Edsall's handled a season of tragedy and tribulation with grace

East Hartford

His team, most likely, earned a victory Saturday that will extend the season, into a bowl game for the third straight year. And while the occasional sourpuss mocks the glut of college football bowls, the opportunity to play another game somewhere against a decent enough opponent beats the alternative.

And that, ultimately, is the yardstick for Randy Edsall. For every coach. Are they winning games or not? Winning frames everything else. Winning marries success with character, forever mutually exclusive, but absurdly linked.

Winning, to some, might make Randy Edsall a better coach.

But this season, more than any other, has shown us an intensely human side to football, a level of humanity we've never experienced amid the usual rhythms of bubble screens, Tampa Twos and blocks in the back. And it has been a privilege to chronicle the other side of football with Edsall setting model examples of direction, compassion, and decorum.

It began last month when Edsall became the public face of Jasper Howard's death. The state saw a strong, compassionate, steadfast man who understood that his players would grieve differently. It was a very public mourning. Edsall's demeanor offered comfort and strength and hope. He became someone with whom parents of prospective players should have become instantly comfortable. Why would you not want your kid to play for him?

But as it has been suggested, character is doing what's right when nobody else is looking.

And while 40,000 fans and a television audience looked at Edsall's on-field accomplishment on Saturday, his off-field accomplishment was more noteworthy.

When nobody was looking earlier this week, Edsall called Ledyard High School football coach Jim Buonocore. Edsall had just learned of Ledyard junior Matt Buriak's death and instantly identified with the pain.

Matt Buriak's funeral was Saturday, while UConn's game against Syracuse proceeded.

Edsall's words, and his decision to send senior lineman Zach Hurd of Waterford to address the Colonels the night before the Thanksgiving game, helped the grieving process for high school kids with no frame of reference to tragedy.

Edsall didn't merely call Buonocore. He spoke to Ledyard athletic director Peter Vincent, too. Vincent and his family had barely returned from South Bend the previous weekend, awestruck by the experience.

And now Edsall was on the home phone.

Edsall had a game to worry about, one on which the postseason hinged.

"I was a UConn fan before and I'm a bigger one now," Buonocore said. "What a class act. To allow Zach to miss film study and speak to us … to hear someone who has been through the same emotional roller coaster, his message was phenomenal."

Hurd's mother, Susan, is close friends with Roberta Buriak, Matt's mother. His speech to the team was deeply personal.

"I knew Matt. He's been (to Rentschler Field) to see me play," Hurd said after Saturday's 56-31 win over Syracuse. "Whenever I'd go see my mom at work, Roberta was there. I felt like I had to be there at Ledyard. They could relate to me and I'm local."

Hurd's mother knew of Matt Buriak's collapse at last Saturday's Ledyard/Fitch junior varsity game. But she didn't tell her son until after the day after the Huskies won at Notre Dame.

"It was really difficult," Hurd said. "But coach Buonocore coached me in (the Connecticut-Rhode Island Governor's Cup) all-star game. Great guy, great coach. After what happened to us with Jasper's death, I thought I needed to be there."

Quite an impressive group of people representing the football team at State U, no?

Edsall's team, by the way, has become quite entertaining to watch. Gone are the days when we'd second guess the play calling, why they run too much, don't throw a lot and never score enough. In the last three games - Cincinnati, Notre Dame, Syracuse - UConn has scored 45, 33 and 56 points.

It's been a long, sometimes painful, road to bowl eligibility. But the Huskies are there, earning the kind of success on the field they've achieved off it.

"It's been real long and real hard," Edsall said. "But I'm so proud."

That's a sentiment to be shared with everybody rooting for him and his team.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro.