No So Fast, My Friend!
The Story: The football team lost 38-3 to Indiana on Saturday afternoon, forcing us to break out in cold sweats as we realized the one-sided thumpings from a year ago may not be a thing of the past.
UNDER PRESSURE: Discussion of the game starts and ends with the performance of Jack Zergiotis, who went 14-for-28 for 90 yards and had an interception in his first road start. It was a vastly different performance than what he put up against Illinois two weeks earlier, and the freshman quarterback looked off all game; after one terribly overthrown pass in the second quarter, television cameras caught Randy Edsall screaming at Zergiotis to “settle down,” but he never did. He routinely missed open receivers, forced passes into coverage and never looked comfortable in the pocket — especially given how much his protection struggled. Steven Krajewski entered with 8:47 remaining, though Edsall said afterward that Zergiotis will remain the starter.
BIG NO-NOS: Two of Zergiotis’ most notable plays were negatives, and they’re things he’ll (hopefully) not do going forward. The first, late in the second quarter, involved the quarterback rolling out to his right, seeing Art Thompkins open over the middle and then throwing, off-balance, across his body to the running back, who made the catch for a loss of three yards. The second, early in the third quarter, was significantly more disastrous, with Zergiotis forced to his left after the pocket broke down from the inside. Rather than eating a sack, the right-handed quarterback tried to backhand a shovel pass left-handed, with the ball easily snatched by Indiana’s Cam Jones and returned 44 yards for a touchdown. “I went through my reads and at the last second, as I was being taken down, I saw Art,” Zergiotis said. “I tried to make a play out of it but sometimes, when you try to do too much, it doesn’t work out.”
HOW ABOUT SOME HELP? It was very curious that the coaching staff didn’t help Zergiotis more early on. What’s a better recipe for disaster than asking a true freshman quarterback, on the road for the first time, to throw the ball on 10 of his first 12 plays, spanning the first three drives and into the second quarter? It’s not as if the Huskies had some chumps in the backfield, either. Thompkins and Kevin Mensah were more than capable of moving the chains, though the running backs didn’t get a chance to really string together a few plays until late in the third quarter. By that point, the game was out of hand and the damage had been done. Thompkins finished with seven carries for 20 yards and Mensah had 10 attempts for 34 yards. As a team, UConn ran for just 51 yards, making that two consecutive weeks without a ground presence. (To his credit, Edsall said yesterday that establishing the run was part of the game plan, but they just … drifted away from it, we guess. He didn’t really elaborate.)
DEFENSE WAS … OK: It wasn’t the greatest performance from the Huskies’ defense, but even a below-average performance by the unit would be an improvement over last year’s standards. Notably absent was linebacker D.J. Morgan, who led UConn in tackles in each of his first two games but missed large stretches Saturday with a shoulder injury. The Huskies also lost safety Tyler Coyle and cornerback Tahj Herring-Wilson to injuries, and the second was notable because it led to the debut of Myles Bell, UConn’s top-rated recruit from its freshman class. All told, the Huskies surrendered 430 yards of total offense, went 0-for-5 in preventing scoring chances in the red zone and went 2-for-10 in stopping Indiana, led by its backup quarterback with its starter out, on third down. It was the group’s worst performance of the season, but … perspective.
WHAT DID EDSALL SAY? “After watching the film, we got whipped physically upfront. On offense, we couldn’t run the ball, couldn’t get anything established from that standpoint. We had some opportunities to make some plays and we didn’t. I thought some of our young guys, their first experience of going on the road, didn’t react the way I thought they would react. When you don’t get any big plays offensively, it’s hard to sustain things and we weren’t able to do that.”
THERE IS A POSITIVE: Despite the performance, the Huskies landed a commitment from Carter Hooper, a defensive end from Bradenton, Florida, who is originally from Toronto. Hooper. 6-foot-5 and 220 pounds, holds scholarship offers from Syracuse, FIU and UMass and is the third Canadian player in the Class of 2020 and the 11th player overall.
UP NEXT: If the Huskies thought facing Indiana on the road was tough, they’ve got another thing coming. They’ll head to Orlando to face No. 15 UCF on Saturday, though the Knights’ mystique has been tarnished as a late defeat at Pitt ended their 27-game regular-season winning streak. Hopefully, Edsall has his trick plays handy.
Schedule Out, Hurley Unhappy
The Story: The men’s basketball schedule was released on Friday and Dan Hurley wasn’t very happy about how the AAC portion broke down. What he is happy about? How about the conditioning of the team.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: Hurley doesn’t like playing Villanova during the middle of the season, isn’t happy opening up back-to-back road games in the AAC against Cincinnati and USF and doesn’t like non-conference home games on Sunday. Is that it?
Yes. There are some things Hurley does like as he watched workouts in preparation for the opening of practice. The Huskies are in shape and leaner and, hopefully, meaner than last year’s edition.
THE PRESS RETURNS? Hurley wants to play uptempo with full-court pressing. At the beginning of last year, that’s what we saw from the Huskies. As the season wore on, however, Hurley had to tone down the pressing due to the fact there was little depth. UConn wants to go at teams in waves, and with more athleticism, more depth and better conditioning, we expect the team to play more as Hurley desires.
HOW LONG DOES GILBERT HAVE LEFT? Alterique Gilbert is a senior, but he is likely to have several years of eligibility remaining because he missed two years with injuries. If Gilbert wants, he can return next year because he would be given a medical redshirt for his first season. He also has a good case for a sixth year due to a medical hardship. That doesn’t mean Gilbert is going to stick around. He is approaching this season as his senior year. He will then make a decision whether to return, go professional or even transfer at the end of the year if he graduates.
BIG RECRUITING WEEKEND: The Huskies hosted small forward Andre Jackson from Albany Academy for an official visit this weekend. Jackson is an athletic 6-foot-6 top-100 recruit who has now visited the Huskies twice. He is also slated to go to Iowa on a visit and has Syracuse, UCLA, and Maryland in the mix.
Morning Reads
FIELD HOCKEY STUNS PRINCETON: No. 4 UConn knocked off No. 6 Princeton 2-1 in overtime on Sunday. Svea Boker knocked in the game-winner for the Huskies (7-1), who have defeated six ranked teams already this season. (UConnHuskies.com)
TRULY UNBELIEVABLE: An absolutely stunning overtime goal by Kess Elmore gave the women’s soccer team a 2-1 victory at UMass-Lowell on Saturday night. (UConnHuskies.com)
A HOME HEARTBREAKER: The men’s soccer team lost 3-2 to previously winless Columbia at Dillon Stadium on Friday night despite yet another goal from Jordan Hall. (UConnHuskies.com)
WHAT A POUNDING: The women’s volleyball team (6-6) won all three matches at the Dog Pound Invitational at Gampel Pavilion, beating Holy Cross, Dartmouth and Providence over the weekend. (UConnHuskies.com)
