UConn Football Spring Session Closed; Edsall Encouraged By Progress – Hartford Courant

Following the UConn football team's Blue-White Game Friday night at Rentschler Field, coach Randy Edsall was as he will continue to be reluctant to heap too much praise on players he's still getting to know, players he will always demand more from.

"I don't want to give them too much sugar," Edsall said. "You do that, they start getting fat."

With that said, and with fact that only so much can be accomplished through 14 practices at the Shenkman Training Center and a glorified one before fans in East Hartford, Edsall and the Huskies came out of the spring period encouraged by strides made.

For most of May, June and July, coaches and players will work separately. The onus is on players to improve their stock, and improve the team, by continuing to work independently on what the team worked toward collectively for the past month.

"Train hard, live right, be right," defensive lineman Foley Fatukasi said. "Hard work, and things will go our way."

The next time UConn returns to The Rent it will be to host Holy Cross in the season opener Aug. 31. The team reports for preseason camp July 27. By then, about 20 incoming freshmen will have arrived and this whole "REStorred" and "Edsall 2.0" project will be in full swing.

"The best compliment I can give Randy is he's a professional," athletic director David Benedict said at halftime Friday. "He's an experienced head coach, 17 years of head-coaching experience, and he's bringing all that to bear as he's putting together this program. As Randy said before, getting this program back to where it used to be is a process, and Randy is all about that process.

"I think he's got a great group of assistant coaches, and he's letting them coach. The difference between how Randy is managing the program vs. how it was being managed previously, it's different. You can do it both ways and be successful, but Randy is that true CEO head coach, and he allows his coordinators to direct their sides of the ball, and he is really focused on specific things."

Players are embracing what are drastically different alignments and responsibilities that come with Rhett Lashlee's up-tempo offense and Billy Crocker's 3-3-5 defense.

"We definitely made some strides," quarterback Bryant Shirreffs said. "There are a lot of areas where we need to get better. But [during spring], collectively, we got a lot better."

Edsall did single out a few players who impressed him either Friday night or throughout camp freshman receivers Keyion Dixon and Quayvon Skanes, and senior running back Arkeel Newsome.

Among defensive players, Edsall said, "One guy I thought has been really consistent is [senior linebacker] Junior Joseph. We've got to get him to be a little more vocal, bring a little more of a leadership presence. And [senior defensive lineman] Cole Ormsby he's got a toughness about him and kind of grew on me as we've gone through the spring. He's a physical guy and likes to be physical. There are guys who did some really good things. Now we have to get [other] guys to step up and make more things happen."

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UConn Football Spring Session Closed; Edsall Encouraged By Progress - Hartford Courant