I never would have believed it. But we earned this chance, and by God, we didn’t waste it. I’m going to do things a little differently this week. Let’s talk first about the experience, and then the game itself, and then the season and where we are.
So I had been to the bowls in Detroit and Charlotte and Toronto and Phoenix, but all of those included overnight stays. For many, including myself, this was the first commuter bowl. Met Fairfield County Fan in a commuter lot in Fairfield at 7:15, three hours later (despite a horrific early morning tie up on the MassPike shortly after 84 fed into it) we “pulled into” my prepurchased space. In quotes because it required fitting my car through an alley with less than a foot of clearance on each side, where some folks’ small trucks just wouldn’t have fit. Into the stadium around 10:40. I’ve been to Fenway twice before for baseball games. Yes, I get the history and the charm, but seriously? Seats were around where first base would be, at about the ten yard line on the side UConn scored the two second quarter TDs and I can forgive that they are angled for baseball. But I’m fairly sure there was no men’s room that didn’t require going up or down a floor, the food and beverage options were clearly insufficient for the number of people and if there was bowl merchandise for purchase I never saw it. But those are nits. The experience despite all this was great. While there were a few thousand Tar Heels and certainly some neutrals, at least 15k to 20k of the crowd had clearly come to pull for UConn. More than have been to many home games over the last few years. The 28k outdrew the previous high, with a Boston university, by a whopping 75% and almost sold the joint out. If the weather had been good that day maybe it would have sold out. And the weather, while requiring a drive through mist and rain the entire trip both ways, held dry for the game itself. And the UConn fans — at least a third of them — were standing the whole damn game. Maybe it was just how uncomfortable the seats were, but damn — we’re lucky at the Rent to get a small fraction of that amount up on defensive third downs. So while Fenway was underwhelming (the use of the baseball scoreboard for the football game was absurd — you didn’t see yardage posted most plays until the play was being run —It was an unbelievable showing by UConn nation, and one that minor bowls can’t help but notice. And yes, with more seats to fill you can bet that the Pinstripe will also figure out how to see what we can draw there one year. A great feeling.
What can you say about the team. But for covering kickoffs, they played close to perfect football for 37 minutes, until Freeman kicked the FG to put us up 27-7 almost halfway through the third quarter, and at that point it was basically over. What happened from there was pretty meaningless — we just tried to contain on defense, and kill clock with no turnovers on offense. We also used the last 23 to get a number of players onto the field who I don’t recall seeing materially, if at all, all season. But those 37 minutes — wow. The defense was just unbelievable. We had 24 points before UNC had a first down. At the half, first downs were 14 to 1, UConn, and we held them to less than 10 yards of rushing offense. Just an overwhelming defensive effort while it mattered, just like we saw a few times the first half of the season. The offense produced two long plays — the TD pass to Bell and Brown’s long run on the second play, but the entire half was totally mistake free and consistent. When given a short field or a defensive penalty, they took advantage almost every time. Just an amazing performance. Fagnano, for the year, was 20 TDs and 4 interceptions. Do people not understand how important and fantastic that ratio is? Does he have NFL level tools? Of course not. Was he thrilling to watch and making every play? Absolutely not. But he had a heck of a year, and the failure of everyone here to realize that is really unfair to the young man. One wonders if he would have been more respected staying as the back up QB. Sigh. The perfect half was marred only by allowing the one TD on special teams. It looked to me as if Malachi McLean was in the lane he ran though, and for some inexplicable reason abandoned his lane to take out a blocker closer to the sideline than the kick returner ever got. It was absolutely bizarre watching it unfold. Maybe he had an assignment he had to carry out and someone else was supposed to slide over, but it looked like he just lost himself. But it didn’t cost us, and I expect McLean who played the dime back all year to step into Dixon Williams shoes next year. But the bottom line is that this was the type of game where even singling out players is a waste of time. For 38 minutes or so, every player put on the field did his job and the result was just a fabulous team victory.
Finally, I want to talk about the season. Yes, I remember how awful Edsall II was. We went from the worst defensive team in the history of NCAA football (literally, not just figuratively) to taking a year off (that’s not on Edsall but didn’t play well for the program, even if it was helpful from a public health perspective) to a 1-11 season that was only that good because we got to play not one but two FCS opponents. But yesterday was not the cherry on the sundae — yesterday changed the narrative of the season. It was great that we followed last year — and this whole last terrible 15 years — with an 8-4 season, but most (5 of the 8) wins were competitive games, and with the exception of Buffalo — a good but not great MAC team — the wins were against really bad football teams. That’s no one’s fault — the players can only win the games on their schedule and the AD can’t predict how good teams will be in advance — but it was tempering in terms of wondering what we accomplished with the 8 wins. Because when we played our 4 games against P-4 teams, we lost competitive games to two fair teams, got blown out by a bad team and played a somewhat competitive game (yes, it was a one possession game inside the last two minutes but it felt like we could be put away whenever Syracuse wanted) against a good team. But the win against UNC — a team in the range of the Duke and Wake teams we couldn’t beat — changes the narrative entirely. And I don’t want to hear about their TB taking the day off or their QB getting hurt early in the game. Call a damn whambulance. No one cries for what we have to overcome as a program. With the monetary advantages UNC has over us, if they don’t have a backup TB and a backup QB good enough to keep playing at close to the same level, that’s on them, not us. So let me make it clear — with the win over a P-4 school, this was an outstanding year. Not just on the field, but on getting the fan base to start believing again. So kudos to coaches, players, administrators, donors and everyone else who contributed in any way to this effort. Great job all.
Now, in the new environment, the work is never done. We’re still in an awful spot as the only non-Notre Dame Indy left, scheduling is not going to get easier, and even if a door to the ACC opens that even without defections may not be a power conference much longer the way the post season is going, And we are being devastated by losses (mostly graduation) on D, where only Yates, BrInson and Chadwick return as starters. But one can’t, for the first time in forever, help but have confidence that the program is moving forward. I have more confidence that we’re moving forward than I do that there is a road for our long term salvation, but you can only control what you can control. So we have to increase fundraising, increase attendance, rebuild the roster and get ready for another season we can be proud of. But I’ll tell you this, for maybe the first time since P’s first season — I CAN’T WAIT!!!!!!!
So I had been to the bowls in Detroit and Charlotte and Toronto and Phoenix, but all of those included overnight stays. For many, including myself, this was the first commuter bowl. Met Fairfield County Fan in a commuter lot in Fairfield at 7:15, three hours later (despite a horrific early morning tie up on the MassPike shortly after 84 fed into it) we “pulled into” my prepurchased space. In quotes because it required fitting my car through an alley with less than a foot of clearance on each side, where some folks’ small trucks just wouldn’t have fit. Into the stadium around 10:40. I’ve been to Fenway twice before for baseball games. Yes, I get the history and the charm, but seriously? Seats were around where first base would be, at about the ten yard line on the side UConn scored the two second quarter TDs and I can forgive that they are angled for baseball. But I’m fairly sure there was no men’s room that didn’t require going up or down a floor, the food and beverage options were clearly insufficient for the number of people and if there was bowl merchandise for purchase I never saw it. But those are nits. The experience despite all this was great. While there were a few thousand Tar Heels and certainly some neutrals, at least 15k to 20k of the crowd had clearly come to pull for UConn. More than have been to many home games over the last few years. The 28k outdrew the previous high, with a Boston university, by a whopping 75% and almost sold the joint out. If the weather had been good that day maybe it would have sold out. And the weather, while requiring a drive through mist and rain the entire trip both ways, held dry for the game itself. And the UConn fans — at least a third of them — were standing the whole damn game. Maybe it was just how uncomfortable the seats were, but damn — we’re lucky at the Rent to get a small fraction of that amount up on defensive third downs. So while Fenway was underwhelming (the use of the baseball scoreboard for the football game was absurd — you didn’t see yardage posted most plays until the play was being run —It was an unbelievable showing by UConn nation, and one that minor bowls can’t help but notice. And yes, with more seats to fill you can bet that the Pinstripe will also figure out how to see what we can draw there one year. A great feeling.
What can you say about the team. But for covering kickoffs, they played close to perfect football for 37 minutes, until Freeman kicked the FG to put us up 27-7 almost halfway through the third quarter, and at that point it was basically over. What happened from there was pretty meaningless — we just tried to contain on defense, and kill clock with no turnovers on offense. We also used the last 23 to get a number of players onto the field who I don’t recall seeing materially, if at all, all season. But those 37 minutes — wow. The defense was just unbelievable. We had 24 points before UNC had a first down. At the half, first downs were 14 to 1, UConn, and we held them to less than 10 yards of rushing offense. Just an overwhelming defensive effort while it mattered, just like we saw a few times the first half of the season. The offense produced two long plays — the TD pass to Bell and Brown’s long run on the second play, but the entire half was totally mistake free and consistent. When given a short field or a defensive penalty, they took advantage almost every time. Just an amazing performance. Fagnano, for the year, was 20 TDs and 4 interceptions. Do people not understand how important and fantastic that ratio is? Does he have NFL level tools? Of course not. Was he thrilling to watch and making every play? Absolutely not. But he had a heck of a year, and the failure of everyone here to realize that is really unfair to the young man. One wonders if he would have been more respected staying as the back up QB. Sigh. The perfect half was marred only by allowing the one TD on special teams. It looked to me as if Malachi McLean was in the lane he ran though, and for some inexplicable reason abandoned his lane to take out a blocker closer to the sideline than the kick returner ever got. It was absolutely bizarre watching it unfold. Maybe he had an assignment he had to carry out and someone else was supposed to slide over, but it looked like he just lost himself. But it didn’t cost us, and I expect McLean who played the dime back all year to step into Dixon Williams shoes next year. But the bottom line is that this was the type of game where even singling out players is a waste of time. For 38 minutes or so, every player put on the field did his job and the result was just a fabulous team victory.
Finally, I want to talk about the season. Yes, I remember how awful Edsall II was. We went from the worst defensive team in the history of NCAA football (literally, not just figuratively) to taking a year off (that’s not on Edsall but didn’t play well for the program, even if it was helpful from a public health perspective) to a 1-11 season that was only that good because we got to play not one but two FCS opponents. But yesterday was not the cherry on the sundae — yesterday changed the narrative of the season. It was great that we followed last year — and this whole last terrible 15 years — with an 8-4 season, but most (5 of the 8) wins were competitive games, and with the exception of Buffalo — a good but not great MAC team — the wins were against really bad football teams. That’s no one’s fault — the players can only win the games on their schedule and the AD can’t predict how good teams will be in advance — but it was tempering in terms of wondering what we accomplished with the 8 wins. Because when we played our 4 games against P-4 teams, we lost competitive games to two fair teams, got blown out by a bad team and played a somewhat competitive game (yes, it was a one possession game inside the last two minutes but it felt like we could be put away whenever Syracuse wanted) against a good team. But the win against UNC — a team in the range of the Duke and Wake teams we couldn’t beat — changes the narrative entirely. And I don’t want to hear about their TB taking the day off or their QB getting hurt early in the game. Call a damn whambulance. No one cries for what we have to overcome as a program. With the monetary advantages UNC has over us, if they don’t have a backup TB and a backup QB good enough to keep playing at close to the same level, that’s on them, not us. So let me make it clear — with the win over a P-4 school, this was an outstanding year. Not just on the field, but on getting the fan base to start believing again. So kudos to coaches, players, administrators, donors and everyone else who contributed in any way to this effort. Great job all.
Now, in the new environment, the work is never done. We’re still in an awful spot as the only non-Notre Dame Indy left, scheduling is not going to get easier, and even if a door to the ACC opens that even without defections may not be a power conference much longer the way the post season is going, And we are being devastated by losses (mostly graduation) on D, where only Yates, BrInson and Chadwick return as starters. But one can’t, for the first time in forever, help but have confidence that the program is moving forward. I have more confidence that we’re moving forward than I do that there is a road for our long term salvation, but you can only control what you can control. So we have to increase fundraising, increase attendance, rebuild the roster and get ready for another season we can be proud of. But I’ll tell you this, for maybe the first time since P’s first season — I CAN’T WAIT!!!!!!!
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