When I spoke with Massachusetts coach Charley Molnar earlier this season, I thought he was crazy. Out of his mind. Bonkers, if you will.
His plan was to take one of the country’s best Football Championship Subdivision programs and mold it into a competitive, middle-of-the-pack Football Bowl Subdivision team. He was going to do so by playing top-level talent on the nation’s most prominent stages — Michigan this year and Wisconsin, Penn State and Notre Dame over the next three seasons — with talent that was largely not sought after. His players would be tough and decisive because they would have to be simply to compete.
I looked at him with a skeptic’s eye, overflowing with doubt. Six games later, he’s made me a believer in UMass’ football program.
The masses disagree. One online formula deems UMass as the third-worst team in the nation. Another says the Minutemen are the country’s most pathetic team.
Even their website provides evidence that there’s nothing to be proud of in Amherst, Mass. An announced tally of less than 25,000 turned out for UMass’ first two “home” games at Gillette Stadium, and 45 minutes before its game against Ohio Saturday, I counted 54 people in the stands from my seat in the press box.
So though I was one of few first-hand witnesses to the foundation of something good, as the Minutemen make their rounds through their Mid-American Conference schedule for the first time, I think they’ll turn some heads — or, in other words, spoil an opponent’s weekend once or twice.
UMass’ track record early this season far from supports my point. In their first FBS game, they accumulated only 62 yards of total offense in a shutout loss to Connecticut.
Saturday, it took UMass less than four minutes of possession to eclipse their first-game total. It’s safe to say the team is on the uptick.
“I give a lot of credit for them coming out and fighting,” said Ohio redshirt junior quarterback Tyler Tettleton, who passed for 229 yards against the Minutemen, his second-lowest total of the season. “They’re going to be good here in a couple years.”
Yes, they are. Mike Wegzyn, the Minutemen’s quarterback and offensive kingpin, is a redshirt freshman. Almost 44 percent of players that have earned a start for UMass this season are redshirt sophomores or younger.
Ohio coach Frank Solich said that following Ohio’s win against UMass he expected a hardnosed affair.
“We thought going in that it would be a typical MAC ball game where we would have to line up and really earn the win,” he said.
Ohio walked away with just that — a close, tense victory that left fans’ blood pumping a bit more than many anticipated. Although Molnar was yet to scratch his first MAC win in the record books, the game’s result was a little triumph for him and his team.
“I’m here to win every game that I coach here in 2012,” Molnar told me during the preseason. “Yes, I’ll have an eye toward the future like every head football coach does and should (do), but certainly I’m trying to win in the now.”
The victories might come slow for the Minutemen now, but as time wears on, missed chances will turn to conversions and skeptics will turn to advocates.
Sometimes it doesn’t hurt to be a little crazy.
Jim Ryan is a sophomore studying journalism and assistant sports editor for The Post. Were you unimpressed by UMass’ Saturday performance? Let him know at jr992810@ohiou.edu.
