UConn, AAC shooting for the moon

NEWPORT, R.I. — On a day when he introduced Shakespeare and Moses, commissioner Mike Aresco decided to conclude his speech with JFK at American Athletic Conference football media day.

With UConn leaving for the Big East, many will miss the lobsters during the annual trek to Newport. Me? I’m going to miss Aresco’s fantastic, buttery dips into human history.

“We now stand on the precipice of the next step,” Aresco said Tuesday morning. “Wide acceptance as a P6 conference and entry into the autonomous group of five. We’re much more like them than different and they know it. Moses did not send down a tablet with ‘P5’ written on it.”

True enough. Still, I’m willing to bet that no one is going to find the burning bush in Greenville, N.C.

OK, enough biblical. Let’s go lunar.

“Just as President Kennedy said we wanted to reach the moon not because it was easy, but because it was hard,” Aresco said of his conference’s aspirations to land among the elite of football. “Fifty years ago, we landed men on the moon. Today is the anniversary of the actual launch.”

The lunar surface is probably a good place to start, because many observers believe UConn has the same chance of having success as an independent program as the man on the moon.

Becoming more like BYU than UMass? Sure. And the moon is made of Swiss cheese.

So what do you say to people who count out your program, Randy Edsall? Who say that a move to becoming an independent demonstrates UConn has given up on football?

“You don’t really say anything,” Edsall said. “There’s no sense to speak. I’m more of a ‘show you.’ Actions speak louder

than words. And that’s what we have to do. Nobody knows what we’re trying to do with the program and how I feel. I’m the coach. I own it. There’s nobody that knows more what has to be done with the program and how it should be built than myself. Maybe when I was younger I’d say something different to you. But there’s nothing to say other than, hey, we’ve just got to shut up and do our work, go do hopefully what we need to do. Then you look at people and …”

Edsall broke into a big smile.

It was an “I told you so” smile.

We haven’t seen Edsall smile much since he returned to UConn. The Huskies were 39 in 2017 and the 111 campaign last year was among the worst in major college football history. The one W was a squeaker against FCS Rhode Island and the defensive numbers were epically bad.

So what do you say to people who count out your program, David Benedict?

“I’d say two things,” UConn’s athletic director said. “We were voted to be in last place in our division this year. Regardless of where we go, we’re in a challenging situation. We’re trying to rebuild our program. We’re challenged regardless. We’ve got a chip on our shoulder. That’s probably the way UConn football is. Even when we were success that’s the mentality of our program.

“I got a little fired up in New York (at the Big East announcement) when people asked that question, maybe in a little different way. I just don’t understand that mentality. I don’t understand where people are coming from … Is every program not in the American or in a Power Five conference dead? What are they playing for? We’re going to play football. We’re going to put our best foot forward as far as putting schedules together and being a competitively successful program.”

Benedict pointed to West

Point as an example of recent independent success.

“Army has gone through a little bit of an evolution the last five years,” he said. “I’m a good friend of Boo Corrigan, the (former AD) who really helped guide that program. They were 102 last year in the regular season and beat Navy and beat Houston (in a bowl game). I think you can do it a lot of different ways.”

UConn wants to be out of the AAC by July of 2020. The AAC bylaws call for 27 months’ notice and a $10 million exit fee. It figures to cost UConn another few million to leave earlier, a number still to be negotiated. There is no indication that the AAC would allow UConn to remain as a football only.

“David and I have a great relationship,” Aresco said. “He’s a friend.

“Everybody in these situations would like to get it done sooner than later. You have to make plans. It’s that simple. We want to get this thing done as amicably and efficiently as possible.”

And Benedict?

“I’m always optimistic,” he said.

Aresco said the AAC is in no rush to replace UConn and has consulted the Big Ten on how it ran its league for years after Penn State joined as an 11th team. Two permanent opponents, six rotating teams, etc. He also would petition the NCAA for a league championship game. Yes, you’re supposed to have 12 teams, yet everyone in the college community would also appreciate the AAC not stealing another league’s school.

The path is not nearly as neat for UConn. With a couple of weeks to prepare, Edsall did have his answers ready for questions on leaving the AAC.

His only concern is 2019 and the opener against Wagner. He answered a halfdozen opening questions essentially the same way. Later, he would open up more.

“Since I’ve come back, we’ve had adversity,” Edsall said. “I’ve had adversity with my son (Corey’s hiring and the state ethics debacle), with what’s going on now. You ain’t

going to get me. I’ll tell you that. You ain’t going to get these guys. We’re better than that. We’re bigger than that. We’re tougher than that. What I’ve got to do is make sure I’m doing the right things. They’ll follow my lead. Been there. Done it. Wasn’t all peaches and cream my first time around. We’re just worried about what we control, what I can control.”

Benedict called the future scheduling a big puzzle. He said he has had a ton of conversations. He has leaned on people who have had experience in such matters. He said you’d be surprised at the quality opponents that can be lined up. Conference affiliations mean opponents are more available in September than October and November, yet he pointed to how television outlets are looking to spread out nonconference games more. He pointed to SNY, which already has expressed an interest in UConn football.

“We’re excited about the future,” Benedict said.

This is media day. Of course, everyone is excited about the future. Or at

least they all say they are. Some of it is manonthemoon talk.

Still, what about this? What if we said UConn football was so horrifyingly awful last year and there is so little interest in the AAC in Connecticut that it can’t possibly get worse? What if we said, hey, maybe UConn wins some games this year and some more next year. What if we said maybe the Huskies put together a fairly attractive annual independent schedule, including a lucrative “buy” game like the one coming with Clemson every year, to help with red ink. And they didn’t always lose more than they won?

If that’s the case, the crown jewels of basketball would be safe in the Big East and, years from now, Mike Aresco wouldn’t be talking about UConn football as if it were the T. rex, the Roman Empire and the lost continent of Atlantis. Just a thought.

The summer moon is out.