A few more notes from a long day at the Burton Family Football Complex and its neighbor to the north Gampel Pavilon:
– UConn coach Randy Edsall had plenty of praise for senior RB Andre Dixon. And the New Brunswick, N.J., native made it clear the feeling was mutual.
“Coach is like a coach, a father, a brother, all of that in one person,” Dixon said.
Edsall has given Dixon plenty of chances to succeed, especially after his DUI arrest one year ago. The now 23-year-old Dixon thought his career was over more than once.
“When I was getting into trouble, making some mistakes or whatever, I thought I jeopardized my career, definitely,” Dixon said.
And if Donald Brown hadn’t left early for the NFL, Dixon might have left the program on his own.
“That’s a question that continues to float,” Dixon said.
“It didn’t seem for a second that Donald was going to slow down at all,” Dixon said. “It probably would have been the best bet, if I wanted to continue to play football, to go somewhere else. But who knows?”
Now Dixon has a shot at joining Brown in the NFL.
“He’s going to graduate in December. He’s going to have an opportunity to play at the next level. He’s going to be playing in one of the all-star games,” Edsall said.
– WR Marcus Easley will play his final home game on Saturday. But because Easley’s football career didn’t begin until his sophomore year of college, the Bunnell High product thought for a second he had more eligibility.
“He was asking coach Sos (wide receivers coach Matt Cersosimo) ‘Are you sure I don’t have any more time left here? I didn’t play my first year,’ ” Edsall said. “He wants to come back. But when I saw him I said ‘Marcus, we’d love to have you back but you’re going have a chance to go on and do some bigger and better things.’ ”
– Scott Lutrus’ move to middle linebacker really doesn’t seem like that big a deal. He’s played there before and doesn’t seem too stressed about the switch.
“I’m sure coach (Todd) Orlando will be on me to make sure I get it right,” Lutrus said. “I’m not too worried.”
– It should be cold Saturday night at Rentschler Field and it might even snow. Is that a big advantage for the Huskies?
Maybe, but some of them (like perhaps all of the Bulls) haven’t played a game in the snow, either.
“I heard it might snow. That will be kind of interesting; I’ve never played a game in the snow before,” quarterback Zach Frazer said. “I’m sure it could be tough coming from one climate to another.”
– While doing a story on OT Mike Hicks for later this week, we had a chance to ask a number of the other players about Hicks. Frazer had a good answer.
“The first time I came in and saw Mike Hicks I said ‘Oh look, it’s Charlie Weis,’ ” Frazer said.
- Neill
