UConn hits new low with loss to Crusaders
The UConn football team, flailing in quicksand for several years, sunk like a stone Saturday with an indefensible loss to Holy Cross.
It was, perhaps, rock bottom for the Huskies’ entire woebegone production. Then again, they play Nov. 13 at Clemson, a situation with potential to become as ugly as Saturday’s was miserable.
For now, this is the lowest of lows for a once successful and now totally lost program.
After opting out of the 2020 season due to COVID-19 complications, UConn reentered the college football world last week and was demolished at Fresno State, 45-0.
Losing to Holy Cross was worse, and one must wonder about the fallout — whether it’s a collection of players now totally demoralized, or the clock ticking on a coach’s second tenure at the school. Losses like Saturday’s, injected into an already borderline hopeless situation, tend to have repercussions.
Randy Edsall is now 6-32 since returning to UConn in 2017, a season that began with a narrow 27-20 victory over Holy Cross. Four years later, the Crusaders, of the lower level Football Championship Subdivision, were back and ultimately celebrating their first victory over a Football Bowl Subdivision team in 19 years.
The bus ride back to Worcester must have been a party.
The postgame scene for UConn had the feel of a funeral.
“I would say that I’m disappointed,” Edsall said. “I thought we would be able to do a little bit more than we we’re doing. … I’ve got to try to do more, myself. I’ve got to try to do more, myself.”
Sophomore linebacker Jackson Mitchell, of Ridgefield, said everybody is angry.
“Also, it’s embarrassing any time someone comes to your field and they dance in the middle of your field after they beat you,” Mitchell said. “Yeah, I would consider that embarrassing.”
Purdue, of the Big Ten, visits Rentschler Field next Saturday, an occasion that was supposed to mark something of an opportunity, even a partial turnaround for UConn. With the program’s work taking place behind the scenes for 21 months, the Huskies entered this season actually encouraged and confident.
The plan — the expectation — was to play well at Fresno State, perhaps pull off an upset against an unsuspecting host, blow the doors off Holy Cross and move onto Purdue having shown that the laughingstock days are over.
The laugh track is on loop. And it is blaring.
The situation is simple. The coaches haven’t been good enough and the players haven’t been good enough. There has been no evidence of progress discussed for well over a year. UConn might be bigger, faster and stronger than it was in 2019. It might not be. It certainly is not as big, not as fast, not as strong and not as good as its opponents, even Saturday’s FCS opponent.
Zergiotis is erratic, sloppy. The lines — offensive and defensive — have serious issues. UConn doesn’t tackle well. Mental mistakes pile up.
These are Edsall’s recruits. This is his team. These are his game plans. These are his results.
Edsall was certainly the right man for the job during his first stint at UConn. One must wonder now how long the university can continue to hope his approach this time around will gain traction. He signed a contract extension Jan. 15 through the 2023 season and is making $1.26 million this season.
There are certain games built into schedules that teams have no business losing. This was one of them.
UConn didn’t lose because of a few fluky plays. It was weaker where games are almost always won and lost, at scrimmage. Holy Cross had the better, tougher, linemen. Holy Cross had the better quarterback. Holy Cross had the better team.
The Crusaders gained 363 yards (226 rushing) to UConn’s 262 and the way they sealed the victory was almost farcical, with quarterback Matthew Sluka scrambling for 76 yards to set up the final touchdown, and establish the final score, with 8:19 remaining.
Jack Zergiotis, UConn’s quarterback, was 17 of 41 for 174 yards, three touchdowns and three interceptions — two that followed Holy Cross’ aforementioned score. He was also stripped for a turnover with UConn trailing 24-21 in the third quarter. Afterward, holding a brief press conference in a nearlyempty field-level room, Zergiotis looked like he might to be carried out of the stadium, so emotionally beaten down.
“I just wasn’t as good as I should have been,” Zergiotis said. “That’s it. You know what I mean?”
UConn had managed to avoid losing FCS games throughout its slide over the past decade, but those victories, as much as any loss, tended to describe the direction of the program. The Huskies haven’t had a breezy, built-in victory against a lower-level opponent that it pays hundreds of thousands of dollars in considerable time.
They crushed Fordham 35-3 in 2011 — the season that followed a Fiesta Bowl appearance, and Edsall’s disappearance to Maryland — then UMass, a team having just transitioned out of FCS, 37-0 in 2012.
Since: A 33-18 loss to Towson in 2013, a season during which then-athletic director Warde Manuel fired Paul Pasqualoni; a 19-6 victory over Stony Brook in 2014; A 20-15 over Villanova in 2015; a 24-21 victory over Maine in 2016; a 27-20 victory over Holy Cross in 2017, a game that relied on a late surge led by quarterback Bryant Shirreffs, after he replaced David Pindell; a 56-49 victory over Rhode Island in 2018, sealed with a sack by Eli Thomas as time expired, URI having reached the UConn 18 yard line; a 24-21 victory over Wagner.
And now, this.
“We have people in place,” Edsall said, noting that he’ll consider personnel changes, at quarterback and beyond, and schematic changes.
There are program-changing wins and program-changing losses.
Saturday, the first home game in 652 days, might have been a program-changing loss.
The announced crowd was 18,782, which includes student tickets scanned and tickets distributed to the general public. The total number of tickets scanned at the game — the actual amount of fans in the building — was not immediately available but tends to be far less than the announced figure.
Who among those in attendance would be inspired to return next week for Purdue? It’s fair to ask. Also fair: Can UConn beat UMass? Yale? Anyone?
Saturday was the clearest sign yet that UConn football hasn’t gotten better.
It was rock bottom. For now.