Storrs — Billy Crocker could bang his head against the wall in frustration. He could flip over a water jug on the sideline or scream until his head explodes.

But Crocker has been around far too long to react that way.

Even though the UConn defensive coordinator might be tempted to act out after watching his inexperienced, overmatched defense get shredded by two nationally-ranked teams, Crocker knows only time, experience and more talent will cure his unit's issues.

Crocker, a Waterford native in his second year at UConn, is preaching patience, something that the fiercely competitive coach admits is hard for him to have sometimes.

"You're in this profession long enough, you're going to go through hard times," Crocker said on Wednesday. "I've been blessed to have not gone through many in my career. This is obviously the most challenging that I've been through. Everyone is in it together."

"... It is what it is. Are we all happy with the results so far? Absolutely not. Is it acceptable? Absolutely not. But, you've got to stay the course. ... And you've got to keep trying to get better."

In the meantime, Crocker will do his part to try to speed up the growth process during the program's massive rebuild while coaching the youngest defensive unit that he's ever worked with.

As many as eight true or redshirt freshmen could start Saturday against Rhode Island at Rentschler Field in East Hartford (noon, SNY). The other three starters will likely be redshirt sophomores.

Crocker's focus is on development, not game results.

There's no shortcut to success.

"I'm not going to say anything that's going to be earth-shattering," he said. "We've just got to continue to get better with these young kids. Last game (at Boise State) was a perfect mixture of them being really good and them doing a lot in terms of changing the picture. When the picture changes on our guys as young as they are, they struggle with it. We've just got to get better with that."

"... We just want to see progress each week. To me whatever the outcome is going to be is going to be the outcome because that's going to happen in all three phases of the football game."

UConn had the misfortune of playing the best two teams on its schedule to begin the season and paid the price.

Central Florida and Boise State, currently No. 18 and 17, respectively, scored basically at will against the Huskies, who had a serious speed, talent and experience disadvantage in the two lopsided losses.

The Huskies are last in the nation in scoring defense (59.0), total defense (735 yards per game) and rushing defense (348 yards). They're 126th out of 128 FBS teams in passing yards allowed (387). They've given up a staggering 9.9 yards per play and not yet registered a sack or forced a turnover.

Opponents have converted 15 of 20 third down conversions and 2 for 2 on fourth down.

All staggering numbers.

Just two years ago, as defensive coordinator at Villanova, Crocker's unit led the nation in points allowed (15.0 per game) and total defense (259.9 yards) on the FCS level.

So how does Crocker keep his sanity during hard times?

"I talk to a lot of people," Crocker said with a laugh. "I talk to a lot of people at home, friends that I have in this profession to just keep you grounded and remember what you've done and keep your confidence up. That's important for us as coaches to keep our confidence up so these young guys can continue to have in themselves."

Crocker also spends time talking to his young Huskies, sometimes putting his arm around them and sometimes giving them a motivational kick in the backside.

The latter was the case during Tuesday's practice when the fiery Crocker "cut loose a little bit." He wants his Huskies to play harder and more physical.

"It's a day by day thing," Crocker said. "If you've got to get on them, you've got to make sure you hug them up afterward, or whatever it may be. And each kid is different."

As long as his defense is giving maximum effort, Crocker can live with some mistakes. But only the right kind of mistakes.

"The allowable ones are if they are doing the right thing and just flat out get beat, then they get beat," Crocker said. "That's going to come down to a talent thing or maybe a small technique thing. But just not doing the right thing, those are the ones that we want to eliminate."

The coaching staff made a few changes to defensive depth chart for the Rhode Island game.

Freshman Jeremy Lucien is the new starting cornerback while redshirt sophomore linebacker Eddie Hahn will make his first start this season. Sophomore Darrian Beavers switched from linebacker to back-up defensive end. If sophomore Omar Fortt (concussion) is unable to play, freshman Oneil Robinson, a former Capital/Achievement First standout, is expected to start at safety.

"We're not looking for heroes," Crocker said. "We're not looking for guys to be overly spectacular. We're looking for guys to just go out and do there job. If we can get 11 guys to do their job, we will be  in better shape."

g.keefe@theday.com