While UConn might be/is the worst team in major college football, they lead the country in one category: Drama.
Move aside, LSU. See ya later, Nebraska. There's a new sheriff in town, and it's the Huskies. That's because after an embarrassing 0-2 start - low-lighted by a 10-point loss to FCS school Holy Cross - head coach Randy Edsall announced that he would retire at the end of the year.
Then, less than 24 hours later, he announced that he would leave, effective immediately.
That news rubbed a lot of people the wrong way (including yours truly, we'll get to that in a minute) including one prominent Connecticut citizen: Ahh, the governor of the state, Ned Lamont.
On Tuesday, Lamont was asked about Edsall's decision to leave just two games into the season, abandoning a locker full of 85 guys in the process.
Lamont did not hold back:
“Look if you don’t want to coach for the rest of the season, it’s probably time to leave,” Lamont said, with the quote coming via the New Haven Register. “[Players] need somebody who believes in them and they believe in that coach, and they’re ready to fight their hearts out for the rest of the season.”
MY. GOODNESS.
Understand that Lamont speaks for a lot of people in the state of Connecticut, who were frustrated with not only the state of the program, but also how Edsall's departure was handled. Sure, there is an argument that if you were going to force him to retire (aka fire him) two games into the season, you probably should have just made a coaching change last off-season. At the same time, who could have imagined this team - which didn't play last season, and spent the whole year training - would look this bad?
Seriously, how does an FBS team - with 85 scholarship players - lose by double-digits to an FCS team? And not even a good one. Their opponent Holy Cross, wasn't even ranked in the FCS Top 25.
And really, that's the frustrating part for just about anyone who supports this program. Edsall pushed harder than anyone to cancel last season, claiming that it would help the program long-term. Seriously, he said that.
Now, he quit just two games in, essentially robbing his players - players he supposedly cares about - of two full seasons of their collegiate careers.
What will be interesting now, is two things:
One, will the team rally now that Edsall is gone? They are over a 30-point underdog to Purdue this weekend, so oddsmakers certainly don't think so. At the same time, you can probably expect the best effort of the season from UConn this weekend.
Two, it will be interesting to see who UConn gets next. As I discussed on today's Aaron Torres Podcast (which you can listen to below), UConn is far from a desirable job. But at the same time, it's far from the worst job in the FBS either. It's a state school with good facilities that pays well, and regularly gets Power Five teams into their home stadium (the Purdue game this weekend is a home game for the Huskies). Is the job Ohio State or Alabama? Not even in the same stratosphere. But is it better than a lot of Group of Five jobs? It is.
Regardless Edsall is gone and everyone seems happy.
Including the governor of Connecticut.
Listen to my reaction to Edsall's firing at the end of today's Aaron Torres Podcast.